Were the deceptions by agents of Live Action in exposing Planned Parenthood wrong or right? That’s a question that Christopher Tollefsen and Christopher Kaczor have been discussing the past few days on at Public Discourse (see here, here, and here).
Today, Robert George weighs in on the legitimacy of lying in the fight against grave injustices:
Even apart from the invocation of religious authority, it seems to me that Tollefsen (with whom I am co-author of Embryo: A Defense of Human Life) is correct that lying is intrinsically wrong. So the only way I can think of to defend Live Action’s tactics is to argue that the utterances and actions of those who represented themselves as sex traffickers and prostitutes were not lies. My sense is that Rick is inclined to defend Live Action’s tactics in precisely this way. I don’t think it can possibly work when it comes to the utterances of the Live Action team. They stated things they knew to be false precisely with a view to persuading the Planned Parenthood workers that they were true. That’s just what a lie is. And their utterances were not made in a context of social conventions that could render a statement one knows to be false something other than a lie: such as when someone invites a friend out for a “quiet meal” on his birthday, only to deliver him to a big surprise party in his honor. Could Live Action have pulled off the sting without making false utterances?
I think the answer to that is probably yes. And that takes us to the next question. What about deceptions that do not involve false utterances? Some are plainly wrong. Others, however, seem pretty clearly not to be. Tollefsen points out that Aquinas, while condemning lying even in justified wars, held that military feints are not necessarily lies and can be morally permissible. Getting to just what it is that distinguishes the two is, I predict, where this debate is heading—and that, I believe, is just where it should head. Getting greater clarity on the issue would be valuable to all who wish to use every legitimate means, while avoiding every illegitimate one, in working to defend human rights, protect the common good, and fight grave injustices such as abortion.
Catholics certainly, but non-Catholic pro-lifers, too, should reject lying even in the greatest of good causes. What we fight for is just and true, and truth—in its unparalleled splendor and luminosity—is the most powerful weapon in our arsenal. It is the truth about the precious life of the child in the womb, and about the consequences of abortion for women and men, and the effects of abortion on families, on the medical profession, and on society more broadly, that will ultimately enable us to build a culture of life—a culture in which, as Fr. Richard John Neuhaus prayed, “every child will be protected by law and welcomed in life.”
February 15th, 2011 | 11:18 am
I have no problem whatsoever with the lying in this case. Saving lives is the goal, this is a war. It is important to expose the enemies tactics.
February 15th, 2011 | 11:30 am
Did those who hid jews and lies about it sin? Where they wrong for breaking laws and telling lies?
February 15th, 2011 | 11:55 am
Jim: No, this isn’t war. The state can declare war. Activist groups cannot (indeed, when they try to do so, we typically use a different name for it).
If your logic is that the harm being fought here (abortion) is more harmful than the harm being done here (lying) then why wouldn’t the same logic apply to say, kidnapping an abortionist. After all, if he’s held captive he can’t perform abortions. And if he isn’t killed then the evil committed (kidnapping) is smaller than the evil being opposed (abortion). So would you support Live Action nabbing abortionists and holding them in a bunker somewhere?
February 15th, 2011 | 12:08 pm
SD, Jim is talking about a spiritual war, a war between morality and a culture of death. More importantly this is a war of information. Means need to be employed to remove the varnish of Planned Parenthood’s lies and deceptive practices. These lies and deaths of unborn children come at the pricetag of $363 million dollars annually from tax payers. Remember, the government isn’t funding abortion when it’s America’s tax dollars. It’s you the tax payer who is funding this insanity. Planned Parenthood needs to be defunded.
February 15th, 2011 | 12:24 pm
This is interesting. How would this apply to a sting operation by the police? Would the office of the those in the sting operation permit lying? Or the fact that it is the state’s role to enforce its laws? I ask this in sincerity, since it is important. Perhaps Dr. George might say that Live Action is not the state, and therefore has no permission to lie in this case, or take on the role of law enforcement. That’s probably the best distinction. Of course, on the other hand, there are cases where the law is ignored (Dr. Gaskell), or not enforced well enough, and Live Action’s methods are the only recourse. This would seem to be the technique for most exposes’, even those by Dateline where they try and catch predators, etc.
February 15th, 2011 | 12:34 pm
Both sides can unite in opposing the sentiments and rhetoric of Jim Jacobson and his ilk.
Even when it’s not carried to such violence-inciting extremes, we ought to flag those individuals who refuse to acknowledge the room for reasonable disagreement over this thorny issue. Whether such refusal is motivated by rhetorical strategy, blind zeal, or mere simple-mindedness, it’s not something that anyone here should welcome.
February 15th, 2011 | 1:04 pm
Abortion is a grave evil and those who oppose it are not an ilk. We are people who see the truth of abortion and must proclaim life. This is a war of a kind. There is one side which is life and the other side which is death. There is no middle ground on the issue of abortion. Given the opportunity to operate in their day to day operations, Planned Parenthood has revealed the manner in which they respect law and professional ethic which is that they do not. This is a spiritual war as defined by the Holy Catholic Church. We should treat it as such.
February 15th, 2011 | 1:21 pm
If the website Mr. Hudon links us to is any indication of his views, they’re rather extreme, and he’s apparently incapable of acknowledging room for reasonable disagreement even over those extremes–that is, even within a pro-life perspective.
Click on Mr. Hudon’s name and view the latest post on that website (the video excerpt about Chuck Smith, as well as the commentary by “Catholic Lifer”.) I think it forcefully illustrates my point.
February 15th, 2011 | 1:24 pm
Coming from the Quaker tradition myself, I’m reminded of the Underground Railroad, which certainly involved organized and premeditated deception in order to achieve a morally laudable result. Apparently Quaker participants in the Underground Railroad found no contradition between this, and the strong emphasis in the Quaker tradition of letting one’s “yes be yes and no be no”, and I think they were on solid moral ground as they did so. There is an old joke where a burglar sneaks into a house and makes a noise, waking up the Quaker owner. The owner points a gun at the burglar and says, “Friend, I would not hurt thee for the world, but thee are standing where I am about to shoot!” This seems to me, to strike the appropriate balance between standing on Christian moral principles, without descending into an excessive legalism that Christ himself would not recognize. To wit, I don’t think one ought to seek out occasions to tell lies for a good cause, but if circumstances create a scenario in which one is presented with a choice, lying seems entirely appropriate to me, whether the cause is escaping slaves in the mid 19th century, or handicapping abortion providers in the early 21st.
My two cents.
February 15th, 2011 | 1:45 pm
Here are my comments about Church Smith, who without any case history recommended a Christian woman seek an abortion on live radio: There is no such thing as Christian and pro-life with exceptions. It’s an oxymoron. It’s a contradiction. That a Christian pastor, entirely lacking in the medical history of this case would in this instance cousel a women to have an abortion on a call-in radio program is deplorable and irresponsible. Does he realise that this woman could on his advice have an abortion before he even would be on the radio again? These unborn conjoined twins could very well die because of this incident and his bad advice. And there is no scriptural justification for what has been done and said here. This is entirely an instance of personal moral and theological interpretation run amok. Pastor Smith has in so many words simply recalled the abortion lobby’s promise of safe, legal and rare abortion. He also stated that he is opposed to abortion as it is being practiced today. As it is being practiced today??? If not entirely prohibited, under what conditions would abortion be permissable? When should it be practiced? The answer that should be obvious is NEVER. Apparently Pastor Chuck Smith thinks that some abortions are good abortions.
February 15th, 2011 | 1:45 pm
@C. Ehrlich: Perhaps you would be so kind as to fill us in as to the sentiments and rhetoric of Mr. Jacobson we should unite against. I’ve never heard of him. Oh yes, add why it is necessary to condemn him if there are many like me.Wouldn’t it be better to find things we agree on? That is, that we are for? For example, I’m for human rights (without age or disability limits). Are you?
I wonder if Planned Parenthood advocates would publicly tackle the same kind of issues as are tackled in this set of articles.
February 15th, 2011 | 2:14 pm
When we consider the issue of whether lying is ever right, we must engage these examples from Scripture:
* The Hebrew midwives lied to Pharaoh on behalf of the baby boys they were commanded to kill, and God blessed them for it (Exodus 1:15-21).
* Rahab lied to the city fathers of Jericho on behalf of the Hebrew spies (Joshua 2) and God does not call her disobedient but blesses her for her faith (Heb. 11:31).
* A prophet of the LORD tells King Ahab something happened that didn’t really happen in the process of dramatically illustrating his message from the LORD (1 Kings 20:35-43).
* Samuel the prophet is afraid of King Saul and God provides a way for him conceal the true purpose of his trip (1 Sam 16:1-5).
February 15th, 2011 | 2:21 pm
@ Mr. Melendez,
In a discussion about abortion, we should all take issue with the person who claims that our state of war against our enemies justifies doing what would otherwise be immoral. When such a person mentions the “enemies,” it’s far from clear that he has in mind mere spiritual entities. It’s also far from clear that his justification applies merely to lying, as lying is not the only thing thought to be justifiable in a state of war.
February 15th, 2011 | 2:44 pm
Stuart Koehl, are you around? I’d be interested in your opinion on this.
February 15th, 2011 | 4:08 pm
@C. Ehrlich: So you read that much into three sentences? I see no reason to agree with him on the lying part, but I have far too little information to make further judgment. Just what are you reading into those sentences? War is a commonly used term to indicate a wide range of hostilities in English from refusing to talk to someone to blowing things up. Enemies has an even wider set of meanings including the simple, “I don’t like him.” I give him little credulity for the simple reason I don’t know what he is saying past the lying part. I see no need to condemn him, let alone whoever his “ilk” are. But then maybe you know more than the sentences he wrote here. Please let us know if you do.
I am also surprised you do not know that talk of spiritual warfare, as in our daily struggle reaching for God, is not uncommon among religious people. But I don’t know if that is what Mr. Jacobson is referring to.
February 15th, 2011 | 6:15 pm
Let’s not be simple, Mr. Melendez. Such talk of enemies in war and the suspension of moral norms is just as irresponsible as drawing rifle sights on abortion clinics or a Tucson congresswoman. And it’s hard to take seriously your suggestion that perhaps Mr. Jacobson thinks lying is justified for a spiritual battle.
Pro-lifers lose whatever moral high ground they might have had when they go to such lengths to defend what they ought to be firmly denouncing.
February 15th, 2011 | 6:39 pm
I guess “the war on drugs” is not a war either.
February 15th, 2011 | 7:48 pm
Lets way into this by examining first the fact that we have 53 million dead babies with about 4,000 more each day.
Imagine in Germany the arguments around the dinner table when one admits to lying to an official who was doing his duty according to the legal law of the land in an attempt to save a life. The father says no, we should never lie because that is evil and it is legal to take these people away to death camps. In fact, you could be taken away to the same place if you are found to be “lying.”
I would imagine that this conversation did happen with Christian people in Germany. Yet here we see people who are talking about lying as if that is somehow evil when it exposes the total corruption inside these death camps. I know, everyone yells not to use germany and death camps as an example, but frankly I think they are lying themselves because deep down they know something is very rotten about what we are doing. The difference is the location of the human being. If the baby were as little as 24 inches over, it would be illegal to kill it. Of course it is also about age. We can kill the human being, but only up to a certain time in development. A baby outside the womb who has gone full 9 months is about as helpless as can be. It cannot survive on its own and it is certainly a great hardship on the parents as they wake to feed it every few hours and to change its pants. There is no doubt that from the moment of conception it will only grow to be one thing, a human being. It will never be a fish or dog. In many ways, it is just like Germany in the numbers of people who want to look the other way and hold on to the fact that judges, just like Germany, made this all legal and nice.
It is interesting to me that the Democratic Party who supported slavery from the founding documents, went to war to keep it, and killed and lynched blacks after the war and freedom was given by law in our Constitution, is the same one now supporting abortion and keeping it alive. Even FDR knew of the beatings and lynchings while he was our President and did nothing because he feared his own Democratic Party. For that I will never forgive him. He did not fear the KKK, but Democrats and this was 80 years after they blacks were freed in the constitution by the 14th amendment.
February 15th, 2011 | 7:49 pm
To say that almost any strategies are acceptable if they save innocent lives is certainly to adopt utilitarianism–that is, to say that “lying in this case is all right because it leads to the greater good” of saving lives.
Well, that stance is a problem in itself, I think. But let’s say that we do all accept this utilitarian view. Then we would ask: Did it succeed even based on its own premises? That is, did the sting action of Live Action save any innocent lives? Is Planned Parenthood shutting down? Are they even going to lose any federal money?
February 15th, 2011 | 8:00 pm
Live Action was not trying to expose Planned Parenthood’s legal activities – abortion, they were trying to expose PP’s illegal activities – knowingly circumventing state laws regarding sexual abuse and trafficking of minors.
While I applaud the effort to lift truth as high as possible I wonder if I’m not throwing pearls before swine when I try to apply absolute truthfulness to every imaginable situation.
This whole dilemma over “false utterances” exhibits a hyper-morality parallel to prudish Victorian concerns over kissing.
February 15th, 2011 | 10:24 pm
I sincerely doubt that Father Neuhaus would have broken into one solitary bead of forehead sweat over this issue.
It is hardly a moral quandary requiring this level of conversation. If your daughter or wife or mother had been raped by a serialist, would you even care if the detective’s veracity when questioning the suspect might be suspect? In the heat of a firefight (ask a soldier), are you going to question every enemy charging up the hill you hold if he believes in all his military leader tells him?
54 million human beings have been holocausted, and that anyone is wondering if maybe PP was somehow wronged into admitting they also will break any law to further their eugenic agenda, borders on the ludicrous. If pro-deathers were honest, they would simply say–”Yeah, our hand was in the cookie jar. So what?”
But they don’t. They try for the high moral ground.
Pete got it right:
Live Action was not trying to expose Planned Parenthood’s legal activities – abortion, they were trying to expose PP’s illegal activities – knowingly circumventing state laws regarding sexual abuse and trafficking of minors.
My only correction to his statement would be replacing “state laws” with “humanity.”
We have entered the “Endarkenment” and seem completely unaware.
February 15th, 2011 | 10:41 pm
If not entirely prohibited, under what conditions would abortion be permissable? When should it be practiced? The answer that should be obvious is NEVER.
So the mother’s life should be endangered for the sake of the child’s?
February 15th, 2011 | 10:50 pm
Ends do not justify the means
There are those who condemn elements of Islam because ‘they’ allow lying to promote Islam. How is this different?
The truth sets us free
Our battle is against powers and principalities-tell me how lying helps us in this kind of war when Satan is the Father of lies?
IS not truth as precious as life?
“Father, consecrate them in the truth….”
February 15th, 2011 | 11:19 pm
I think the examples of the Hebrew midwives and Rahab, mentioned earlier by another poster, end much of this discussion. It has been revealed to us by God that in some situations lying is not only acceptable but praiseworthy. God did not give us a commandment against lying, he gave us a commandment agaisnt bearing false witness – lying in a legal setting for the sake of gaining personal advantage.
I suppose someone could make the argument that God allows us to lie in some circumstances, but not in the circumstances under discussion. I throw that out there as a theoretical possibility. It is difficult for me to imagine how someone could defend that position with a straight face.
Those who argue that it is always wrong to lie are giving philosophical concepts created outside of a Christian context greater weight than Christian revelation. It is depressing to think that discourse among those who claim the title of Christian could ever sink to that level, but in this case it has.
February 15th, 2011 | 11:40 pm
I keep hearing about how the ends does not justify the means. What means? The means here was play acting. Neither Lila Rose or anyone in Live Action broke any existing law in their actions. I might add that the command to not bear false witness against ones neighbor was a decree regarding purjury. Thou shall not bear false witness against your neighbor means precisely that; false witness. Live Action has born true witness. This pro-life group has not testified to anything in civil or criminal court but they have not made one unsubstantiated charge in the court of public opinion. These videos are damning because they are true. Planned Parenthood has been exposed I tell you, doing what they do, which is break law and policy which in turn exposes young woman and girls to great harm and exploitation. Lila and her team should be gratefully applauded for their bravery.
February 15th, 2011 | 11:52 pm
A young Pol in the mid 20st century once wrote poetry which was subversive to communists who held power in post World War II Poland, poems intended to stir up feelings of intellectual and cultural rebellion and human and religious freedom, which of course was strictly forbidden by the state. These poems were published under a false name, a pseudonym, truly an obviously deceptive practice! That young Pol’s name was Karol Wojtyla who the world knows now as Pope John Paul II!
February 16th, 2011 | 12:30 am
Cross-posted at Mirror of Justice…
None of these rhetorical games about this or that admirable Catholic who used deception at one point or another gets around the fact that not only did the Live Action folks lie, they tempted others into sin.
If we all agree that it is wrong to aid in prostitution and trafficing in underage girls then the PP staffers in these cases did something wrong – likely committing a mortal sin. And if we agree that their intent to do so means that they are guilty of mortal sin, even though in fact they were dealing with actors and not actual pimps/prostitutes, then clearly the scenarios set up by Live Action had the effect (anticipated – otherwise Live Action would not have gone into the clinics in the first place) of tempting human beings into mortal sin under conditions in which it was likely that they would follow through and commit such sins.
The fact that these clinic workers are likely just as guilty of many other mortal sins is of no matter – its not given to human beings to tempt other human beings into grave evil for any purpose – even indeed a “higher” purpose.
A person who hides Jews in WWII and lies about it to Nazi agents, isn’t tempting those Nazi agents into an act of evil. Future popes writing poetry under pseudonymns aren’t tempting anyone into acts of evil. So even if we grant (which its not all clear that Catholic teaching allows) that in some cases in can be morally acceptable to lie, surely it is not in any circumstances whatsoever acceptable to tempt another person into sin of their own.
Live Action wanted to show PP workers doing evil things. So they lied to them to get them to do evil things on camera. And that doesn;t set off your moral spidey sense? Really? The souls of those PP workers are still loved by God, and were further separated from God by the scenario that Live Action set in motion.
Secular law of course doesn’t have the moral clarity that Catholic moral teaching does on these matters, but even still the law recognizes a boundry line in undercover police work between legal deception and illeagal entrapment, which is to say, inducing someone to commit a crime that they would not commit in the absence of the entrapping decpetion.
February 16th, 2011 | 2:26 am
The problem I think is that a lie would be valid if it directly saves a life. As said above, Hebrew Midwives or hiding Jews. However, this isn’t directly saving one-it’s trying to confront someone with a rare if not outlandish situation (what person who did that would actually go to planned parenthood?) and using it to cast doubts on the organization itself. Manufactured outrage.
I don’t see the point of it at all. It’s not like there are many ways to argue legitimately against planned parenthood that you need to do bad street theater to try and entrap individual employees.
February 16th, 2011 | 6:41 am
St Augustine says in the De Mendacio
“For that death which men are foolishly afraid of, who are not afraid to sin, kills not the soul but the body, as the Lord teaches in the Gospel; whence He charges us not to fear that death: but the mouth which lies kills not the body but the soul. For in these words it is most plainly written, “The mouth that lies slays the soul.” [Wisdom 1:11] How then can it be said without the greatest perverseness, that to the end one man may have life of the body, it is another man’s duty to incur death of the soul?”
He also quotes Psalm 5 “You hate all who do wrong; you destroy those who tell lies,” where lying is singled out as a special object of God’s vengeance, for liars he not only hates, but also destroys.
Both in the De Mendacio and in the Ad Consentium, St Augustine points out that the midwives, Rahab &c are commended for their humanity, but their lying is passed over in silence, in the “times of ignorance.”
February 16th, 2011 | 8:16 am
I am bemused that we are having this conversation at all. I suppose that it’s always good to clarify things, but — really?? Are these theologians, professional and non-professional, seriously asserting that it is immoral to be an undercover policeman or an undercover journalist? How about private investigators? How about “secret” inspectors? I had friends who used to go into fast food restaurants pretending to be ordinary customers while taking notes for the parent companies — isn’t that a deception? If so, then a lot of good Christians and others are going to be out of a job.
Funny, but I have not heard this sort of outcry against what is common in television news. I saw an expose about duct cleaning on national television a few weeks ago — two different homeowners had their ducts cleaned, pretending they were just nice old folks who did not have hidden cameras in their basements and that they were paying the bill themselves. That is a lie by omission. Are they Hell-bound too? It is either moral to do that kind of thing, or it’s not — whether the intent is to expose duct cleaners who take a few hundred dollars for doing nothing, or an abortion clinic who does not report statutory rape.
There is a difference between this sort of deception and elaborate sting operations set up to catch online predators — who, one can argue, would never have done anything to anyone if they had not been drawn along by people pretending to respond to their creepy posts. I will take any of these arguments seriously the moment people start applying them across the board.
February 16th, 2011 | 8:45 am
Ryan Larson wrote, “I suppose someone could make the argument that God allows us to lie in some circumstances, but not in the circumstances under discussion. I throw that out there as a theoretical possibility. It is difficult for me to imagine how someone could defend that position with a straight face.”
I was going to respond, but then sd already did: “None of these rhetorical games about this or that admirable Catholic who used deception at one point or another gets around the fact that not only did the Live Action folks lie, they tempted others into sin.”
The biblical examples of the midwives and Rahab obviously do not apply to the current incident. Face it: Many of you are defending lying (which is a sin), entrapment (which is at least questionable), and tempting others into sin (another sin), because you think the pro-life cause is important enough to warrant these actions.
February 16th, 2011 | 8:54 am
sd nails it.
And, for Catholics, proof-texting from Scripture is an insufficient response.
February 16th, 2011 | 9:17 am
Wait — I’m open to the argument that LiveAction’s actions are tarnished because they tempted others to sin — but what sin, exactly, did they tempt anyone to?
What they got people to do was to honestly explain what they would do if confronted with a particular ethical dilemma. They didn’t actually tempt anyone to do those unethical things. The effect they had on their targets was no different than someone posing a dilemma in an ethics class, except that they got them to talk more freely by deceiving them into believing that their hearers would be pleased by an unethical answer.
What “sin” did the targeted PP workers actually commit in explaining their already existing willingness to cooperate with evil?
So before I’ll buy the idea that their actions were tainted by leading others into temptation, I’ll want to know what they were tempting the others to do.
February 16th, 2011 | 9:23 am
I’m with Gail – deception in the name of duty is not evil for undercover cops or investigative journalists, or anyone else who needs to hide their identity in order to get at the truth (like someone who goes into a fast food restaurant pretending to be a customer).
February 16th, 2011 | 9:32 am
@Liam: Not quite. Mortal Sin requires one more thing: the act must actually be bad (learned that for First Confession ;^). Because of that, there was no sin committed in the response precisely because the Live Action folks were deceiving them. I gather either sd isn’t Catholic or has forgotten his basic catechism. Then there’s the entire problem with the requirement that the PP responder knew it was evil, though that’s more subtle what we Catholics call invincible ignorance.
But then sd’s argument (though recast in a pseudo-Catholic mold) is an old one, like the speeding motorist who complains that the motorcycle cop was cheating because he hid behind the billboard.
No, the argument is over whether it was legitimate for the Live Action actors to “lie” in their presentation. That the posted videos show an illegal response is clear provided the actors were real, which, by the way, is why no one has been or can be arrested. (In a drug sting, for example, drugs must change hands. The police involved are actually committing an illegal act but then that’s why the double-zero is in front of their numbers.)
February 16th, 2011 | 9:48 am
“Pro-lifers lose whatever moral high ground they might have had when they go to such lengths to defend what they ought to be firmly denouncing.”
You reveal yourself, Mr. Erhlich. You are more interested in thought crimes than in real ones, especially when people disagree with you. The trouble is the thoughts you object to appear to be your own (psychology calls it projection).
Apparently lying is a worse act (you do know it isn’t against the law in this case, right?) than killing fetuses (which unfortunately is also not against the law).
I agree, let’s not be simple here. Save the demonizations for people who agree with you. What part of “I don’t know,” do you have trouble with? And when did you learn to read other people’s minds?
February 16th, 2011 | 9:56 am
@sd > @cross-posted at Mirror of Justice wrote:
“Live Action wanted to show PP workers doing evil things. So they lied to them to get them to do evil things on camera. And that doesn;t set off your moral spidey sense? Really? The souls of those PP workers are still loved by God, and were further separated from God by the scenario that Live Action set in motion.”
This is the most ridiculous take on the situation to date.
LA wanted to expose practices ALREADY IN PLACE, ALREADY PART OF THE SOP.
LA wanted to expose PP’s STANDING POLICIES that disregard state laws protecting minors.
Forget all this sin mumbo-jumbo. This is about breaking state laws protecting minors. The perennial stream of allegations against PP issuing from a broad spectrum of citizens and from diverse regions has reached a critical mass that must be investigated. Can such a broad sampling of citizens, some former employees of PP, all be lying about PP’s unlawful practices regarding minors? Seems unlikely. So now the allegations are more than suspicion, more than possible – it is probable. Now to prove this probability true an actual occurrence must be recorded – recorded so that it is not merely one’s word against another’s. It is clear from the taped “probe” that the PP employee was not coerced or tricked into breaking any laws. She offered ‘solutions’ that were already in place – SOP. She did not come up with this ‘work around’ on the spot on her own initiative as a personal favor. She was conducting business, business that is clearly against the law.
Are people seriously considering LA’s evidence exposing the trafficking of minors to be null and void because the investigators “pretended” to be a pimp and prostitute? Are you serious? “Pretending” carries weight against human trafficking? Are you serious?
February 16th, 2011 | 10:01 am
Mike wrote:
“@Liam: Not quite. Mortal Sin requires one more thing: the act must actually be bad… Because of that, there was no sin committed in the response precisely because the Live Action folks were deceiving them.”
Not so. Say I have an ipod and you have an ipod. I see mine laying on the table when you’re out of the room and mistakening think its yours when its really mine (mine is really in my briefcase). I say to myself “hey! free ipod!.” and promptly pocket the device. I’ve clearly sinned. I thought the ipod in question was your property, I knew it was wrong to steal your property, and yet I still chose to take something that I (mistaken) thought was yours. The fact that I’m an idiot doesn;t change the moral calculus of my action – I’ve still chosen to do wrong.
Also:
“But then sd’s argument (though recast in a pseudo-Catholic mold) is an old one, like the speeding motorist who complains that the motorcycle cop was cheating because he hid behind the billboard.”
No, not at all. The cop hiding behind a billboard doesn’t tempt you to speed. He just observes and if you break the law takes action. But a cop posing as a drug dealer who sells you cocaine so he can record you snorting it on videotape tempts you into drug use. Its a night and day difference.
The issue of temptation wouldn;t be there had LiveAction simply hid cameras in PP office, recorded what went on there, and released video evidence of wrongdoing. but that’s not what they did – they deliberately manufactured the occasion where wrongdoing could happen – fully expecting that the PP workers (huiman beings mind you, whose eternal fate hangs in the balanbce) to sin.
February 16th, 2011 | 10:03 am
Planned Parenthood has been exposed I tell you, doing what they do, which is break law and policy which in turn exposes young woman and girls to great harm and exploitation.
What bothers me about this debate is that this statement is taken as accepted truth.
A) That a few people in a few PP offices acted shamefully does not prove that PP endorses their behavior.
B) How many posters here have considered the fact that PP fired the clinic manager in New Jersey, and contacted the FBI before Live Action even released the videos?
February 16th, 2011 | 10:05 am
Mr. Melendez apparently has a problem with denouncing violent and violence-inciting rhetoric over an issue for which, as we should all concede, there is room for reasonable disagreement.
Though it’s encouraging to see what some here are saying, honesty isn’t the only virtue getting discarded by overly zealous and short-sighted pro-life activists.
February 16th, 2011 | 10:15 am
Again, I have no issue with that Lila Rose and Live Action have done in these videos. None! Like one person noted, I can hardly believe that we are having these conversations. These are not theorhetical issues, these are real issues surrounding real videos taken in real abortion mills. Just feet from where Lila took her first videos, real people, real unborn children were being ripped apart behind closed doors. I have argued with other people about her actions, other people who called her a phony, and unethical, but not for posting videos made undercover. No, these people called against her her condemnation of violence and lawlessness in the pro-life movement. I have called out these proponents of violence myself. I have been banned from forums, I have had threatening comments left on my blogs and been threatened with legal action. I will not condone violence and neither will I condone moral cowardice. The actions and words of these proponents were criminal. What I find here is simply self serving sanctimonious cowardice. Lila has broken no rules of Planned Parenthood, broken no law of the state or local ordinances, has committed no sin against God in these videos. She has no born false witness against her neighbor. What she has done is brightly exposed the false witness of Planned Parenthood to the public. She has exposed the defrauding of the American government and the American people. And yet the strong hand of the abortion lobby would silence her voice and so too would the self sanctifying scrupulosity of a few moral pacifists. My name is Brian F Hudon and I am willing to stand behind Lila Rose and these Live Action videos that expose Planned Parenthood. Let those who oppose her and her videos stand behind their opposition with their name and reputation.
February 16th, 2011 | 10:25 am
Lila Rose’s actions have unsettled the calm about Planned Parenthood and may lead to their defunding. She did not use physical violence to accomplish this. For these reasons, she has done amazing things. Period. Anyone who peacefully works to bring down this evil organization is a hero in my book.
February 16th, 2011 | 10:42 am
Ken, Planned Parenthood fired the worker only after they allegedly made the report to the FBI and then only after the Live Action went public. This organization funds birth control with abortion money. I think that on this basis alone, any Catholic should question their moral character as an organization.
February 16th, 2011 | 11:26 am
Brian, they first claimed they’d been victim of a hoax, then acknowledged the manager had behaved “repugnantly” and fired him. Neither action suggests they approved of either his behavior or the behavior of the other employees caught on tape, or that the organization’s leadership approves.
If the subject is deception, let’s not deceive ourselves about their culpability, or attempt to deceive the public. Let’s not say the ends justify the means. Time and again we Christians act no better than the people we criticize.
February 16th, 2011 | 12:08 pm
Gail F
There is all the difference in the world between a lie on the one hand and evasion, equivocation and mental reservation on the other, which are permissible, in some cases.
In lying, one states what one knows to be false; in the other cases, ons simply induces a false belief in another.
An undercover police officer or inspector is under no obligation to announce the fact. If asked, he must not directly deny it, but if he simply says something like, “What do you think?” or “If I was, would I tell you?” that is merely evasion, not lying. Or, if asked if someone is in the office and I reply “He went out at 10,” I need not add that he returned shortly afterwards; or I can say “he is not here,” meaning he is not in the same room as me. In none of these cases is a falsehood affirmed to be true; they are mere deceptions.
February 16th, 2011 | 12:39 pm
In none of these cases is a falsehood affirmed to be true; they are mere deceptions.
So it’s OK to deceive, just not to lie to deceive? What sense does that make?
I applaud Live Action and find no fault with its tactics. I see nothing wrong with deceiving people in order to expose and thereby prevent wrongdoing.
February 16th, 2011 | 1:50 pm
C. Ehrlich,
No, there is no room for reasonable disagreement about abortion, for the most part. Either the fetus is an innocent human life or it isn’t. If it is, killing it is cleary wrong. There can be no reasonable disagreement about whether or not anyone should be allowed, under most circumstances, to take an innocent life. I say “for the most part” and “under ordinary circumstances” because there is the exceptional case of threat to the mother’s life. The prohibition against killing is not absolute. There are such things as killing in self-defense, collateral damage in a just war, the death penalty for heinous crimes, etc. To my mind, abortion to save the life of a woman is such an exceptional case, though reasonable people (and the Catholic Church) disagree with me on that.
February 16th, 2011 | 1:54 pm
I’m with Ken, it is scholastic hair-splitting to distinguish between lying and deception. If we are ok with deception tactics, then I don’t think we can engage handwringing about “lying either.
February 16th, 2011 | 2:14 pm
Nice try, sd. Here’s the CCC:
“1859. Mortal sin requires full knowledge and complete consent. It presupposes knowledge of the sinful character of the act, of its opposition to God’s law. It also implies a consent sufficiently deliberate to be a personal choice. Feigned ignorance and hardness of heart do not diminish, but rather increase, the voluntary character of a sin.”
As I was taught at age seven:
1. It must be seriously wrong.
2. You must know it is seriously wrong.
3. You do it anyway.
What you are talking to is the “sinful character of the act” not the sin. Yet here, no such act occurs, precisely because the actors are not what they suggest they are. If the responder was a serious Catholic, she would have nothing to confess but considerable food for thought. I recommend the CCC to you as a reference.
Your argument is the entrapment argument. It presupposes that the responder would have done the right thing if only she had not been deceived.
February 16th, 2011 | 2:23 pm
“Mr. Melendez apparently has a problem with denouncing violent and violence-inciting rhetoric over an issue for which, as we should all concede, there is room for reasonable disagreement.”
Demonization pure and simple. I have no such problem. I do have a problem with people claiming “violent and violence-inciting rhetoric” exists when there is no such evidence except their own claim about the state of mind of the person demonized. Maybe the accused is claiming that, maybe not. I can’t tell based on two words with very broad meanings. Now if the accused had said, “Kill all the abortionists,” I’d be all over him, hand in hand with C Erhlich, but he didn’t say that.
February 16th, 2011 | 2:52 pm
Ehrlich, so we all should agree with you that there is room to disagree about whether abortion, the taking of life, can be acceptable, as you have argued time and time again, but there is no room to argue about lying in certain circumstances, particularly if one uses language that offends your delicate palate. Spoken like a true pro-abortionist. I await your next dictat.
February 16th, 2011 | 4:29 pm
Michael
Not pro-abortionist . . .
Pro-deather. That is what they are, and if you press them, they will visit that attitude upon you as well.
Their position is a cancer to humanity. They are, however, a remarkable tribute to how far the eugenics of Sanger and her descendants have progressed.
February 16th, 2011 | 4:35 pm
It is amazing even having this conversation about the morality of lying when talking about Planned Parenthood abortion mills. What was exposed was a group of people so lost in morals that they do not seem to have any idea of what is right or wrong anymore. When you are slaughtering babies for your income, what is wrong with helping others to evade the law. So lets attack those who expose the total corruption of the abortion mils because we have to defend the slaughtering of babies at all costs. There were so many stupid arguments made here to get the butchers off the hook that I doubt even the Germans went that far to act ignorant of the slaughter.
February 16th, 2011 | 5:11 pm
There are a number of zealots here who are not content simply to affirm that their particular pro-life views are true. Instead, for whatever reason, they are also committed to the idea that whoever disagrees with them is also being unreasonable. That is, they cannot see (or they at least claim the inability to see) any room for reasonable disagreement. For such ideologues, I don’t think there’s really much point in engaging them with them. It’s best rather to mark them out and steer clear.
That said, it becomes everyone’s concern when these sorts of people start to advocate their position with violent and violence-inciting rhetoric, and to defend such behavior. Such is the case when a person claims that pro-lifers are at “war,” and are thereby licensed to violate ordinary moral prohibitions in dealing with their “enemies.” Thoughtful people on both sides of the debate should denounce such rhetoric.
February 16th, 2011 | 6:22 pm
When you are slaughtering babies for your income
Pro-deather.
What they’re trying to do is give women better lives, and until we acknowledge that, they won’t listen to our criticism. In other words, unless we’re willing to obey God and love our enemies, they won’t recognize us as followers of Christ.
February 16th, 2011 | 8:57 pm
Ken,
What makes you believe they are trying to give women better lives?
I don’t believe that. I don’t think they care about women at all.
In fact, I believe that if that really was a pimp – instead of an actor – those Planned Parenthood people would have helped the pimp to exploit those women.
Loving someone is not the same as standing by and doing nothing when someone is behaving in ways that hurt innocent people.
February 16th, 2011 | 10:00 pm
Loving someone is not the same as standing by and doing nothing when someone is behaving in ways that hurt innocent people.
No of course it’s not. Really, Blake, you need to realize how often you jump to unwarranted conclusions about what people you’re debating believe. This is perhaps the 5th time in my memory that you’ve responded to a post of mine, and every single time you have, as it were, put words in my mouth.
What makes me believe they are trying to give women better lives? Have you never listened to what they say? Have you never imagined how the issue of unwanted children – children of impoverished women with other children, children of emotionally unstable women, children of rape victims, children of children – might look to unbelievers? What makes me believe they’re trying to give women better lives? I try to empathize with people even if they’re not just like me, that’s what.
February 17th, 2011 | 8:49 am
Forget Live Action; what about the horrible deception practiced by Nathan the Prophet, to trick David into pronouncing a death sentence on his own head? He related to David a story that hadn’t even happened, in order to make public some wrong-doing that David had done in secret. For shame, Nathan, for shame!
2 Samuel 12:
February 17th, 2011 | 9:34 am
Moderation in defense of the indefensible is no virtue. Arguments about and around abortion have been going on for decades at least. there have not been many new positions articulated for some time. In this nation of ours there have been many stances that one could call moderate. Some have been argued from a political perspective, some from a moral/ethical/legal perspective and some from a purely religious perspective. There have been woman running into meetings, holding jars containing their just recently aborted babies, declaring their liberty from the oppressive powers to be. There have been lone gunmen and bombers who have shot or bombed abortionists and abortion clinics who have stood by their supposed righteous acts.
The numbers of people that these acts have represented are vanishingly small, on both sides. So for all of the divisive language its primary purpose is expressive of a frustration born out of the recognition that, given their belief in what abortion is, it continues unabated. The act they abhor is ,by any definition, violent, final and not ameliorated by arguments to rights. Some, while calling for moderation in speech seem to ignore the million or so acts of violence committed on those marked for physical annihilation while in quieter realms we parcel out their value and draw lots for their robes.
Moderation surely has its place but when the stakes are existence or non existence pure and simple there is no room for half a baby.
February 17th, 2011 | 9:45 am
Ken,
I appreciate your posts and your calm, clear reason. I don’t always agree with your positions, but you make them intelligently and in a Christian spirit.
I’ve had two exchanges with Blake that followed the same pattern you’re seeing here. He has some good insights, but he likes to demonize the opposition rather than understand that the opposition is often pursuing the good.
I look forward to your future contributions.
February 17th, 2011 | 10:01 am
Ken and Arty
A lie is wrong, because it is a statement at variance with the mind of the speaker, for truth is the correspondence between the signifier and the thing signified. To lie is a misuse of the faculty of speech and a sin against Truth.
However, not everyone is entitled to the truth, as in the classic case of the murderer, searching for his intended victim. In such a case, it is permitted to mislead him, that is to say, to deceive. If I say. “He went out at 10,” assuming he did so, there is no variance between that statement and my mind, for it is true. I am under no duty to add that he subsequently returned, for the intending murderer has no right to that information.
To deceive, in this way, an officer of justice in pursuit of a fugitive would be wrong (but not lying), for he is entitled to the truth and I am under a duty to give it.
And so of my former examples. One can find thousands of others in the manuals of moral theology; it is a question that gave great scope for their ingenuity.
February 17th, 2011 | 10:09 am
Loving someone is not the same as standing by and doing nothing when someone is behaving in ways that hurt innocent people.
No of course it’s not. Really, Blake, you need to realize how often you jump to unwarranted conclusions about what people you’re debating believe.
I don’t pretend to know what you believe.
I only know what you said.
You said that we should love these people.
Does this not presume that (a) we aren’t already loving these people (how do you know?) and (b) “love” would mean changing our actions, away from the way we are behaving now, toward a new set of actions – presumably the more “tolerant” stance you yourself propose?
By choosing to scold us for being unloving toward these people, you are the one assuming to know the motives of others.
February 17th, 2011 | 10:11 am
Michael Currie,
Though you might believe that abortion is wrong, such a belief doesn’t require you to also conclude that everyone who disagrees with you is being unreasonable. The zealot tends to forget this distinction, which leads to all manner of broken dialogue, incivility and violent rhetoric. We have many examples of this here.
So let’s remember the distinction. Many who should no better seem to want to forget it.
February 17th, 2011 | 10:12 am
many who should *know* better :)
February 17th, 2011 | 10:40 am
To be against lying and entrapment and enticement to sin is not to be “moderate” in defense of the unborn.
Or should we divide up this way: those who are moderate in defense of the unborn, over here, and those who are moderately in favor of sinning and enticing others to sin, over there.
February 17th, 2011 | 12:32 pm
I still haven’t heard an answer to my question as to how anyone was enticed to sin.
If someone posing as an actual child prostitute had walked in and attempted to get an abortion, that would be enticement to sin, because they would be enticing someone to attempt perform an abortion upon a child.
But that didn’t happen — all that happened was a pair of people walking in and asking someone what she would do in a particular situation, which situation was not even represented as occurring at that moment.
So again, to what sin was she enticed? Surely not the sin of contemplating murder and lying, since she had clearly already thought these things through, having evidently contemplated them long before this. That sin had already occurred long ago, and had it not occurred, would not likely have been a genuine temptation to her now, any more than my asking you “what would you do if someone came and asked you for an abortion” would be tempting you to contemplate actually doing it.
February 17th, 2011 | 12:56 pm
C. Erlich,
Apparently, you believe any disagreement can be “moderate” or “reasonable.” Ok, I’ll call your bluff. If, as can be empirically demonstrated and logically argued, the fetus is an innocent human life, then murder of the innocent is what abortion is. What is the “moderate” position on murder of the innocent? What is the “reasonable” basis for slaughtering those who are inconvenient or flawed? Note that nowhere in any of my comments have I advocated killing anyone. I am simply saying that abortion is an either/or question. If the fetus is an innocent human life, we are obligated to do what we can, within the law, to end it. All your condescension and pseudorationality does not change that a whit. As far as I know, Live Action violated no law and committed no act of violence.
February 17th, 2011 | 1:21 pm
Fred, I didn’t say that every disagreement can be a reasonable one. Regarding the morality and politics of abortion, there is plenty of room for reasonable disagreement. You can believe that your pro-life views are true without also believing that everyone who disagrees with you is being unreasonable.
The same is true with many “either/or” questions. Either team X is going to win the game or not. There’s nothing about this question which precludes reasonable disagreement about who is going to win.
If you really cannot see what room there might be for reasonable disagreement over abortion and abortion legislation, here’s what I suggest: find someone whose thoughtfulness and intelligence you deeply respect, and who is well read on the topic. Carefully articulate to this person your own views about abortion and abortion legislation, and whatever grounds you have for them. Then ask this person to direct you to some well thought out arguments that lead to a different conclusion, as well to point out the possible weaknesses in your own argument.
If you don’t know of anyone who can help you in this regard, shoot an email to any local philosophy department with a Ph.D. program. Hire a graduate student to give you a tutoring session in which you can present your argument and then have him or her critique it. This is what they’ve been trained to do. I’m sure someone would be willing to help.
February 17th, 2011 | 1:24 pm
Michael, you’re far too kind, but thank you very much.
Michael PS, wrote:
A lie is wrong, because it is a statement at variance with the mind of the speaker, for truth is the correspondence between the signifier and the thing signified.
To lie is a misuse of the faculty of speech and a sin against Truth.
Thanks for answering. I don’t know if you want to go any further with this, or just suggest I pick up one of those manuals of moral theology, but it seems to me your answer just begs the question, and that you’re confusing truthful speech with what’s True because it’s good and beautiful, with what’s God’s created reality. God gave us speech to use for good ends, and surely to use it to deceive and thereby restrain evildoers is a good end.
Blake, the loving our enemies I was referring to in my post at 6:22 yesterday was what I mentioned in my first sentence there: acknowledging that they mean well, acknowledging to ourselves and to them that their intentions are good. Where they go wrong is in placing the welfare of women, as they see it, above God’s command to preserve life.
I think it’s clear that love entails empathy, and that when we empathize with people, when we’re willing to put ourselves in their shoes, we judge them less harshly because we understand them better. This doesn’t mean that we excuse or downplay their wrongdoing. It means, in the case of pro-choicers, that before we condemn their actions, we recognize that their actions are aimed at accomplishing a very real good. It means we forgo the emotional satisfaction of condemning them as people, as “murderers.” And of course if we do that, they are far more likely to listen to our criticism. Would you condemn a starving man stealing food in the same terms you’d condemn a well-to-do man for stealing caviar? Our criticism needs to be proportionate, or else people will just dismiss us.
February 17th, 2011 | 1:54 pm
You’re welcome, Ken. Some of the pro-abortion rights people I know are quite cavalier about the question of life, and others are quite torn over the conflict between the unborn child and the mother. I think it’s important to know and respect the difference.
—
Ehrlich, I think you’re right in your emphasis on reasonable disagreement, though I think you might have made more out of Jacobson’s statement than was there. It’s hard to say since he hasn’t clarified what he meant.
But I’d like to hear more about how you’d answer Fred. You’ve said elsewhere that you think human life begins at the six-week mark, and you’ve offered your reasons and logic for believing so. What flows from this decision? Do you support abortion before six weeks and not after?
February 17th, 2011 | 2:18 pm
Michael,
I don’t think I have ever said anything about a six-week mark. I think you must have someone else in mind. At any rate, I don’t think “human life” is the decisive category here. A human spermatozoon is human life. So is a human skin cell. But, since I know you know that, I look forward to hearing you clarify your question.
Also, I don’t so much support abortion as favor the idea that there shouldn’t be legislation in this country prohibiting abortion, at least at early stages. I also happen to think that, generally speaking, abortions are regrettable, that attitudes that regard them too casually may be morally criticizeable, and that the legal availability of abortion services shouldn’t be regarded as providing a moral license to engage in irresponsible procreative behavior.
February 18th, 2011 | 4:16 pm
Ken wrote
“God gave us speech to use for good ends, and surely to use it to deceive and thereby restrain evildoers is a good end.”
Of course. But we may not do evil that good may come of it. To say what we know to be false or do not believe to be true is always evil and incapable of justification; for, the origin of the universe is Mind and the good of Mind is truth, so wilfully to asert what is false can never serve any good end whatsoever, but is contrary to the supreme, original Good.
Of course we can use speech to deceive an evildoer, or, rather, as in the rather hackneyed examples I have given, to allow him to deceive himself.
It is precisely those theologians who believe the prohibition on lying to be absolute who have been so diligent in exploring the legitimate means of deceiving, without actually lying – and for obvious reasons. On the other hand, it is those who hold that lying is sometimes allowable, who tend to equate all deception with lying, which is to suggest that the commandments of God are impracticable for humankind, which is the end of all morality whatsoever. After all, if some lies, why not some murders? And such a position has its advocates, too.
But lying to save a life (or lives) is simply wrong. There is no proportion between the death of the body being averted and the death of the soul being incurred by lying, which is the thrust of St Augustine’s argument and of St Thomas’s, too.
February 18th, 2011 | 8:47 pm
Thanks again, Michael PS, but where in scripture do we get the concept “the good of Mind is truth”? What does that mean? And why is it that only actually telling lies is wrong, but deceiving otherwise is permissible? How does the latter serve truth? Why is equating all deception with lying to suggest that the commandments of God are impracticable for humankind?
After all, if some lies, why not some murders?
Lies don’t take human lives, unless perhaps they’re lies in the course of war, which also takes lives. Are you a pacifist?
February 19th, 2011 | 8:17 am
Ken
No, I am not a pacifist. I no more believe that all deliberate killing of other people is murder than I believe that all deception is lying.
That the origin of the universe is Mind is apparent from Genesis 1:1 “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, taken together with Romans 11:33 “O the depth of the riches of the wisdom and of the knowledge of God” Now, knowledge is the conformity of the intellect to the thing known and this we call truth. So the good of the intellect is the knowledge of the truth. That God is truth, our Lord declares, where he says, “I am the way, the truth and the life” (John 14:6)
If everyone were obliged to disclose the whole truth to everyone that asked it, even those who intend to use it to harm oneself or others, that duty would often conflict with charity and both commands could not be obeyed simultaneously; but it is no breach of charity to frustrate the evil will of another; accordingly, we may for a sufficient cause, mislead another. At least, so many theologians teach, whereas, since the decree of Innocent XI dated 2 March 1679, no Catholic theologian has taught that a lie is ever permitted, this opinion being condemned as “at least scandalous and pernicious in practice.”
February 19th, 2011 | 11:00 am
Michael, I’m not disputing that the universe was created by an intellect, that knowledge is the apprehension of truth, or that our created intellects naturally seek to know the truth.
We also agree that misleading someone for the sake of frustrating evil intent is no breach of charity. What I’m trying to understand is why you countenance passively but not actively misleading in such instances, since both methods yield the same result.
To my way of thinking, in neither case does the evildoer deserve to know the truth, since he will only use it as an occasion to do evil. Whether I mislead by what I say or by what I choose not to say is of no import.
February 20th, 2011 | 3:14 am
Ken
Because the one involves the perverse use of a faculty, namely speech, and the other does not. Lying is a sin against (rational) nature.
A person who lies intends to say something that does not accord with his mind and that is a great evil. His further, or ulterior intention, namely to mislead, may be good or bad, according to circumstances, but the good end (misleading) does not justify the evil means chosen, namely lying.
Similarly, a lie may not mislead at all, for to say what one does not believe to be true (although one may hope it is, e.g., “No one else knows about it”) but which turns out to be true in fact, makes it no less a lie; for it was not an expression of the speaker’s mind. But the malice of lying is the same.
February 21st, 2011 | 9:20 am
Ken wrote
“Whether I mislead by what I say or by what I choose not to say is of no import.”
But a lie is, by definition, a statement at variance with the mind of the speaker. As such, it is a perverse use of a natural faculty and so wrong simply.
This is quite different to saying what is true, but misleading to another.
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