Tuesday, February 10, 2009

More on Abortion and Holocaust comparisons

The Crustier Curdmudgeon has several videos relating to the feminists silencing of Jojo Ruba at St. Mary's University.

The point is that when large swaths of humanity are deliberately dehumanized, it is easy to find a way to dispose of them and shroud the act in euphemisms and rhetoric. The Third Reich treated European Jews, Gypsies, and others as nonpersons, thereby justifying their efficient disposal in the gas chambers and ovens. Legal abortion on demand treats the unborn as nonpersons, thereby justifying their efficient disposal in the doctor’s office. There is a perfectly valid point of comparison here. Does it trivialize the Holocaust? By the numbers alone - approximately 45-50 million abortions in the United States since 1973 - legal abortion on demand certainly does make the Holocaust look trivial.

The issue, as always, comes back to the identity of the unborn. If they are not human persons, then 45 million abortions are merely the moral equivalent of 45 million tonsillectomies, and require no justification. If they are human persons, then 45 million abortions are the moral equivalent of 9 Holocausts, and there can be no justification.

But to the extent that an unruly gaggle of women successfully suppressed someone’s right to free speech, because they did not approve of the ideology of that speech, yes, some women can be compared to Nazis.