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NYT Does Piece on Randall Terry While Ignoring Wichita 2001
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A Page One Outrage
NYT Does Piece on Randall Terry While Ignoring Wichita 2001
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by Laura Flanders
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"Make no mistake. This battle is about self-determination by women of the direction and course of their lives and their family's lives. Abortion is about women's hopes and dreams. Abortion is a matter of survival for women."
-- Dr. George Tiller, Women's Health Care Services.
Survival has not been easy for Dr. George Tiller of Wichita. Twelve years ago this week, his clinic was firebombed and largely destroyed by anti-abortion terrorists. Two years after that, Operation Rescue stormed into Wichita for a blockading blitz that terrorized clinics including his for no less than seven weeks.
In August, '94, leaving work late, Tiller saw half a dozen protestors outside the building. One walked up to his car and shot him twice at point blank range. Miraculously, he survived and with bandaged arms returned to work the next day. With slight nerve damage in both hands, Tiller still works in his clinic full time.
This week, he was treated to a repeat peformance from the Operation Rescue folks -- now called Operation Save America -- when a thousand or so showed up in Wichita again, to mark the tenth anniversary of their 1991 blockades.
Tiller would make a good subject for a Page One profile in the New York Times this week. Who knows, perhaps they're storing one up for tomorrow, or Sunday. Fine. Today, however, on page one of that paper, we're treated to a 2,000+ word feature on not Tiller, but Terry, Randall Terry, founder of Operation Rescue, the guy who played a leading role in putting Tiller's life at risk.
It's hard to imagine the New York Times describing unambomber Ted Kaczynski as simply "charismatic, hyper-aggressive," but that's how Dan Barry sums up Terry, a convicted felon, former used car salesman, drug-user and high-school dropout. (None of those details make it into the NYT.)
Terry, we're told, has had a hard time. He divorced his wife, became estranged from his anti-abortion pals, was criticized on the Internet ("the posting was devastating"), his radio show went off the air. He got married again, honeymooned in Rome, and now he lives with his wife "and their puppy" not far from his kids.
It's amazing what space the New York Times has for Terry, especially when you consider what they've left out this same week.
The paper has so far written NOT ONE account of what has happened in Kansas this anniversary, where Dr. Tiller's clinic again received a bomb threat. (You can find some reports in
the Wichita Eagle, or on the website of the political group, Refuse and
Resist.) It hasn't covered the to-the-ground burning of a women's clinic in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, or the fatal shooting of a security guard for a clinic in Melbourne, Australia.
Wichita, 2001 (which runs July 15-21) is a story that deserves Page One attention. This week's protests were the first big test of Attorney General Ashcroft's promise to enforce the 1994 law that makes abortion-clinic violence a federal crime. But a Page-One profile of Terry? The Times, a paper that relies on a pro-choice readership, should be made to feel some "hyper-aggressive" heat.
Laura Flanders is a journalist and broadcaster, host of the Laura Flanders Show (formerly on KWAB/RadioForChange) and author of "Real Majority, Media Minority: The Cost of Sidelining Women in Reporting." Her Spin Doctor Laura columns appear daily on WorkingForChange. You can contact her at laura@lauraflanders.com
© 2001 WorkingForChange.com
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