{"id":231,"date":"2010-01-18T13:36:28","date_gmt":"2010-01-18T12:36:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/medical-ethics\/?p=231"},"modified":"2010-01-18T20:42:54","modified_gmt":"2010-01-18T19:42:54","slug":"protecting-innocent-lives","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/medical-ethics\/2010\/01\/18\/protecting-innocent-lives\/","title":{"rendered":"Protecting Innocent Lives?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last spring, George Tiller was killed.\u00a0 (I was going to say murdered, or assassinated, but both of those are morally and legally weighted…)\u00a0 Tiller was one of a very small community of doctors in the US willing to give late-term abortions, and it was for this that he was shot.\u00a0 Scott Roeder is currently on trial for murder in connection to the killing.\u00a0 What’s interesting is that he has been told by the judge that he will be able to plead necessity.<\/p>\n

According to the New York Times<\/em><\/a>, Kansas law allows defendants to plead that a deliberate killing should be tried as voluntary manslaughter if the defendant has “an unreasonable but honest<\/em> belief that circumstances existed that justified deadly force”.\u00a0 The presiding judge has made it clear that he is unwilling to bar Roeder presenting arguments and evidence based on this notion during the trial – though he has stopped short of promising to\u00a0allow them.\u00a0 Roeder’s defence – he doesn’t deny the killing – is that\u00a0his hand was\u00a0forced and that he was defending innocent lives.\u00a0 (See here for a report.<\/a>)<\/p>\n

It seems to me to be fairly straightforward to say that the protection of the innocent may mean we can violate or bend some of the rules of everyday conduct.\u00a0 For example, I’ve suggested elsewhere<\/a> that if\u00a0Smith and Jones work in a noisy factory, and\u00a0if\u00a0Smith is about to pull a lever that will result in Jones\u2019 death, and if Smith cannot hear our warnings, we might be entitled to throw a stone or small bolt at him to distract him and stop him, even though we would not dream of throwing anything at him in any other circumstance.<\/p>\n

So when examining Roeder’s action, we have to ask two questions: first, is the foetus really that important?; and, second, was his action proportionate?\u00a0 I’ll leave aside the first question, except to note that I tend to think that a termination of pregnancy is frequently, if not invariably, permissible (although also frequently, if not invariably, a matter of regret).\u00a0 But suppose I thought differently – that all ToP was a grievous wrong.\u00a0 Would that justify killing?<\/p>\n

No matter how hard I try to put myself in the shoes of the anti-abortion lobby, I can’t make that leap.\u00a0 There seem to me to be far too many ways to stop a person performing ToP procedures that stop far short of killing, even though it’s possible that violence of some sort against persons or property might be permissible at times.\u00a0 Bluntly, it’d’ve been enough to shoot Tiller in the arm, or to pour sugar into his petrol tank, or something like that.\u00a0 Even if I strain my imagination and sympathetic capabilities to their limits, though, that’s as far as I can go.<\/p>\n

I’m also puzzled by the Kansas statute.\u00a0 There’s a couple of oddities here.\u00a0 First, it’s strange to imagine that someone could stand up in court and say that, even though he believes that no reasonable person would find his action defensible, it is so anyway because he really<\/em> believes it is.\u00a0 Second, if I’ve understood the law aright, it would seem positively to offer protection to the unreasonable.\u00a0 Indeed, it gives no incentive at all to people to examine their own motives, since that might undermine their ability to endorse their own actions and beliefs honestly.\u00a0 Strange stuff indeed.<\/p>\n

UPDATE: The unreasonable-but-honest defence reminds me of something… something half-remembered… a sense of familiari…. \u00a0AH-HA! \u00a0Yes! \u00a0It’s the Chewbacca Defence!<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last spring, George Tiller was killed.\u00a0 (I was going to say murdered, or assassinated, but both of those are morally and legally weighted…)\u00a0 Tiller was one of a very small community of doctors in the US willing to give late-term abortions, and it was for this that he was shot.\u00a0 Scott Roeder is currently on […]<\/p>\n

Read More…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[511,591,475,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-231","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-in-the-news","category-life-and-death","category-politics","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nProtecting Innocent Lives? - Journal of Medical Ethics blog<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/medical-ethics\/2010\/01\/18\/protecting-innocent-lives\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Protecting Innocent Lives? - Journal of Medical Ethics blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Last spring, George Tiller was killed.\u00a0 (I was going to say murdered, or assassinated, but both of those are morally and legally weighted…)\u00a0 Tiller was one of a very small community of doctors in the US willing to give late-term abortions, and it was for this that he was shot.\u00a0 Scott Roeder is currently on [...]Read More...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/medical-ethics\/2010\/01\/18\/protecting-innocent-lives\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Journal of Medical Ethics blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2010-01-18T12:36:28+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2010-01-18T19:42:54+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"BMJ\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"BMJ\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/blogs.bmj.com\\\/medical-ethics\\\/2010\\\/01\\\/18\\\/protecting-innocent-lives\\\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/blogs.bmj.com\\\/medical-ethics\\\/2010\\\/01\\\/18\\\/protecting-innocent-lives\\\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"BMJ\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/blogs.bmj.com\\\/medical-ethics\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/ba3da426ed20e8f1d933ca367d8216fe\"},\"headline\":\"Protecting Innocent Lives?\",\"datePublished\":\"2010-01-18T12:36:28+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2010-01-18T19:42:54+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/blogs.bmj.com\\\/medical-ethics\\\/2010\\\/01\\\/18\\\/protecting-innocent-lives\\\/\"},\"wordCount\":602,\"commentCount\":21,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/blogs.bmj.com\\\/medical-ethics\\\/#organization\"},\"articleSection\":[\"In the News\",\"Life and Death\",\"Politics\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/blogs.bmj.com\\\/medical-ethics\\\/2010\\\/01\\\/18\\\/protecting-innocent-lives\\\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/blogs.bmj.com\\\/medical-ethics\\\/2010\\\/01\\\/18\\\/protecting-innocent-lives\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/blogs.bmj.com\\\/medical-ethics\\\/2010\\\/01\\\/18\\\/protecting-innocent-lives\\\/\",\"name\":\"Protecting Innocent Lives? 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