Wednesday, July 08, 2015

"Anti-abortion extremists are domestic terrorists."

If we spend our days fearing Muslims halfway across the planet, we won't think to look in our own backyards. Opposed to violence? Then the opposition needs to be uniform.

Anti-abortion extremists are domestic terrorists: They have created fear among providers that something violent can happen to any of them at any time, by David Cohen and Krysten Connon (Al Jazeera)

Part of Kristina Romero’s job as the regional director for several reproductive health clinics in the South, some of which offer abortion services, is to drive one of the clinic doctors to and from work. That way anti-abortion extremists can’t identify the doctor’s car.

One day, as Romero left her home, she saw a big poster with the doctor’s picture in a bullseye. There were more: The posters started in front of her house and continued along the entire route she took to get to the clinic.

To Romero, the posters were not only threatening to the doctor, but also to her. That they lined her route to work was a clear sign that anti-abortion extremists had followed her. The message, she explained, “was for me to be scared. It was for me. There’s nothing in my experience with the protesters that stands out more than that morning when I got up to go get the doctor and saw the doctor’s picture all over town.”

This is just one example of what abortion providers face in America today.

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