"Murder," I asked, incredulous. "Who's talking about murder? We're talking about abortion."
She responded: "Murder is the deliberate taking of a human life with malice aforethought. How does abortion not qualify?"
To which I said, heated: "Humanness is a complex condition with a strong experiential component. I do not consider, for example, a week-old fetus “human” in any meaningful sense. It is not possessed by the flame that sets our species apart, at least not yet. It is alive, sure, but there’s a real distinction between a human life and a human being. Indeed, my recently departed friend Bryan has more humanity -- even as a 'dead man' (notice the phrase) -- than a globule of cells that will be expelled tomorrow from the womb of Teenage Mother X.
"Murder? Bah. You can't sincerely believe that abortion = murder. If you do, if you truly believe we are in the midst of a decades-long campaign of mass murder that has claimed tens of millions of innocent lives, then you are duty-bound to rise against this government, which is worse than Hitler’s, Stalin’s, or Mao’s.
"With the knowledge (so-called) that you possess, to do anything besides ferment armed revolution is the moral equivalent of sitting outside the gates of Auschwitz frowning, wagging your finger.
"Perhaps you think I am disgusting. Yet, if your conviction that abortion is murder is 100% honest, then you are infinitely more loathsome than I. You are a coward, a passive spectator of holocaust.
"Or. Or you are simply engaging in empty but highly inflammatory (and thus dangerous) rhetoric.
"So, which is it: Are you yellow, or are you a liar?"
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