Outrage at the border and other places

The other day, I posted a picture of a Philadelphia Planned Parenthood center on my Facebook Page with the following comment:

I don’t support separating mothers and children. And the border is a very dangerous place.

But there are other places where mothers and children are separated. Very dangerous places. Just a reminder. It was a not-so-subtle jab at the hypocrisy of people who were concerned about the welfare of immigrant children at the border, but who have a big problem seeing the humanity of children in the womb.

I see this all the time, with friends who wax eloquent about how our society lacks compassion for the little ones, cutting services and making it difficult for them to have enough to eat and access health care and have a good education, but who see nothing wrong with telling an expectant mother she can make that baby who was just diagnosed with Downs Syndrome in utero “optional.”

When you point that out, you are accused of conflating apples and oranges, or of deflecting attention from man’s inhumanity to man.

Which brings me to the hypocrisy of those who have compassion for the children who are separated from their parents at the border (a horrible thing that I have criticized and which I myself am trying to remedy through my immigration work) but who really don’t see that their support for abortion on demand is an equally cruel, viscerally inhumane position.

And I’m not the only one who sees it, which means I’m not as clever as I thought I was.

On Friday, Gary McCoy, a cartoonist for the Cagle Syndicate (full disclosure, they syndicate my columns as well) penned a searing and provocative cartoon that displayed a receptionist at a Planned Parenthood clinic on the phone complaining about those horrible Republicans ripping children from their parents, while at the same time informing a pregnant African American woman that “we’re running a two for one special if you’re having twins.”

Admittedly, that’s a controversial sock to the gut. It’s supposed to be, and it carries a lot more punch than my subtle dig at the “family planning” industry. But that’s what cartoonists and opinion columnists are supposed to do.

They are supposed to provoke, and make people think, and make them face their own positions and demons and ambiguities.

The readers of the Bucks County Courier Times, where the cartoon appeared, didn’t seem to agree.

They flooded the paper with phone calls of the pearl-clutching “how dare you!” variety, with some people so outraged that they broke down in tears. The editorial page editor apologized to his queasy, triggered readers in an “Explanation and Apology.”

But the cartoonist stood strong and responded, “I make no apologies for bringing to light the hypocrisy I see from those on the left advocating for the welfare of immigrant children while at the same time accepting the murder of children in the womb.”

He’s right, and that’s why I posted my own photographic “J’accuse” on social media.

This is personal to me. I’ve spent most of my life hearing people talk about how important it is to allow mothers to discard their babies if those babies are inconvenient, and of course they phrase it differently but it basically comes down to the same thing when you’re discussing “a woman’s right to control her body.”

But then they dare pretend to care about vulnerable creatures like the children who are being taken from their parents.

My point is this: You can only pretend to stand on the moral high ground when you have both feet on it.

If one foot is dragging in the mud of nihilism and narcissism (otherwise known as reproductive freedom,) that other foot planted high on the mountain of social justice for immigrants is going to slip and, boom, down you come from that high and mighty place.

I’m appalled at what is happening to those kids at the border. But if I had to choose the greater moral evil, it would be the sanctioned, wanton, legalized separation of a child who wants to stay with its mother, at least long enough to see the light.

And bravo to a courageous cartoonist and the clarity of his message.