Some Abortion Protestors Overstep Free Speech Bounds

To the editors:

I am shocked and dismayed that Jenny E. Heller (Dissent, March 16) would even begin to condone the sort of violent, intimidating protests that have occurred around family planning clinics.

It is not right when a group of anti-abortion individuals, a small minority of the population, scares people out of exercising what is currently a constitutional right. If you don't agree with abortion, that's fine. If you think it's wrong, that's your right. But don't tell me that your right to free speech enables you to harass, intimidate, and tacitly threaten with violence other individuals in society who are attempting to exercise their own rights.

In their righteous zeal, the lunatic fringe of the anti-abortion movement has forgotten their right to protest does not mean they can violently overturn a Supreme Court decision. Many in the pro-life movement do understand this, and the staff of The Crimson is right in calling upon them to control the more radical elements of their movement.

Michael O'Mary '99-'00

March 16, 1999

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Not All Abortion Foes Violent

To the editors:

Re Meredith Osborn's "Defending Roe v. Wade" (Op-Ed, March 3): Osborn says that on early Saturday mornings anti-abortion activists gather to "threaten, abuse and physically block" the entrance to the abortion clinic (on Commonwealth Ave.). Yet it is not these protestors in peaceful prayer who give cause for alarm--but rather Osborn and others as they shout "Racist, sexist, anti-gay, born-again bigots go away!" to drown out the prayers of the crowd.

Unfortunately Osborn does not content herself with her false portrayal of local pro-lifers as violent. She also blames the acts of anti-abortion murderers on pro-lifers in general. To be pro-life is to support all life. Those who are truly pro-life cannot condone the acts of those who do not respect and treasure all life. Osborn is right when she asserts that anti-abortion killers are indefensible. They are indeed as indefensible as any persons who choose one human life over another.

Marah C. Stith '02

March 14, 1999

Literary Theory Irrelevant

To the editors:

Michel Chaouli (Faculty, March 18) mistakes a political problem for a theoretical one. The fault is not in literary studies, but with literary studies. Academics in this field are not paid to produce anything, are not paid for the content of their work at all. Our society chooses to pay them to do what they do because they are a symbol of knowledge and tradition, regardless of how radical their theories might be. Really, it's only a kind of effete entertainment or, at best, private passion, for them. The truest words I ever heard in an English class were that the purpose of the English department is to help you increase your pleasure in reading. That's really it. Any claims that literary theory plays some ethical role form a chorus of pure wind-baggery which wilfully ignores political realities. We don't pay cagers to play basketball behind closed doors, so why should we pay these academics to do something equally inaccessible and pointless? I don't speak out of any ideological grudge and I could care less whether these academics continue to get paid for their self-gratification. But I find the "concerns" raised by Chaouli irresistibly absurd. The academics are a union of tailors trying to knit sewing machines.

Thomas C. Munro '97-'99

March 18, 1999