What if your neighbor confessed to you on video that he tortured his child, murdered it, dismembered it, and sold the parts? He then told you that he was going to go home and do it to the rest of his children, and he did. Rather than go to the police, you use the video to discredit your neighbor by editing it, and posting it on social media in episodes, rather than going to the police right away.
Knowing that he murdered his other children, and is still free, what do you think of the moral and ethical values of your neighbor, who could have cooperated with the law to bring the murderer to justice, maybe before he killed his other children.
I asked a similar question in this forum, and by the responses, realized I had asked it to the wrong people. I realized that the people in this forum recognized the accusation a false, and a slander, and therefore the premise of my question had no standing.
Thank you for making that clear.
Here is the result of asking the same question to the right people.
Yesterday, (August 22) I drove past a Planned Parenthood where people outside were protesting. Across the road, were a few 'pro choice' people. I decided to stop and, ask my question to those claiming to protest against Planned Parenthood. I walked past the various signs, a lot of them colorful, and very descriptive of their point of view. A lot of them had the word 'murder' in them, and one person handed me a handbill with the 'description' of an 'abortion'.
I found it dangerous to actually go into the building because the kind of protestors that were closer to the door tended to question my morality in personal ways, referring to my woman's parts, one of them calling me a name I cant post on the forum.
I walked down the street and found a Black woman I thought was my age. She was with her husband who was waving a typical sign that said something similar to 'Abortion is Murder. I thought she would be a nice person to talk to, and I was right. Her, and her husband were co pastors of a church.
I sat on the planter beside her, and she stood up, and reached into the cooler she was sitting on, and asked if I wanted some water, or some Diet Coke. I thanked her and took some water. She asked me my name, and after she had a hard time pronouncing it, I told her that my friends call me Flower. Her first name is Dorothy, and she said since we are friends, you can call me Dot. For the rest of our conversation, this is how we referred to each other.
We talked about our growing up, she was born in Phoenix, and is one year older than me. We have both been married to our only spouse for more than 30 years. We talked about our up brining, family, children and grandchildren and she and I shared pictures on our phones. Her daughter is one of my favorite Christian music artists it turns out, and I talked about the inspiration I got from one of her songs. I shared with her my grand daughter doing a liturgical dance on Easter Sunday, and my grandson playing 'Morning Has Broken" to accompany her. My family is Lutheran, and her family is Evangelical. Of course, we talked about the religious stuff...are you saved, gave some personal witness to bolster our beliefs and the like...because we are Christian.
Then, we got to why she was there. She asked me how I felt about 'abortion'. I told her my feeling was that it should not be used as a means to control the numbers of a population, or birth control. She was well informed, not simply repeating the talking points, but pointing out fact, such as how 'population control' is carried out in China, the one child per family rule and the like. I told her I was against the kind of population control that forced abortions, sterilized women, and made people pay heavy taxes for having more than one child, but FOR the part of the program that focuses on women's health, contraceptives, breast exams, pap smears, 'rape care', and things like that. I told her that I have used the services in China, and Planned Parenthood services in the US, regardless of what other things they do. Dot then asked me would I support a murderer, even if he did good things, and I told her that as soon as I found out he was a criminal I would go to the law. She equated her protesting Planned Parenthood to this justification. Dot acknowledged that Planned Parenthood does good things, but the murder of unborn children is unacceptable to her.
She asked me if was aware of the videos that claim Planned Parenthood was torturing and murdering babies, dismembering them, and selling the parts...and again, Dot was well informed, walking me through her objections to what she believed is true in the videos. She cued up a video of a woman claiming to have worked for a "tissue harvesting company" so I could hear the nasty details. She was focused on the descriptions of how a particular person described the 'procedure', and noted how 'matter of fact' they were about describing such a gruesome thing, and in her mind showed how callous and heartless Planned Parenthood is concerning the unborn.
I then saw my opening...and jumped right in...being kind and respectful in all things. I asked her if her husband was always a pastor. She told me that before becoming a minister, he was a machinist. My husband is currently a machinist, and has worked for the same company all of our married lives.
I told her that sometimes when my husband comes home from work, he talks about his job as if I am a machinist too. He will talk about 'rebuilding a pump' for example, and although I have actually seen the pumps he has to rebuild, know what he means when he says 'rebuild a pump', and he may go into detail, but other than rebuilding it, I have no idea what else he is saying. However when he is among co workers, they talk about the same job in fine details, sequences, and laugh when 'Bob put the thingamajig before the whatzit and wondered why it didn't work" I told her that I am sure brain surgeons, or coroners talk about their jobs in gruesome details among each other too. What may be gruesome detail to us, would be 'matter of fact' to them because they do it everyday. We agreed that this may be true, but she did say that it was a gruesome way to 'kill unborn babies'...and I conceded, because I don't believe a fetus is an 'unborn baby'...but I didn't tell her that. My point is to understand, not to argue.
I told her that I have a dilemma about the people who put out these videos, and she, being a Christian would help me understand.
Then I asked her the question:
What if your neighbor confessed to you on video that he tortured his child, murdered it, dismembered it, and sold the parts? He then told you that he was going to go home and do it to the rest of his children, and he did. Rather than go to the police, you use the video to discredit your neighbor by editing it, and posting it on social media in episodes, rather than going to the police right away.
Knowing that he murdered his other children, and is still free, what do you think of the moral and ethical values of your neighbor, who could have cooperated with the law to bring the murderer to justice, maybe before he killed his other children.
She knew right what I was getting at, and went on defense and said that it is wrong to attack the people who brought killing babies to our attention. I countered, and used her point of view to explain how had the Center for Medical Progress gone to the police right away, babies would have been saved. If they (CMP) thought there was a crime, and was sure the criminals were going to do it again, they should have went directly to the police, and not post it in episodes on You Tube.
She tied to appeal to my Christianity, and asked me what Jesus would have done if he knew babies were being murdered by Planned Parenthood, and I answered her this way. I think Jesus would have gone to the police as soon as he found out that Planned Parenthood was murdering children (remembering again discussing this from her point of view) just like I believe you or I would have. I reminded her that she admonished me for 'supporting a murderer, even though that murderer had done good things'.
I told her, I am not attacking the Center for Medical Progress, nor defending Planned Parenthood. I am just wondering about how the hypocrisy of condemning and denouncing, and accusing Planned Parenthood of horrific crimes, and on the other hand giving hero status to the Center for Medical Progress who facilitated the horrible, by hiding the crime, and only using it to slander and destroy Planned Parenthood by editing evidence, and posting it in episodes on social media.
She said that they both were in the wrong, and I told her, from the way she sees it, I agree, both are wrong.
We parted ways with a hug and a wish for prosperity. Dot believes with a passion that she is saving babies. Although we don't agree, from her point of view she isn't radical, and feels it is her duty as a Christian to speak for the 'unborn'. I walked away thinking that dismissing people like my new friend Dot as nut cases, and equating them to the likes of Donald Trump or ISIS, or making fun of them like we do Pat Robertson, Benny Hinn, or claiming they all have an agenda like Mike Huckabee is the wrong approach.
Perhaps giving them our point of view in their own words may be the way to go.