As is often the case, because the amount of information on the web is virtually limitless, you run across the response to something that had run previously you hadn’t seen. That happened to me today when The Oklahoman ran a letter-to-the-editor responding to its editorial, “When the issue is abortion, plain English discouraged.”
The letter (boxing the editorial board’s ears) comes from “Julie Burkhart, Wichita, Kan.” Her allegiance is not noted. For the record, Burkhart (below right) has opened an abortion business (manned by “circuit-rider” abortionists) at the location of the late George Tiller’s infamous abortion clinic. Her response requires we know something about the editorial, which is, say we shall, written circuitously before arriving at a thoughtful conclusion.
The two players referenced in the editorial are Oklahoma County District Judge Bill Graves, who “recently upheld a state law requiring doctors who perform abortions to have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital,” and “Dr. Larry A. Burns, who challenged the Oklahoma law regarding admitting privileges.”
The editorial goes on to note that “Burns performs 44 percent of abortions that occur in Oklahoma. And he’s done them for 40 years. Yet Burns isn’t referred to as an ‘abortionist,’ although his practice clearly focuses on abortion.”
The editorial does a masterful job illustrating why Burns, who aborts and aborts and aborts, wants to be call a “doctor.”
Here is a lengthy quote:
Contrast “abortionist” with “doctor.” The latter term prompts images of an individual who strenuously works to save others, such as those putting their own lives at risk to combat Ebola in Africa today. The former term paints a far less noble picture. One word conveys immediate, concise meaning; the other actually dilutes clarity in this instance. Yet, when it comes to abortion, words that convey clear meaning are often left unsaid.
Burns says he has applied for admitting privileges at 16 hospitals. None have agreed. The clinical language of that description actually reduces comprehension. In plain English, the response by hospital officials indicates virtually no hospital wants to be associated with abortion on demand. It’s far less (politically) jarring to simply say that “admitting privileges were denied.”
In the abortion arena, words that convey clear meaning are often left unsaid.
So what is Burkhart’s lament? “Abortionist” is “hardly a neutral term.” Besides it’s used by you-know-who, so therefore it’s wrong to use the word because it is associated with the usual riff-raff (that would be us).
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Burkhart follows that up with these oh-so-reveal passages.
The term is used to imply that doctors who provide safe, legal abortions aren’t real physicians.
I plead guilty. I don’t believe that someone who makes a living killing babies is a “real” physician.
And then, this
Burns is a doctor of osteopathy.
What is osteopathy? Here’s one representative definition: “a branch of medical practice that emphasizes the treatment of medical disorders through the manipulation and massage of the bones, joints, and muscles.”
This is the background for a man who for 40 years has performed 44% of all the abortions in Oklahoma; Manipulation as is ripping heads from torsos, breaking joints apart , and shredding tiny muscles.
So what’s a better word (more “neutral,” right?) “for doctors who do abortions,” according to Burkhart?
“Heroes.”
You can’t make this stuff up.
LifeNews.com Note: Dave Andrusko is the editor of National Right to Life News and an author and editor of several books on abortion topics. This post originally appeared at National Right to Life News Today.
