The Kermit Gosnell Trial

This is the first time that I'm addressing the Kermit Gosnell murder trial, and I must admit a bit of embarrassment for that.   It's one thing for ABC News to ignore this horrible atrocity, it is another thing for me.  One problem is that I'm at a loss for words.  I have seen the images of the mutilated and in some cases decapitated, babies and am left in utter disgust.  And lets not delude ourselves, these were babies.  In one of the more despicable comments accredited to this "doctor,"  after he severed the spinal cord of one of his victims with a scissors at the base of the neck, he jokes to the attendant that the dead child was "big enough to walk me to the bus stop."  Now Gosnell, who evidently has a long history in the abortion industry as both a practitioner and an activist, awaits his fate.

That so many news outlets have chosen to ignore this trial does not surprise me.  The News now is not about gathering facts or reporting events but about creating a narrative; painting a picture with words, telling a personal story that makes you identify and sympathize with or vilify the subject or situation depending on the editorial staff's wishes.  This is not journalism, this is propaganda.  Even someone like Fran Lebowitz, no conservative she, laments New York Times articles on the Iraq War that begin with descriptions of dusty roads and lone soldiers suffering from the heat, jittery from dodging IED's, as if she were reading a short fiction or essay piece as opposed to the intended hard news story.  We need to feel emotionally engaged for the information to mean something to us, or so the theory goes.  I would argue that the goal is to persuade the reader to the politically correct view, and right now the PC view is that abortion is a right that needs to stay "safe" and legal, but most importantly legal with unlimited access.  So yes to stories of women who have to travel miles to get an abortion because they aren't available in their town, no stories about boy friends, and even parents, who pressure their girlfriend or daughter into getting one against their will.  Yes to stories of the bad old days of back ally abortions (the statistics for which many old time pro-choice activists admit were made up), no to real time accounts of dead babies and mothers in the age of Roe.

I can't get myself to post or even link to the pictures I've seen.  They're out there on the Internet, easy enough to find if you want to; news blackout or none.  I guess I don't want the believer to go and see these images, but the doubter.  The one who has been fed the lies that these are indistinguishable masses of tissue. I want you to see that these are babies.  At what point back on the developmental trail do we say that they aren't?  When does it become right to drown them in solvent or rip off their limbs?  How long will we allow the "narrative" that abortions are safe, sanitary and liberating for women keep us from seeing the truth.  Abortion is murder, and if you want to kid your self that some how this is not true, at least in the first two trimesters,  I'm not sure how you can convince yourself of that in this case.