If you don’t believe in a woman’s right to choose, you are not pro-life, you are anti-choice.

If you believe a woman should be forced to carry a child full-term, regardless of the circumstances she finds herself in, or the quality of life that child would be subject to once brought into the world, you are not merely anti-choice, you are anti-life.

If you think any woman’s dominion over her own body is subject to the whims, religious beliefs, or alleged “morals” of others, you are anti-equality.

If you are arrogant enough to hold that your God, your religion, your church’s doctrine should be foisted on others, whether they adhere to the same doctrine or not, you are laughable in the eyes of whatever god it is you think you worship and revere.

If you decry abortion but cling to capital punishment, unprovoked war, the use of torture, or the justification of death in any form, you are not pro-life in any sense of the word – you are pro-hypocrisy.

If you assert that your opinion on the topic of abortion, whether based on your religious beliefs or your political bent, is somehow superior to all other opinions and should be deferred to by everyone, you are not pro-life for all, you are pro-ME – and just how arrogant is THAT?

It has not escaped my attention, nor that of the citizenry of our country, that the same people who maintain that adoption is always a viable option think homosexual couples should not be allowed to adopt – pro-child? No, anti-child – because if you would deny the love and care a same-sex couple would happily bestow, you are denying love to a child desperately in want and need of it - something you vociferously advocate, as long as it is your idea of suitable love and care, the child's needs suddenly being of lesser importance.

It has also not escaped my attention, nor that of the people of the world, that while the alleged pro-life crowd talks a good game when it comes to women being forced to birth unwanted children, children born into poverty are dismissed out-of-hand as the offspring of “welfare queens”, and are automatically perceived as undeserving of basic needs – like nutritious meals, an education, and medical care that comes at the expense of tax dollars.

The very people who brag about their pro-life position are the same people, more often than not, who get their respective knickers in a twist over things like sex education and the use of contraception. They’re not anti-awareness, they are pro-ignorance – and the consequences of that position be damned.

Words are powerful tools; they can often sway the opinions of others, influence political policy, change attitudes, correct misconceptions (pun very much intended).

But when words are deliberately mis-used, one can’t help but wonder at the weakness of the underpinnings of arguments that must inevitably rely on said mis-use, misinterpretation, misappropriation of phrases meant to misdirect, misinform, disengage.

Finally, when a group touting themselves as pro-life lauds the death of someone – anyone – whose views or beliefs are different than their own, whose life was dedicated to the quality of life a pregnant woman considered in terms of an unborn, as-yet-unfulfilled life that she chose to terminate – for reasons that should be personal and left forever unquestioned – the abject stupidity, hypocrisy, and lack of morals of said group should be put on public display as often as possible - and, in this case, as necessary as is warranted to get the truth out there, as opposed to the "talking points" of those who DO nothing but talk.

Pro-life means just THAT – pro-choice, pro-education, pro-meaningful-options, pro-caring for every child born, not just those born into families with the financial means to care for them, or the emotional wherewithal to deal with their birth into our society as it IS, and not what some wish to PRETEND it is.

Every child a wanted child. Every child a cared-for child. Every child a coddled, looked-after child with every opportunity before them, as well as before their parents, nothing withheld, nothing denied – nothing predicated on the “good intentions” of those who say that a child should be brought into the world regardless of prospects, then squawk like stuck pigs when their tax dollars are involved. Nothing reliant on those who grab the megaphone outside an abortion-provider’s clinic and rant about the sanctity of life, who then slink off in their “good Christian silence” when said provider is left in a pool of their own blood.

Pro-life? No, pro-death – and like it or not, that IS the name of that tune.

Rest in eternal peace, Dr. Tiller. Your principles will not go unnoticed, your song will not go unsung, and your true compassion for others will never be forgotten.