Serial Killers & Abortionists: Psychological parallels

The subtitle of the 2018 film Gosnell is "The Untold Story of America's Most Prolific Serial Killer." This is more than just a description of someone who took multiple lives. When one compares some of the common psychological and other characteristics of serial killers and supporters of abortion, one finds ominous parallels.

DEHUMANIZATION OF VICTIM

Compartmentalization is aided by another universal process: the capacity of human beings to dehumanize “the other” by regarding outsiders as animals or demons who are therefore expendable. Serial killers have taken advantage of this process in the selection of their victims: They often view prostitutes as mere sex machines, gays as AIDS carriers, nursing home patients as vegetables, and homeless alcoholics as nothing more than trash. By regarding their victims as subhuman elements of society, the killers can delude themselves into believing that they are doing something positive rather than negative. They are, in their minds, ridding the world of filth and evil. (Serial Murder and the Psychology of Violent Crimes, 2008)

Dehumanization of victims was something the writers of the 1991 film The Silence of the Lambs incorporated into the character of the killer, who was based on several real serial killers, when he referred to his victims as "it."

Likewise, proponents of abortion avoid confronting the humanity of the enwombed victim. As made well-known by the 2019 film Unplanned, when the enwombed infant is dismembered, he/she is "reassembled" for inventory in a room referencing not "human" remains, but rather, "products of conception."

A defender of her days as an abortion counselor declared, "fetuses are not people," and "It is not a baby. It is medical waste." and

While it was shaped like a baby, what I was looking at was not a person. It was a fetus. A fetus my patient had chosen not to make into a baby." (Rewire News)

Activists at abortion rallies have been seen with signage referring to the enwombed as "parasites," paralleling the serial killer's reframing of their victims as some type of "filth and evil."

EUPHEMISMS
Related to dehumanization is euphemistic language. I reviewed a number of other euphemisms used by supporters of abortion in my review of Unplanned. Though euphemisms are common to political issues of all sorts, these are specifically designed to avoid confronting the humanity of the victim. Not one of the abortion industry's euphemisms, such as:

• Planned Parenthood
• Anti-choice
• Tissue
• Products of conception
• Reproductive health
• Her body

or a host of other diversionary terms directly confront the humanity of the enwombed.

Notice also how referring to the baby as "waste" and abortion as "healthcare" aligns with the serial killer's delusion that he is "ridding the world of filth and evil."

In March, Georgia House member Stacey Abrams used the euphemism "forced pregnancy" to describe a bill against abortion. Notice how the term avoids the humanity of the victim, as does the language of the serial killer. Diverting the matter to a "pregnancy," something the mother undergoes, or calling abortion "healthcare," etc., is to use "sanitizing language," which makes the idea of abortion more easily digestible for its proponents. (And, nevermind that the women in question are already pregnant. Saying "forced pregnancy" is like saying that the prohibition of all murder is "forced parenthood" to the victim's parents.)

Kermit Gosnell, the now-imprisoned abortionist featured in the 2018 Gosnell film, said in the 1960s, he pushed for "the liberalization of the performance of therapeutic abortions." He likewise touted  his work in abortion, saying, "I provide the same care I would want my daughter to receive and I feel I fulfill that standard." And, a reporter quoted him as saying, "my work to the community is of value."

Like the attitude of the serial killer thinking he is "doing something positive," phrases that describe abortion as "healthcare," or as "therapeutic," or as opposition to "forced pregnancy," are all euphemisms designed to delude one to believe he is committing some act of heroism by killing the enwombed.

HIDING/OBSCURING THE VICTIM'S IDENTITY
Related to both of the prior categories is the serial killer's and the pro-abortionist's desire to conceal the identity of the victim. Some serial killers conceal the face of the victim:

[D]epersonalization of the body...refers to actions taken to obscure the identity of the victim, as through mutilation or covering of the face. (Handbook of Psychological Approaches with Violent Offenders, 1999) 

However, in cases of sexual or lust murder, the victim's face may be covered in order to dehumanize or depersonalize the victim. (Serial Murder and the Psychology of Violent Crimes, 2008)

The notorious "Jack the Ripper" was famously known to target faces in his attacks, especially disfiguring the faces of his last two victims.

Planned Parenthood openly decries the notion that a mother should see her baby via a "mandatory ultrasound." Young women have been denied by Planned Parenthood their request to see their baby in an ultrasound. Planned Parenthood has also refused to even perform an ultrasound unless the mother is "terminating"—per another of their euphemisms.

This aversion to ultrasounds is confirmed by former employees. For example, ex-Planned Parenthood worker Patricia Sandoval described how she was taught the following:

So the most important thing here [at Planned Parenthood] is that when we do the ultrasounds before their abortions, you never ever let the woman see the screen. If she wants to see that ultrasound, that screen has to face the doctor, never the patient. I don’t care if she cries. I don't care if she’s screaming. [She] never sees that ultrasound. (Patricia Sandoval - Testimony on Abortion)

The ACLU also fights regularly against women seeing their ultrasounds prior to abortion.

Pro-life campaigns like "Face the Truth", which show photos of aborted babies to the public, have likewise been met with hostility by abortion supporters. It is another attempt to conceal the identity of the victim.

Among serial killers and pro-abortionists, there exists a psychology that avoids looking upon the victim.

SELLING THE BODIES FOR SCIENCE
Selling the bodies and body parts of victims is more common among abortionists, but known to happen among serial killers. We learned of the abortion industry's body part sales in recent years via first-hand video conducted by the Center for Medical Progress. In harmony with the serial killer's delusion that they are "doing something positive" when killing, we see another mental justification used by abortionists—that the body parts will go toward medical studies. Consider the following serial killer cases involving sale of body parts and using victims for medical study.

• Notorious Chicago serial killer H.H. Holmes "sold several of his victims' skeletons and organs to medical schools."
• Victims of the Burke and Hare murders were sold to physician Robert Knox for use in anatomy lectures.
• Nazi scientists testified that their murder was justified because they derived use by medically studying the victims.

CONCLUSIONS
The preceding parallels are not merely ordinary characteristics native to ordinary folk. The characteristics described are, in a sense, essential to the psychological justifications of both serial killers and pro-abortionists.

For those whose hearts may be stung by the pain of abortion, there are many resources available, such as at AbbyJohnson, LiveAction, or Waterleaf.

Takeaways from Unplanned movie

One of the first sentiments I had after viewing the film Unplanned was the same as my opening remarks last October about the film Gosnell: the scariest moment perhaps "is when one realizes how protected the abortion industry is."

Let's review that and several other takeaways from the film. I will keep spoilers at a minimum.

Still from the movie Unplanned (2019). Obtained from unplannedfilm.com.

AN IMPORTANT FILM
Unplanned is an important insider look at the machinations of Planned Parenthood and the abortion industry on which it thrives. The film is based on the actual life of Abby Johnson, whose name is very familiar to Catholics and the pro-life industry. Her perspective as an acclaimed and former director of Planned Parenthood has inspired many. The film's epilogue notes how Johnson's organization And Then There Were None has provided resources for and helped lead over 500 workers to discover the truth about Planned Parenthood and subsequently abandon it.

Planned Parenthood's business model is evident in the film. Abortions collect the largest margin of any product or "service" they offer. That means the difference in the amount an abortion costs them versus what they charge typically vulnerable women and girls is a larger dollar amount than anything else they offer. The description of this business model in the film is evidenced by the facts.

The film draws attention to Planned Parenthood publicly claiming they desire abortion to be "rare." Yet, as Abby Johnson and others have revealed, Planned Parenthood issues awards for increasing abortion productivity. This is hardly the organization's only lie.

Although the film does not delve into it, Planned Parenthood's long list of lies includes denial that they cover up child sex abuse, and denial that they sell baby body parts and have altered abortion procedures in order to procure specific parts.

The film does involve more than one bloody scene, including a dramatic abortion. The film received an R rating, which seems excessive, considering bloodier films without pro-life messages are given lesser ratings. However, the film's co-director Chuck Konzelman pointed out the irony of this rating, because "abortion is an act of extreme violence."

THE SEDUCTION OF PLANNED PARENTHOOD'S EUPHEMISMS
Another feature in the film worth mentioning are the several euphemisms and terms of snakery Planned Parenthood uses to disguise the truth.

• "Planned Parenthood" - The very name of the organization itself belies the fact that abortion clients are already mothers. Its main product, abortion, and its other products like contraception, are designed to eliminate parenting. As some have noted, "unparenthood" more accurately describes their intentions.
• "Anti-Choice" - As is often the case, including with a complicit media, the term "anti-choice" is used to describe pro-lifers who recognize the enwombed as a life. As Father Corapi often used to ask of the abortion industry's use of the word "choice": "Choose what?"
• "Tissue" - The baby is referenced only as "tissue" that is not a baby "yet." In the film, we hear this used to convince a teen about the acceptability of having an abortion.
• "Products of Conception" - A lesser known euphemism is the official term used by Planned Parenthood to refer to the remains of the aborted baby: "Products of Conception." In the P.O.C. room, pieces of the baby are "reassembled" and accounted for, so they can determine that they got the entire baby. As I said, the film is disturbing, but the information it reveals in this mass media format is important in combating the lies about the enwombed. Ancient Egypt wasn't the only sinful nation plagued with rivers of blood. 
• "Reproductive Health" - Another phrase heard in the film and with frequency in media and from politicians is the term "reproductive health" to refer to the dismemberment or pulverizing of an enwombed baby. The reality is, a baby that would otherwise continue to live and grow, is terminated—the very antithesis of "health" and a diabolical lie.
• "Her body" - Although the abortion industry has tried to sell the idea that abortion is ultimately about "her body," the nascent baby in the womb—left out of the abortion propagandist's equation—has his/her own unique DNA, distinct from the mother. Empirically and factually, the baby is not the mother's "body."

SIN IS BLINDING
For eight years Abby Johnson worked up close and personal with the abortion of some 22,000 babies.  She was also not stuck at Planned Parenthood against her will and had family that consistently encouraged her to leave. But all those euphemisms and all Planned Parenthood's talk about health for vulnerable women serves as a veil, a means by which to deflect the public's attention, to avoid asking the actual question—is the enwombed a life?

Still, we have seen in modern days those who admit that from the moment of conception, the enwombed is by all reasonable measure a human life. Their justification for abortion comes in the the illogical idea that the baby's value is dependent on the mother's desire. If a mother considers herself "not ready" to raise a child or doesn't want to be connected to the father anymore (as was described in the movie about Johnson), the baby's very life loses value. This is to treat a baby the same as any other commodity, where market demand determines value. In this case, the mother is the market. This relativistic and perverse mentality deprives human life of objective worth.

Johnson has spoken at length about the blindness of sin she incurred. One takeaway for our own lives is to be on guard for what ways we might be deluding ourselves, falling for some seductive sales pitch on a particular sin.

One of the sins to which Johnson was blinded in her youth was her having obtained two abortions herself. She suffered terribly from the second, yet still pursued a career fostering abortions. The film especially brings to light the lie especially underlying her second abortion. She had filed for divorce and discovered she was pregnant. She didn't want to be "connected" to that man anymore and the termination of the baby was a "fix" for that problem. Of course, she merely sacrificed her baby for that separation and took on a different cross, knowing she offered no fight for her own child's life and paid someone to end it. This is not an uncommon story. It underscores the importance of treating the conjugal act with the utmost sacredness, and should discourage anyone from engaging in casual sex, and certainly not commit to someone of questionable character which is more difficult to avoid when engaging in sex with that person. But modern phenomena like abortion and contraception imply that one needn't be as careful or choosy with a partner. It's another dimension of abortion's lies.

SOROS, GATES, AND BUFFET
The film mentions the type of powers that fund Planned Parenthood, explicitly naming George Soros, Bill Gates, and Warren Buffet. The support from these multi-billionaires for an organization consistently caught lying and disguising its depraved work goes a long way in explaining its continued existence.

Soros and Gates have given over a combined $32 million to Planned Parenthood in recent years, dwarfed only by Buffet, who issued the abortion provider a deluge of over $230 million. (see LifeSiteNews.) Incoming donations such as these as well as Planned Parenthood's outbound political donations are reasons why many have questioned their reception of taxpayer funds and non-profit status. Their legal intimidation, also shown in the film, are important facts to know when understanding the entity that is Planned Parenthood. With such a concentration of influence from just a few donors, one rightfully must question how much of the organization's survival is due to ideology and paid propaganda. This is especially a fair question when one considers the euphemisms, that Planned Parenthood uses language to describe what they do other than language that actually describes what they do.

Despite such colossal funding, Planned Parenthood still vies for public funds. Politicians who support them are not apt to reveal the flow of income they already enjoy from other sources. They typically hide behind miswordings like "health" to market things like abortion and contraception that are properly defined as non-medicine or poisons.

Such political and corporate funding could also explain why Planned Parenthood has been caught multiple times in outright lies yet fail to incur any consequence of significance. We are witnessing the undeniably naked emperor and are told to look the other way and deny it.

CATHOLIC ANGLE
The film seems to avoid Johnson's eventual conversion to Catholicism. It only mentions an earlier stage of her spiritual development when she attended a generally Christian service. There are shots of pro-lifers praying the rosary at times, but nothing overtly Catholic, even though that appears to be central in where Johnson is today. This might make the film more widely appealing to non-Catholics to support the pro-life movement, but it's worth noting that the whole story has a definite Catholic component.

Part of what I remember hearing about Johnson's exodus from Planned Parenthood was that one of the items she took with her when she left was a bowl full of Miraculous Medals left by pro-lifers. She had collected them over time. I think I might have seen a bowl on her desk late in the film that contained them, but it was hard to tell if that was an "Easter Egg" or just another prop. Perhaps a commenter can shed light. But, undoubtedly, Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal lent her immaculate gaze to that day when Abby Johnson finally stood for innocent life in the womb.

TAKEAWAYS FROM UNPLANNED: BEHIND THE SCENES (added 3/29/2019)
Unplanned: Behind the Scenes is viewable over at Formed.org. There are a number of fascinating tidbits from this video and the phenomena behind the movie. But I'd like to focus on these three additional takeaways from this mini-film.

• Providence. Lead actress Ashley Bratcher (whom was warned not to take the role because she would never find work again) discovered that her mother had almost aborted her after already having been post-abortive. Not only was abortion considered, but her mother was literally seconds away from permitting the deed against Ashley, having gone all the way to a "clinic," and was in the room for an abortion before she walked out. This story adds a providential mystique to the film and what it represents.
• Opposition. Shawn Carney of 40 Days for Life made a prophetic statement which will undoubtedly come true. There will be critics of the film who will avoid confronting the truth it exposes by seeking refuge in more euphemisms, claiming the film is the "anti-Planned Parenthood movie, the anti-abortion movie, the anti-woman movie, the anti-fill-in-the-blank..."
• Revelation. Writer/Director Cary Solomon told an interesting story about how his father had seen the movie and experienced a conversion on the matter of abortion. He quoted his father as saying, "You've shown us what we didn't want to see." The statement superbly summates the theme of the film, from the power Planned Parenthood wields, to the truth about abortion itself.

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Further resources:

• The Ambitions of Bill and Melinda Gates: Controlling Population and Public Education by Dr. Ann Hendershott, March 25, 2013
• Hillary Clinton Once Thought Abortion Should be “Safe, Legal and Rare.” Two No Longer Apply by Tom Glessner, August 9, 2016
• Shocking Planned Parenthood Annual Report Shows Abortions, Taxpayer Funding, and Profits Soar; Prenatal Services and Cancer Screenings Plummet, American Center for Law and Justice, 2018
• Why Planned Parenthood Must Be Stripped Of Taxpayer Funds, by Koree R Fellows, Human Defense
• Planned Parenthood’s Annual Report Is Out. Here’s What You Need to Know, by Melanie Israel, The Daily Signal, January 23, 2019
• Unplanned: The Dramatic True Story of a Former Planned Parenthood Leader's Eye-opening Journey Across the Life Line by Abby Johnson
• Unplanned movie website

Refutation of justifying abortion because of zygote mortality, historic infanticide, and more

Evolutionary biologist Heather Heying's recent argument for abortion makes appeal to zygote survival, historical periods of infanticide, and careers.

Often, arguments for abortion avoid the ultimate question: is that which is in the womb a human life? This article clearly concedes it is, stating that even zygotes "are human, by any usual definition of the term." The argument in this article is not whether the enwombed are "human." Instead, their level of sacredness is called into question. Let's look at the various arguments in the article, starting with this matter of zygotes.

THE MAIN ARGUMENT: ZYGOTE SURVIVAL RATES
The article says “most human zygotes throughout history never became children” because they were either “miscarried,” had “chromosomal abnormalities” that proved fatal to the zygote, or that “genetic and environmental conditions rendered the zygote non-viable.” The article then concludes of these zygotes:

They are human, by any usual definition of the term, but they cannot survive. This happens to most zygotes that have ever been conceived. This fact leaves me, a biologist, wholly unconvinced by arguments about the sanctity of life.

Before we parse this conclusion, let’s again pause on the point of agreement. Fertilized zygotes “are human.” The article is correct in this regard. From the moment of conception, the nascent life has its own unique DNA, and is the empirical beginning of human life that progresses unto death. Now, let's analyze this main premise.

• Why should we question the sanctity of life of babies in utero on the grounds that “most zygotes” do not survive? Explanation for this foundational claim is absent. It is merely asserted. Later, we will address the claim that sacredness is attributed to varying stages of physical development.
• The argument here resembles, but falls short of, a logical three-term syllogism. The argument in syllogistic form is: Most zygotes die, therefore they are not sacred; or: Most Z are D. Therefore no Z are S. Missing is a second (minor) premise, such as a statement about what constitutes sacredness. The argument is logically invalid without even addressing whether the premises are valid.

Ultimately, it's nonsensical to assert life isn't sacred regardless of the frequency of biological malformations. It would not matter if 99% of zygotes didn't survive. No statistical appeals are necessary once we recognize human life is sacred and human life begins at conception.

Keep that in mind when reading these next three bullets, which are not foundational rebuttals to the article's zygote argument. Remember, the statistics are inconsequential to sacredness of life. Where there is human life, the sanctity proper to human life is present. The following thoughts are rather an inspection of zygote mortality statistics.

• What effect does the pill, which literally siphoned the life out of society beginning in 1960, have on the failure of zygote survival? The FDA's description of the "mechanism of action" of the oral contraceptive Ella admits: "alterations to the endometrium that may affect implantation may also contribute to efficacy." How many zygotes are counted that couldn't implant simply because the mother took an abortifacient pill? How many zygotes were deemed "flawed" because the mother had a virus, consumed too much alcohol, took drugs, used spermicides, had a bacterial infection, or an STD? Should we deny the sacredness of the nascent human on account of external forces? According to the article, which states "environmental conditions rendered the zygote non-viable," the zygote wouldn't even have to be "flawed" to lose sacredness. It only needs to fall victim to some unnamed environmental condition. This would be, of course, a nonsensical index to measure the sacredness of human life, for a baby could be speciously deemed unsacred on account of someone else taking heroin.
• An examination of embryo mortality rate studies was published in June 2017 by Dr. Gavin E. Jarvis in the Cambridge Department of Physiology, Development and Neuroscience. He concluded current data is not reliable regarding the mortality of embryos, stating: "natural human embryo mortality is lower than often claimed and widely accepted." (e.g. A multitude of studies have widely disparate statistics, e.g. ranging from 46%-90% mortality for all pregnancies, from zygote to term.) 
• Consider the following: According to a study in the New England Journal of Medicine, the total "rate of pregnancy loss after implantation" is 31%—much less than half. If one denies the sanctity of life based on "most zygotes" not surviving, wouldn't one have to say life is sacred at the stage in which the gestational survival rate exceeds 50%? And, if not, the appeal to "most zygotes" is moot.
  
  But, again, the percentages are irrelevant. Life is sacred from conception, because, even as the article concedes, it is a "human" life. We needn't demand a certain stage of gestational development to elapse before we can attribute sacredness to the life. What these statistics demonstrate is that post-implantation abortion would be unacceptable even to someone who arbitrarily wishes to claim a greater-than-50% mortality statistic as the threshold for sanctity of life.

INFANTICIDE
Another phenomenon to which the article appeals to justify abortion is the reality of historical infanticide. Granted, it does not endorse infanticide, at least not for modern cultures. The article states of America: "Society-wide, we have agreed on this much: once they are born, let us not kill our children."

That much is a relief (even though proponents of post-birth infanticide exist in the West, such as the notorious atheist professor Peter Singer). However, the article still appears to use the reality of historical infanticide as justification of abortion as a necessary evil:

There is a long list of behaviors and actions historically available to women who are trying to control their own reproductive lives. Infanticide is on that list. I am not arguing that this is good, but it is true. ... Evolution responds to circumstance. Most zygotes disappear before even making themselves known to their mothers. In many cultures, in which the environment was variable enough that many children were unlikely to make it to adulthood, infanticide has been acceptable. ... Indian and African slave populations in Surinam [used abortifacients] so that they would not bring children into a life of slavery.

And, in the opening paragraph of the article:

Sometimes, though, in the service of the greater good, abortions are necessary.

You see in these related excerpts several ideas. Let's examine them:

One must carefully read this section of the article to grasp exactly why historic infanticide is cited, ultimately, as justification for abortion. Although the article claims it is not arguing that infanticide is "good," it says it has at times in history "been acceptable." This ties into the opening claim that "in the service of the greater good, abortions are necessary." Essentially, this all amounts to arguing that, although abortion is not "good," it is something "necessary" to prevent something bad in the judgement of the mother. The "bad thing" ranges anywhere from the mother's judgement of saving a baby from growing up in slavery to the baby being an obstacle to the mother's career.
This brings us to a segue. Earlier in the article, we see reference to the career factor:

One of my friends escaped an abusive home, became addicted to heroin, and got pregnant very young, before aborting the fetus, getting her act together, and becoming a scientist. That part where she got her act together and became a scientist? Far less likely had she been a teenage mother.

To the devout pro-lifer, this is an atrocious razing of the ears and heart. One could imagine a paraphrase of the conclusion: "That part where the baby grew up to be a scientist? Far less likely since she was killed in utero." But, more to the point, the mother's potential future career is an irrelevant factor when determining the sacredness of the enwombed baby. It is not sensible to justify the killing of one's children on the grounds that one might enjoy a successful career without them. And, a baby is not more or less sacred if her mother eventually becomes a scientist, a seamstress, a homemaker, or whatever. We don't need to wait to find out what the mother's career aspirations are before we can determine if life in the womb is expendable. The life of the enwombed is sacred on its own merit. The mother's career is a diversion.

Scapegoating evolution
Let's return to "evolution." You see how evolution is cited as a scapegoat both for the unwilled death of zygotes and willed infanticide. This is not the first time we've seen evolution speciously cited as some unimpugnably good force to justify something outside its purview (Atheist evolutionary biologist professor Gad Saad erroneously argued that "morality" was strictly a "scientific" phenomenon of evolution). But the problem with such appeals to evolution is at least twofold.

• First, what constitutes behaviors that are "evolution responding to circumstances"? Zygote mortality? Killing the young? These are the first two notions the article mentions in light of "evolution responding to circumstances." These are both unwilled and willed deaths, which are deemed beneficial for "evolution." But, if these are not "good" but "necessary" evolutionary responses, what other willed and unwilled phenomena is? What about the Black Plague that wiped out a third of Europe? What about the Titanic tragedy? What about 20th century smallpox? What about killing the weak? What about killing the neighboring tribe because one tribe wants the others' more fertile land? What about Aztec temple sacrifices? What about any genocidal regimes in history? What about prolific serial killers? Shall we argue these are all simply "responses of evolution" because afterward there were more resources available per remaining person? Shall we legalize related forms of terminating life on the grounds that "evolution" delivered similar deaths in history? And shall we call each a necessary evil for a greater good? Kind of like a recent movie villain did with the snap of a finger?
  
  You see the danger in grouping things like zygote mortality, infanticide, evolution's "response," and abortion as an argument for "greater good."
• Second, let's say one wanted to attribute every action in human history as the work of "evolution." That wouldn't make any of those actions "good." Nor would it make any of those actions "bad," nor even a necessary evil. The study of evolution is in the purview of science. It deals with observable facts. It has no capacity to quantify good or evil. One cannot use evolution as an axiom to say that an action that was the response of "evolution" (if that can even be "observed) is automatically "good." Value judgements must be derived elsewhere.

LINE VS. CONTINUUM

Line
The article then argues against the notion of a distinct “line” at which sacrosanct life begins. I emphasize sacrosanct because the article has conceded earlier that the fertilized egg is already a “human” life. This section of the article is really a thought exercise about what are acceptable stages of development it’s still okay to terminate that human life. The two most “obvious” lines, conception and birth, are both rejected.

• First, conception is rejected in the article on the grounds of the main argument, that “most zygotes are not destined to survive.” But, again, it is illogical to deny the sanctity of human life on the grounds that unwilled malfunctions or external factors sometimes interfere with biological processes. 
• Second, birth is rejected on the grounds that "for most moderns, the idea of abortion at nine months gestation, just before a full-term birth would occur, is a bridge too far." However, this is followed by another appeal to historic infanticide: "given the prevalence of infanticide in human history...this line has not always been considered sacrosanct." Two fallacies of argument are at work here:
• First, the appeal to "most moderns," is the fallacy of ad populum. Even though the pro-lifer obviously agrees it is wrong to terminate a baby at 9 months (or any stage!), that view is not derived by submitting to "most moderns." Rather, the sanctity of life is intertwined with the value of humanity itself, a value necessarily beyond a human's biological cluster of subatomic particles, but in the human being's inherent participation in the image of the Transcendent. This idea is the foundation for all morality. Morality dissolves when one attempts to reduce humanity to biological functions alone or as a tool, as in the case of determining a human's value based on what effect one thinks that human will have on the determiner's career. 
• The second fallacy is the appeal to historical "prevalence of infanticide." This is the fallacy of ad antiquitatem, which argues if something was done in history, it must have been correct.

Continuum
So, if conception and birth are both inadequate "lines" to determine sanctity of life, when is it supposedly no longer okay to end a human life because it became too sacred? The article tosses out more than one suggestion.

One of the article's suggestions is that abortion could be considered acceptable up to the stage when the baby would survive outside of the womb. The viability argument has been refuted in prior articles: e.g. Notre Dame professor's flawed argument for abortion).

The article also posits the average age at which organs are laid down or when "brain development accelerates in utero" as a possible threshold to no longer allow for abortion.

• But, the article has already conceded that the zygote is "human." Arbitrarily appealing to this or that normative and natural stage of development as an apparent consideration for sacredness is nonsensical. Why should a baby be killable when it is at the correct and normal stage of life development? We're not even talking about an abnormality in development here—which is neither justification to end a human life. These are normal stages of development. A cynic might not be wrong to think such abortion-supporters are merely citing stages arbitrarily in order to accommodate abortion.
• As well, considering sacredness of life in view of something like level of organ or brain development also suggests that even adults' lives would be "less sacred" if they suffered from some setback of organ or brain development. It also begs the question: What other developmental drawbacks can compromise the sanctity of one's life? Poor vision? Deviated septum? Narcolepsy? 

The article does not actually define any of these considerations as the exact threshold of sanctity of life. Rather, it is ultimately arguing for a nebulous "continuum" for abortion instead of a definite line. From there, the article suggests the following unspecific solution:

If we recognize a trade-off between the positive social impact of keeping abortion available to women, and the problems of providing carte blanche for all abortions up to some very late date, perhaps we should seek a solution that renders barriers to abortion higher the farther along in the pregnancy a woman is, but allows free and easy access early in pregnancy, and so does not sacrifice a woman’s ability to choose her life’s fate.

Many readers were probably already aghast at the phrase "positive social impact of keeping abortion available."

• To start with the obvious, estimates of over 1.5 billion babies have been killed by abortion in the last 40 years. It remains a vexing reality, the elephant to end all elephants in the room, that the lives of aborted babies are not counted, and often not considered, when the effects of abortion are discussed. The previous quote parrots the common abortion supporters' sole angle: "her life," never the baby's. 
• Later, the article even claims that "[f]acilitating choices that allow people to live their highest and best lives is consistent with...a pro-choice...position." But, obviously forgotten in that statement is the bloody hemorrhage of lives intentionally lost in the womb. The idea that a supporter of abortion calls for "allowing people to live their highest and best lives" is one heap of irony. The babies aren't given a choice. They are dismembered or pulverized and killed. Only the woman who wants to pursue her science career gets a choice. And none of this even touches on the many statistics that show the psychological and social detriment resulting from abortion.

The article segues here to call anyone who is pro-life and believes the possibility of the death penalty a hypocrite. This is a common claim by abortion supporters and has been rebutted in numerous places (eg. CatholicVote, Jimmy Akin).

BROKEN LEG ANALOGY
The article then attempts to justify abortion by claiming it is morally analogous to fixing a broken leg:

Furthermore, if you play soccer and break a leg doing so, it is not responsible to remain maimed simply because the playing of soccer brought with it the risk of breaking one’s leg. It is, in fact, responsible to have your leg fixed, not merely so that you can live to play soccer again, but so that you can go on to contribute maximally to society, living up to your potential, not just with regard to soccer, but in other regards as well. If you have sex and end up pregnant, it is not responsible to become a parent out of a sense of moral obligation, if you are not ready to do so. Responsible athletic and sexual behavior both involve a reduction, on the front-end, of the chances of undesirable outcomes. Setting a bone is not identical to aborting a fetus, but there is a moral analogy to be made, with regard to how a person should take responsibility for their actions.

There is actually no moral analogy to be made here.

• Breaking a leg is a medical disorder that needs fixing. Pregnancy is the opposite of that. It is not a medical disorder.¹ Pregnancy is the normative, correctly functioning, and proper order of gestation and human life. This analogy is exactly backward. Abortion corresponds to breaking a leg, not fixing it.
• Also, the notion that it's okay to have an abortion if the mother is "not ready to" "become a parent" is an argument that entirely ignores due regard for the enwombed. The value of the life in the womb is not dependent on the mental "readiness" of the mother. And adoption is an option. The mother's "readiness" is an inexcusable and irrational barometer for determining the worth of enwombed life.

AN UNCONVINCING ATTEMPT TO CALL ABORTION "HUMANE"
The final section of the article is called "A humane and reasoned response." But, this argument for abortion is neither.

There is a question of which of two lives we, as a society, prefer. Do we prefer the life of an adult who can make decisions for herself, and who has found herself in an unfortunate position? Or do we prefer the life of her unborn child—a child who has not yet had the opportunity to make decisions for itself, good or bad? ... The implicit moralizing that prefers the fetus to the woman has judged the woman guilty for needing an abortion in the first place.

This is a glaring fallacy of false dichotomy.

• First, think about this statement: "prefers the fetus to the woman." We are talking about death for the baby. Death. The mother's "punishment"—if one has been conditioned and deluded enough to believe motherhood is a punishment—is a possible career setback or lack of "readiness" to be a mother. She might have to complete her science degree via distance learning. We're not being asked if we "prefer" vanilla or chocolate here. We're not being asked which of the two shall be killed. We're asked if one person's life is as valuable as someone else's ease of getting job.
• Second, the reason there are pro-life organizations like Ireland's LoveBoth Project is because "the baby or the mother" is a false dichotomy. Love both. 
• Third, one of the ways we can help women (and men) avoid situations where abortion is seductive is to discourage pre-marital and recreational sex, stop handing out "birth control" to teens, and start teaching that sex is a serious act that could result in another person who otherwise would never exist. Particularly, Western culture fosters promiscuity from entertainment to education. From such attitudes we have record STDs and articles promoting abortion instead of encouraging abstinence for those not "ready" to be a parent. Passing the culture's reckless norms onto babies by killing them in utero is an egregious injustice.
• Notice the juxtaposition of a mother "who can make decisions for herself" versus the unborn child who cannot "make decisions for itself." The implication here is that, because only the mother is capable of making a choice in this situation, the choice should go to her. Apparently, the logic here is that the baby hasn't actually articulated a desire not to be dismembered or killed by suction machine. So let the mother chose because the baby can't decide yet! This ability-to-choose argument is utterly convoluted, and, much like most arguments for abortion, ignores the dignity of the enwombed human being.

Finally, let's look at one more excerpt from the article:

By preferring the future baby—who will need love and sacrifice, and lots of it—over the adult—who does not need that kind of support—you guarantee that our shared social fabric will be stretched ever thinner.

Consider the following reactions to this quote:

• First, this assertion is actually a call for less love. Reread the statement to see. It says babies need lots more love than adults—therefore, it's better to kill a baby to save all that love effort. This brings us back to earlier in this blog post where we philosophized as to whether genocide or a massive plague is just evolution performing some good "response to circumstances." According to the this-requires-too-much-love theory, all such loss of life is good because now we can concentrate our "shared social fabric" of love on fewer survivors.
• Second, according to this quote, a person who requires "lots of" love is expendable. The logical conclusion of such an attitude is to terminate the sick. What about a cancer patient that has a fair chance of recovery with months or years of treatment? What in the too-much-love theory suggests we should expend resources on such a person rather than salvage the "lots of" "social fabric" by killing them as soon as possible? Nothing,
• Third, if even adults need some degree of love and support, proponents of too-much-love would commit suicide, no? This is not to be provocative. This is to let the trajectory of a claim play out of its own accord. The only thing in the article that suggests killing birthed people is bad is the statement: "Society-wide, we have agreed on this much: once they are born, let us not kill our children." But, not only is there is not full agreement on this matter as shown earlier, but leaving such a matter open to some implied majority has historically given rise in various cultures to cannibalism, human sacrifice, slavery, and more. 

FINAL THOUGHTS
The modern abortion movement is the bloody scandal of our time. All this brings us to an even clearer understanding of the evil of abortion. Neither evolutionary, nor biological, nor career-based arguments for abortion can withstand scrutiny. Each collapses under their own fallacies and self-contradictions. Proponents of life from conception until death should stand strong in these dark times, by being informed, praying and fasting, and continuing to contribute time and resources on behalf of the enwombed innocents, marriage, and stable families.




¹In extreme cases where pregnancy threatens the life of the mother, see discussion of incident at Phoenix hospital in 2010—refer to paragraph beginning with "Brown's book is fraught with footnotes..."

5 modern lies sold as truth

Woe to those who call evil good and good evil,

who put darkness for light and light for darkness,

who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter! (Isaiah 5:20)

Detail of Prophet Isaiah in Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel Ceiling.
Acquired from Wikimedia Commons.

Today's culture, in plain sight, successfully sells lies that are often 180 degrees opposite the truth.

Contraception
Birth control is "medicine," claimed Hillary Clinton in 2017. Planned Parenthood has called it "basic health care." Yet contraceptives used to prevent birth are the opposite of medicine—for their end goal is to cause a normally functioning body to malfunction. Birth control more closely resembles the medical definition of Poison: a substance that "may cause structural or functional disturbance."

Read more in earlier TCV blog post: "Birth control" is not medicine.

Abortion
"It's my body!" shouts the 21st century feminist of enwombed offspring. Yet, in reality, the fertilized egg—the zygote—has its own unique DNA, distinct from the mother. A mother thus advances the culture's lie when she refers as "her body" to that which is not her body.

Additional resources: Science is clear: Each new human life begins at fertilization (Sarah Terzo, 2013); 41 Quotes From Medical Textbooks Prove Human Life Begins at Conception (Terzo, 2015); The Science About When Life Begins Makes Pro-Choicers Look Terrible (Dr. Donna Harrison, 2018)

Marriage
During the years leading up to the 2015 gay "marriage" ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court, there were three common slogans used to advance the idea of gay "marriage": "love is love," "same love," and "marriage equality."

Dialogue on this issue was minimal and even discouraged. Then-First Lady Michelle Obama declared: "In a country where we teach our children that everyone is equal under the law, discriminating against same-sex couples just isn’t right. So, it’s as simple as that."

Although the state declared marriage redefined by stroke of a pen, marriage was not the only thing their verdict "redefined." The censoring of discussion disguised this. Notice how each of the three slogans advanced the idea that men and women are interchangeable with no difference. One ingredient is equal to another. This was among the undiscussed, dangerous side effects of the formulations: "same," "equal," "A is equal to B." These were the Orwellian newspeak that tickled many ears.

The idea that Man+Man = Man+Woman is absurd on its face. The sale of this idea that men and women are interchangeable variables is also contrary to science, which shows the unique qualities brought to parenthood by mothers and fathers, as well as the obvious family structure innate in the male and female union. Any children raised in such arrangements are deprived of one or more of their mother and father. The idea also paved the way for society's next chapter, discussed below (Sex/Gender), in denying the significant qualities between males and females.

Additional Resources: Reengineering the Family (Heather Mac Donald, 2010); How Re-Defining Marriage Harms Society (Dr. Jennifer Roback Morse, 2012); Truth Overruled: The Future of Marriage and Religious Freedom (Dr. Ryan T. Anderson, 2015); and additional social science resources in the endnotes at Same-Sex “Marriage”: The Victims. The Children (2015).

Sex/Gender
Modern transgenderism: It is the idea that a man can "become" a woman (or vice versa) either based on his own feelings and/or after a surgery alters some of his body parts. A significant portion of society is at the point where it cannot tell the difference between a boy and girl and even believes there are a multitude of sexes beyond male and female. This is the hypnotic effect that abusing truth has created.

The idea of switching "genders" is again contrary to science:

In human embryos, the SRY gene encodes a unique transcription factor that activates a testis-forming pathway at about week seven of development. Before this time, the embryonic gonad is "indifferent"... (Genetic Mechanisms of Sex Determination, Nature Education 1(1):25, 2008)

Instead of simply admitting a boy with xyz feelings is still a boy who has these feelings, society fosters the lie that he's not a boy at all, or that somehow a new "gender" can even be created as a result of sexual proclivities.

But calling a boy a girl and a girl a boy is a dangerous inversion of reality that has led to regretful surgeries, harmful use of puberty blockers in children, and other personal and public damage, not to mention the instability caused to any other truth. In "redefining" marriage and what is a boy and girl, society has paved the way to other redefinitions, such as the recent effort to rebrand pedophilia under the moniker "minor attracted person (MAP)." The trajectory will result in future "redefinitions" of parenthood and more as previously discussed in 5 difficult issues human cloning will cause.

Additional resources: Transgenderism: Semantic contagion or biological fact? (Dr. Anne Hendershott, 2018); The Genetics of Sex Differences in Brain and Behavior (NCBI, 2010); The myth of gender-neutral parenting (Dr. Deborah Soh, 2017)

Morality
As previously detailed at length, modern atheists such as Sam Harris, Gad Saad, or Patricia Churchland have attempted to explain morality strictly as a function of biology and evolution. Harris goes so far as to say morality exists even though he believes free will does not.

But these efforts are as misguided as they are ironic. By assigning the label "morality" to biological instincts or automatic actions devoid of free will, morality's necessary feature of obligation is stripped from the equation. By reducing man to an automaton or animal obeying euphoric bodily chemicals, these atheists actually make the argument that morality doesn't exist.

---

Conclusions
The significance of these lies is not something to take lightly. They are prone to cause damage, whether to public policy, the innocent baby, the fatherless child, the sexually confused, or the very foundation of moral truth. We end with a relevant quote from a saint:

[Y]ou did well in urging me not to betray the truth, but to refute the slanderers, lest, by a success of falsehood against truth, many might be injured. (Gregory of Nyssa, On the Holy Trinity, ca 375 A.D.)

Thoughts on Gosnell film

Dean Cain in Gosnell
(production still from gosnellmovie.com/press)

Gosnell: The Trial of America's Biggest Serial Killer is one of the most important films in recent years. It is an engaging, well-paced crime drama that sheds overdue light on the nature of the abortion industry and the government and media powers that protect it.

ABORTION COVERUP
Perhaps the scariest moment in the Gosnell movie is when one realizes how protected the abortion industry is. During a scene depicting pretrial questioning, a state official shrugs at the fact that the state of Pennsylvania neglected to properly vet abortion businesses.

In the actual case, Pennsylvania health department official Janet Staloski testified that health department attorneys "changed their legal opinions and advice to suit the policy preferences of different governors" and that the state didn't want to be "putting a barrier up to women" seeking abortions.

The lack of media interest in the case likewise reveals the propagandist quality of the abortion industry. Whether from government or media, such propagandists have proven reluctant to even discuss abortion's true nature.

The actual Gosnell Grand Jury report filed in 2011 goes on for over 60 pages detailing how the Pennsylvania Department of Health woefully permitted unsafe medical conditions to persist at abortion offices. Gosnell's office, as the movie reiterated, went uninspected at one point for a span of 17 years.

That section of the report begins:

We discovered that Pennsylvania’s Department of Health has deliberately chosen not to enforce laws that should afford patients at abortion clinics the same safeguards and assurances of quality health care as patients of other medical service providers. Even nail salons in Pennsylvania are monitored more closely for client safety. 

The film moves along at a decent pace, beginning with investigators discovering illegal prescription drug activity from Gosnell's office. The abortion horrors transpiring there might not otherwise ever have been exposed if not for the state following the drug leads.

It is a fascinating watch, especially for those interested in true crime, courtroom drama, and police investigation. Ed Morrissey, senior editor at Hot Air and regular guest host on Relevant Radio, reviews some of the other accurate attributes of Gosnell here.

Although the subject matter largely revolves around abortion, the movie is not graphic. Evening television depicts far more gruesome imagery than can be seen in Gosnell. That brings me to Baby Boy A.

BABY BOY A
Baby Boy A was born alive and subsequently murdered by Gosnell. "[T]he doctor just slit the neck," testified Kareem Cross, an assistant at Gosnell's office. A photo of the baby factored into Gosnell's guilt. Gruesome details of Baby Boy A's fate are given in the Grand Jury Report beginning on page 100. Cross was asked why she took the picture of this boy Gosnell killed. Cross testified:

Because it was big and it was wrong and we knew it. We knew something was wrong. ... I’m not sure who took the picture first, but when we seen this baby, it was – it was a shock to us because I never seen a baby that big that he had done. So it was – I knew something was wrong because everything, like you can see everything, the hair, eyes, everything. And I never seen for any other procedure that he did, I never seen any like that.

Below is a screencap of Baby Boy A from the Grand Jury Report.

I asked film director and star Nick Searcy via Twitter why the photo was not shown in the movie. He graciously replied: "Because we have good taste and discernment."

While I respect that decision and the audiences Gosnell had to consider, I would like to have seen the photo in the film. Granted, the film's epilogue does refer the viewer to the Gosnell film website to see the photo.

The issue brings to mind the question of whether or not to show images of aborted babies. For example, images are shown by the Pro-Life Action League's "Face the Truth" tours. Pro-life theology professor Dr. Monica Miller argues photos expose the truth of abortion's atrocity in a way non-visual communication cannot. In 2013, not long after the Gosnell trial, she was interviewed on the Kresta in the Afternoon show on the topic Graphic Images: An Apologia (written form of her arguments can be also read at Pro-Life Action League).  In the case of Baby Boy A, I do not find the photo that graphic. It is a photo of a newborn. I would like to have seen the image in the movie, if even by way of a long camera shot. To include the photo in the film seems consistent with the unmasking theme of the film itself. The matter also reminds me of the graphic nature of The Passion of the Christ (2004). Although many criticized the brutality in that film, many others argued for the necessity of depicting the violence. And the Baby Boy A image is far more benign than what is depicted in The Passion.

GOSNELL EVEN WORSE THAN FILM REVEALS
Depicting all of Gosnell's crimes could probably fill multiple television seasons. The Gosnell film focuses largely on the investigation and parts of the trial, including Baby Boy A and the death of Karnamaya Mongar. However, his gruesome legacy went much further. As the film mentioned, Gosnell's atrocities go back at least to the early 1970s in which he participated in an experimental abortion technique that badly damaged many women's insides.

The Grand Jury Report goes on for hundreds of pages about his improprieties, including especially disturbing accounts beginning on page 6 under the subhead "Butcher of women."

For example, Gosnell tore the cervix and colon of one woman, prevented relatives from getting to her, and only let them in once they threatened to call police. The victim was brought to a hospital and had to have a portion of her intestine removed. Multiple other stories in the report tell of similar horror.

SUMMARY
All in all, this is a gripping film full of accurate details on one of the most important issues of our time. Not to be lost is awareness of the collaborative effort by government and media in facilitating Gosnell's crimes in the name of abortion. It is an eye-opening account to anyone unfamiliar with the abortion industry and the schemes that hide its true horrors.

"Birth Control" is not medicine

On October 13, 2017, the federal government issued an interim rule which exempts religious entities from paying for objectionable services as part of their insurance plans. These include:

(FDA)-approved contraceptive methods, sterilization procedures ... [including] certain drugs and devices that may not only prevent conception (fertilization), but may also prevent implantation of an embryo ... that many persons and organizations believe are abortifacient.

See here for several prior TCV blog posts about this issue.

WHAT IS MEDICINE?
Responding to this interim rule, Hillary Clinton tweeted: "Rolling back no-copay birth control shows a blatant disregard for medicine, science, & every woman's right to make her own health decisions."

Planned Parenthood, which is pacing at about 300,000 abortion victims per year, also responded. Their president, Cecile Richards, issued a statement saying exemptions for "birth control coverage" are an "attack on basic health care."

Many other celebrities and non-celebrities upset by the rule echoed similar sentiments.

But medicine is designed to fix an affliction of the body. Medicine's end goal is a body that functions properly. For example, medical remedies can come in the form of pills that directly fix a bodily problem such as antibiotics that attack or prevent bacterial infections. Medical remedies can come in the form of a surgery to repair a broken limb or remove a cancerous mass—any necessary part of that surgery could be considered medical care.

Birth control is not medicine. In fact, birth control's end goal is to cause a properly functioning body to malfunction.

One might try to argue something like anesthesia is not medicine, since, for example, it temporarily causes the patient the inability to feel—a malfunction of the body. However, this is only done as part of a larger goal of correcting the body. Body malfunction is not the end goal of using anesthesia. Something like an incision is similar. The ultimate goal isn't to scar a patient, but it can be necessary to ultimately treat the affliction. Contrary to these, the end goal of birth control is body malfunction.

In the case of oral contraceptives, an otherwise properly functioning ovulation cycle is stifled. Other oral contraceptives thicken an otherwise fertile uterine wall, preventing implantation of a zygote, thus killing it. Generally speaking, these are all forms of sterilization—which is a field of disease in itself. This is the product we are told must be covered by medical insurance. Forget for a moment any religious beliefs behind objections to the original mandate. Requiring insurance coverage of birth control can be opposed on medical grounds alone—specifically that birth control is not medicine.

In the earliest stages of this birth control/insurance matter, Cardinal Daniel DiNardo wrote on behalf of the U.S. bishops: "[P]regnancy is not a disease." 

In response to this latest rule, Lila Rose, president of Live Action, defended this concept in a tweet:

Abortifacient drugs are the antithesis of "healthcare." Medicine is meant to heal, not kill.

Abortifacient drugs are the antithesis of "healthcare." Medicine is meant to heal, not kill. https://t.co/Xx2XKP3TYp

— Lila Rose (@LilaGraceRose) October 6, 2017

And she is exactly right. Medicine is meant to heal.

WHAT ABOUT OTHER USES FOR CONTRACEPTIVES?
As in 2012, objectors immediately pointed out that some contraceptives can be used to regulate cycles or alleviate pains. However, in such cases, the product would not properly be called "birth control" because the drug is not used to prevent birth. Recall in 2012, Bishop Lori, speaking before congress, explained how the same medications typically used for birth control could possibly have other uses:

Blake Farenthold - The Catholic Church does not have a problem with contraceptives for medical purposes. So I would assume from that it wouldn't be morally objectionable to the Church to pay for those for medical purposes. I'm not trying to put you on the spot, I'm just trying to make sure I understand where the Church stands. 

Bishop Lori - That would be my understanding also.

And:

Bishop Lori - I think Catholic moral theology is very nuanced. It recognizes that the same drug can operate in different ways and accomplish different things. If it is used to prevent birth, it is against our teaching.

The Bishop's principle can be seen in action, for example, at the University of Notre Dame's human resources page:

[U]nder the university’s plan, you cannot receive reimbursement for oral contraceptives, contraceptive devices or contraceptive implants, except when specifically requested by a physician based on medical necessity and for purposes other than contraception.

Insurance companies have made similar distinctions with other drugs. For example, Finasteride can be used to treat enlarged prostates but also to treat hair loss. The latter is considered cosmetic and insurance companies are not required to cover the drug in such cases.

Nevertheless, the original HHS Mandate made no distinction regarding coverage of contraceptive products. Contraceptives were required for medicinal as well as anti-medicinal purposes. The Church and other entities object to the anti-medicinal use of contraceptives, i.e. birth control.

WHAT ABOUT VIAGRA?
You may have seen in reaction to this latest rule cries that requiring coverage for Viagra is hypocritical or misogynistic. For instance, NARAL, a vocal pro-abortion group, tweeted: "In case you were wondering, bosses can’t “opt out” of paying for Viagra." 

But what is the obvious failure of intellect in that statement? Viagra, which treats erectile dysfunction, is designed to correct a body malfunction. And, again, birth control, is designed to cause body malfunction. If NARAL and their peers were serious about finding a valid parallel, they would argue that something like OTC skin ointment should be covered since it is designed to fix a bodily affliction or mouthwash which is designed to prevent poor hygiene.

I should note, for the purposes of this blog post, I'm not arguing whether or not any drug/treatment should be "required" in medical insurance policies. Certainly there are reasonable discussions that could be had regarding coverage of only major medical expenses or to give market forces a greater voice in shaping insurance policies. The purpose of this post is focused on birth control and the nature of medicine.

OUR LADY'S INVOLVEMENT?
You might have noticed at the beginning that this interim rule was issued on October 13, 2017, the 100th anniversary of the apparition of Our Lady at Fatima and the Miracle of the Sun. One of the central figures in this contraceptive case was the Little Sisters of the Poor who would have incurred severe fines under the original mandate had they not paid for birth control for someone else. Other religious entities faced similar burdens. Many prayers on this matter have occurred over the past 5 years. Participation in birth control, sterilizations, and chemical abortions are clearly a moral offense in the eyes of the faithful. This is why the matter of conscious rights took a prevalent position in this discussion. We saw in a previous TCV article the amazing rescue of Chilean miners on October 13, 2010. Might Our Lady have interceded for the faithful and little ones, to protect their consciences, lives, and souls?

5 difficult issues human cloning will cause

What will happen when a significant portion of the human population is the product of cloning? These will be individuals that were created in a laboratory rather than having gone through natural human gestation in the mother's womb. For the purposes of this blog post, cloning represents not only a "duplicate" of an existing person, but any person generated in a laboratory by biological and chemical means. This would even include unique persons generated by more than two parents, as is already a scientific enterprise.

What you will read herein is this author's projection, grounded on the trajectory of current events. And there are certainly more issues at hand than supposed herein. Time may reveal more issues or eliminate the likelihood of others. This thought exercise is intended to shed light on potential consequences, particularly moral, on the matter of human cloning.


1. Are the cloned human?
The cloned may or may not have umbilical cords and will not be the product of man and woman conjugal union. They will not be the direct result of a physical expression of a loving action. An obvious question will be whether or not a person's "humanity" depends on that natural union. I would surmise the Church would consider such person's human, just as those who are born today by means of in vitro fertilization. Even though those born via in vitro are conceived in a manner outside the conjugal act, such persons are still welcomed to baptism, which is only receivable by a human being. Basic clones generated in a lab from a single sperm and egg will be recognized as human just as anyone else.

More complex clones may pose greater problems. Suppose laboratories begin to produce clones who do not need sleep. Or clones with six appendages. Or androgynous clones deliberately generated without genitalia. Or clones with two human parents and one chimpanzee parent. Or further down the road if a being is constructed from a variety of human and mammalian or even reptilian or other foundations. We have seen nascent evidence of animal incorporation in human-animal organ crossovers. As more complex experiments occur, the debate over the humanity of the clone will grow more complex.

For her part, the Church in such cases might at least perform "conditional" baptisms. This would be similar to a conditional baptism bestowed on a person unsure if he/she had previously been baptized. In the case of a clone, the baptism might be administered on the condition that the recipient is indeed a human being.

In civil life, there will be a number of legal cases that will be considered landmarks regarding the human status of the cloned. However, these cases will be difficult precedents if the cloning process continues to evolve and if persons are developed by multiple methods. So, for instance, if a court determined that a five-parent-one-other-mammal person merited full human rights, the precedent might not stand if a future case arose regarding a person generated from seven-human-parents-and-one-reptile.

These speculative examples may be fanciful. But they are designed more to demonstrate the difficulties that will arise the further mankind gets from matrimonial, conjugal offspring. Clones with greater and greater aberrations will suffer tremendous psychological difficulties, wondering what they are, whether they are human. The human DNA written in their fabric will alert them to the abnormalities within themselves. The natural arrangement of mother-father-child will arise as a discovery to the pensive mind of some of these clones, alerting them that something is disordered. This will cause great psychological trauma in some clones and families.

2. Clones will not have parental attachment
Written in the fabric of normative human generation are parents who have a certain attachment to offspring that is "of oneself." Paternal and maternal instincts can be seen in parents' protective tendencies toward their children. In fact, when a parent fails in this obligation, we recognize the violation committed by that parent. Phrases like "dead-beat dad" are evidence that a father has failed in his attachment to his own child.

Let's say an infertile couple in the future goes to a cloning market and selects a "child" to be developed for them. This is different from in vitro in which the father's sperm is united to the mother's egg and the child is developed in the womb. This is a "child" developed wholly in a laboratory according to whatever catalog options are offered by the cloning company. By commodotizing the child, parental attachment will suffer. If the child grows up to have criminal or unsatisfactory tendencies, the "parents" will be more apt to blame the "failure" on the cloning company. It will be easier to dismiss a child as a corporation's failure versus a child raised out of conjugal love, the direct gift of one's conjugal action.

From this, complexities will arise among parents who adopt clones. There will be a market for "returned" clones who did not meet the satisfaction of the adopting parents. Psychological problems will run rampant among clones, particularly among those who are rejected as corporate defects. Their plight could turn very ugly.

3. "Abortions" of clones will find new debate
Abortions of lab-generated clones may occur if the clone is not developing according to the customer's order. There will be debates as to what should happen with cancelled orders. Should the clone be terminated? If so, the same debate we have with abortion today will characterize the termination of developing clones. As speculated in point #1, simpler clones will be considered human. So at what point in the laboratory development period will such a clone be considered human?  Will there be a legal point at which a customer who orders a clone can no longer reject the product produced?

Rejected clones who are not terminated will suffer terrible psychological strains of inadequacy. Mental illness will be an enormous problem in the future, both among clones, and among a society whose expectation of custom-made satisfaction will permeate their everyday attitudes.

Even today, the "my body, my choice" argument is a red herring because it does not take into account the baby, who is essential to the pro-life movement's perspective. But when women order a lab-made child through a catalog, they will not be able to abort the child under the guise of doing what she wants with "her body." With a lab-generated baby, a couple, or an individual "ordering" a clone will have no such so-called right. Their argument will come from commerce and the power of the dollar with which they ordered the clone.

Those who order clones and seek to terminate their order prior to completion may seek refuge, not in "my body, my choice," but "my possession, my choice." It is difficult to determine what kind of traction such a specious argument might boast. But it will nonetheless be a serpentine diversion away from the violation of another being that takes place in an abortion.

For their part, the Church will oppose abortion of the developing clone, even if there is some question as to the humanity of the clone.

Today, some politically correct feminists accuse the Church's pro-life stance of being a means to control women unjustly. In the future, if persons are generated in labs, this argument won't even have specious merit if the Church voices a pro-life stance for the developing laboratory clone.

4. Good "health" will be used as a pro-cloning argument
On the eve of mass-cloning, proponents of the measure will abandon the moral consequences of lab-generated persons in favor of producing persons with good health. Over time, the cloning process will tend toward producing healthier and stronger beings, immune to old diseases. While healthiness on its face is a "good," such proponents will not be able to counter moral arguments against a person's right to be born of conjugal love. And, as supposed in this article, mental unhealthiness will spread. Written in the fiber of human DNA is a person's desire to be loved and raised by his natural parents. We can see evidence of this in the many difficulties that plague children of fatherless homes.

5. More legal problems relating to clones
Presumably, when a couple or person orders a clone from a catalog, the corporation will require legal indemnification once the clone leaves its possession. In other words, the buyer will have to sign a document absolving the company of liability if the clone should not meet expectations once bought or if the clone commits a crime, etc.

However, legal cases will arise in which the customer will accuse the corporation of deception if the clone fails to meet expectations. For example, if a teenage clone commits murder, the buying parents will seek recourse to hold the corporation liable in spite of the indemnifying document signed. The parents' attorneys will argue that the corporation willingly sold a flawed clone to parents who had no way of knowing the clone would have criminal tendencies.

There will also be cases in which the clones themselves will bring lawsuit against their manufacturers. The clones' attorneys will argue that the cloning corporation did not take proper care of the clone during development, which resulted in some health or social defect. These cases will add to the psychological disaster bound to raze at the hearts of clones, and at a society that spars with making sense of their identity as fully human or otherwise.

Refuting Planned Parenthood on viability and SCOTUS

THE VIABILITY ARGUMENT
The "viability" argument goes something like this: "A fetus can't survive on its own outside the womb, therefore, it's not a fully developed human." Therefore, says the Planned Parenthood supporter, abortion is morally acceptable.

For example, we see this from among Planned Parenthood's Arizona advocates, one of whom writes that a woman has the "right not to be forced to give birth and choosing not to carry a non-viable, non human being..."

With the scandal of Planned Parenthood having been caught on film negotiating the sale of infant body parts, such supporters of the organization are perhaps finding themselves having to seek refuge in such shelters as the "viability" argument. (By the way, you can keep abreast of the Center for Medical Progress and David Daleiden's legal battle surrounding Planned Parenthood at Life Legal Defense Foundation.)

So what's wrong with the viability argument?

• The presence of human life is not dependent on the subject's personal capacity to survive in any particular environment. For example:

• Even a post-live-birth baby cannot survive without a variety of dependencies and isn't "viable" of his/her own accord. A newborn baby cannot feed him/herself, dress him/herself, protect him/herself, nor a variety of other things that can easily determine that child's fate. Thus, a baby's ability to viably self-preserve is not a logical measure by which the presence of human life is determined.
• If the PP supporter is referring to a baby's ability to survive outside the womb even with medical assistance, there is another problem. Throughout history, the stage at which a baby has survived outside the womb gets younger and younger. The PP supporter finds him/herself arguing that human life comes into being at a different point, depending on whether that child was born in 2016 or 1916. The same supporter would have to argue that human life comes into being at a different point, depending on whether that child was born in Beverly Hills or the terrains of Somalia. Holders of this view must change their view of when they believe human life to exist by appealing to available medical technology. This is a nonsensical position.
• If the PP supporter is merely talking about respiration, there are clearly situations in which even an adult human cannot "viably" respire of his/her own accord, such as under water, in outer space, in a dense fire, amid toxic air, or other situations. Point being––ability to respire is not a logical measure by which the presence of human life is determined. It's absurd to say an adult who cannot respire in any given environment is less than human. 

THE SUPREME COURT ARGUMENT
The Supreme Court argument goes something like this: "The Supreme Court determined that a fetus isn't a human being." Thus, says the PP supporter, abortion is morally acceptable.

For example, we see this implied by NARAL Wisconsin, outlining what it believes to be good arguments to tell pro-lifers, including the following statements (emphasis mine): "The Supreme Court has said and I believe that legal personhood begins with birth" and "Embryos are a cluster of cells with the potential to develop into a human life if implanted into a woman's womb and brought to term."

So what's wrong with the Supreme Court argument?

• The presence of human life is not dependent on any verdict by the Supreme Court of the United States. For example:

• The Supreme Court itself has reversed its own prior verdicts. In fact, it has done so well over 100 times. Appealing to a source that denies its own immutability is hardly a satisfactory argument.
• Thus, appealing to the "Supreme Court" results in the nonsensical position that human life began in the womb prior to 1973 but not after 1973. It fails the same test as the "medical technology" fallacy described in the first section above: depending on when a child was born, the court's Roe v. Wade opinion may not even have existed. In fact, prior to 1789, SCOTUS didn't even exist. 
• As well, the Supreme Court's jurisdiction ends at the United States. Obviously, the majority of the human population is not subject to SCOTUS verdicts. Appealing to a single country's legal verdict as the benchmark for a philosophical argument for all of humanity is self-defeating when the court itself does not claim to govern all humanity. 
• In an ironic twist, Planned Parenthood doesn't even embrace verdicts of the Supreme Court. For example, in 2014, SCOTUS upheld a federal abortion ban involving second trimester pregnancies.  PP immediately sent out a press release which stated: "Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA) denounced the ruling."

CONCLUSIONS
It's not difficult to refute arguments built on shaky ground as we can see here. It may be a bigger challenge simply to find a mind willing to permit his/her views to pass scrutiny.

Regarding the matter of abortion, I would suggest the discussion must always be founded on whether or not that which is in the womb is a human life. Biological arguments are effective here. It is no secret that the when a zygote is formed at conception, the baby has a unique DNA, distinct from the mother. Even the government admits this:

The zygote contains all of the genetic information (DNA) needed to become a baby. Half the DNA comes from the mother's egg and half from the father's sperm. Fetal Development, U.S. National Library of Medicine, 2013) (see more references at Life begins at conception, science teaches, Live Action News)

The NLM is ironically part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services––the government entity that admitted oral contraceptives increase cancer risk in women. And here it admits the unique DNA identity of the enwombed infant from conception.

Building on the science from a philosophical perspective, we can observe the beginning of the life process with the merger of the egg and sperm (the zygote). And we can observe continuity from that stage until a person passes away. To assign human life's beginning at some other point along the empirical timeline inevitably proves arbitrary, inconsistent, and fails scrutiny. For some examples of these flawed arguments here at TCV, see Replies to Planned Parenthood arguments or Notre Dame professor's flawed argument for abortion.