On Monday, political commentator Marc Lamont Hill spoke at Saint Bonaventure University in Allegany, New York. The topic of Hill’s speech was his latest book, Nobody: Casualties of America’s War on the Vulnerable, from Ferguson to Flint and Beyond.
Following his speech, Hill held a Q&A. One student, freshman Patrick Hauf, decided to address something glaringly absent in Hill’s book about the “war on the vulnerable” — abortion.
HAUF: When you talk about individual worth and the vulnerable in your book, you don’t talk about the issue of abortion. Abortion, scientifically, is proven to end human life, which is the most vulnerable of lives — the unborn in the womb. … So, would you say that abortion is a war on the vulnerable in America?
HILL: Well, uh … would you see abortion as relevant to the thesis of my argument?
HAUF: When you talk about the vulnerable in America, and there being a war on the vulnerable, I think that is definitely a war on the vulnerable, the most vulnerable there could possibly be.
Hauf argued that government funding of Planned Parenthood does indeed fit Hill’s thesis regarding state marginalization of the vulnerable. Hill then claimed that taxpayer funding of abortion is prohibited under the law. Hauf countered, correctly noting that the fungibility of money within organizations like Planned Parenthood essentially allows them to use taxpayer cash to fund abortions.
The conversation eventually circled back to the freshman’s original question: “Do you think abortion is a war on the vulnerable in America?”
Hill replied:
Do I think abortion is a war on the vulnerable? No, I don’t. I think that, I believe — what do I believe? It’s a complicated, nuanced argument. I don’t want … I don’t know if my personal belief on the issue is the point … but what I will say is I believe in women’s right to reproductive freedom, and their right to determine what to do with their own bodies.
The students cheered Hill’s response, but Hauf wasn’t finished. Given the thesis of African American marginalization, Hauf asked Hill if he believed abortion has harmed the black community. Hill replied:
Do I think that abortion has hurt the African American community? No. I think that joblessness has hurt the African American community; I think that mass incarceration has hurt the African American community; I think Jim Crow hurt the African American community — slavery was a big one.
… I would be curious to know what data there is, what evidence there is, what social science research there is that demonstrates that abortion has had a negative impact on the African American community.
Here’s the full audio exchange between Hill and Hauf:
Marc Lamont Hill made the point that his book wasn’t pro or anti-abortion because the topic simply wasn’t part of his thesis. It’s interesting to note, however, that in his response to Hauf’s questions, he asked for data to show that abortion was harmful to the black community.
This is the fundamental break between conservatives and progressives. One believes that abortion is the termination of innocent life, and the other does not. While Hauf clearly sees that the killing of black children harms the black community, Hill doesn’t see infants in the womb as children, and is therefore unable to even engage with Hauf’s line of argumentation.
Despite Hauf’s able reasoning, he was ultimately unsuccessful because he was trying to show a photograph to a blind man.
Unfortunately, this is where many conservatives find themselves when debating progressives on abortion. We want them to see what we see, but after decades of manipulation and distortion by the pro-abortion lobby, they are simply blind to what we know as reality.
The question then becomes: How does one get a blind person to see? If someone has been so brainwashed as to believe something that runs contrary to reality, words and reasoned arguments often fail to change perspectives. Other avenues are required to get the blind man to understand what someone with the gift of sight already knows.
Stepping outside the metaphor of blindness, visual evidence is the pro-life movement’s strongest weapon. We can talk to people about the horrors of abortion, or we can show people the horrors of abortion.
Live Action, an anti-abortion organization, put this idea to the test.
They filmed themselves showing pro-choice Americans a series of animated videos depicting various abortion procedures. The videos are narrated by former abortionist, Dr. Anthony Levatino, who describes what’s occurring as the videos progress. Many of the people who took part were visibly stunned by what they saw.
Sometimes, words cannot do justice to evil, and we have to get creative.
The following video is a compilation of the various segments from the Live Action videos: