Targets of Hatred: Anti-Abortion Terrorism

St. Martin's Press

Review by Beverly Lowy

Stalking, arson, kidnapping, murder. This year's most chilling read is not from Stephen King. Journalist/rights activist Eleanor Bader and former abortion provider Patricia Baird-Windle have collaborated to produce a book that will make the hairs stand up and the skin become goosefleshed. Never before has the anti-violence against centers for choice, clinic personnel, and abortion providers been so thoroughly documented, cross-referenced, and time lined. Here are the horror stories that even those of us active in the pro-choice movement never heard. For this expose, three years in the making, Bader spent one year traversing the country to get the personal accounts of those in the front lines. Additionally, there was contact by phone, email, and snail mail for additional information and updating. The result is a clearly-written, month-by-month chronicle that shocks and informs.

The assaults against clinic personnel rarely get press unless they are more egregious than usual. The psychological effects on those being terrorized are never mentioned. Especially heinous are the threats, real or implied, against the families—most of all, the children—of heroes on what has become a battlefield for choice. Imagine the feelings of nurse administrator Roni Windle when she was on staff at the Aware Woman Center for Choice and found a photograph of a fetus in her mailbox with a picture of her 12-year-old daughter's head superimposed on it.

In the case of Cathy Conner who was a clinic administrator, the antis picketed her home and carried signs saying “Cathy Conner: Baby Killer,” while using bullhorns. Her children, eight and ten years old at the time, were playing outside. She was understandably upset, having the antis know who her children were.

Jude Hanson was a clinic director in Portland, Oregon who had worked in abortion facilities for 20 years. She left her job in 1997 because of the barrage of screaming picketers outside her home. Clinic administrator Sandy Sheldon tells of being stalked by a man who had been one of the picketers outside her home. He followed her everywhere and her greatest fear was the safety of her nine-year old daughter. Finally, the state attorney agreed she was being stalked and took the case. Even after the man was convicted, Sheldon was afraid to have birthday parties for her daughter or to let her daughter's friends sleep over because the pickets might show up. She and her daughter spent a year and a half in counseling after the stalker's conviction. Even with implied rather than overt violence, and with constant harassment, the antis can, and have, whittled away the sense of autonomy of dedicated clinic personnel, making them fear for their safety and for that of those closest to them. They know, only too well, that from 1977-September 2000 there have been 7 murders, 17 attempted murders, 115 incidents of assaults, and 3 kidnappings of those working in abortion clinics. They are painfully aware that no one is safe.

Targets of Hatred begins with a comprehensive overview, “The State of the Union: Abortion in North America,” which presents what is happening to our reproductive rights since Roe v. Wade. To say the least, it is not a pretty picture.

The foes of abortion rights are well-organized and, although to date they have not been able to overturn Roe v. Wade, they have been successful in chipping away at our right to choose by utilizing everything within their well-organized arsenal to close clinics, to limit Medicaid spending on abortions for poor women, to institute parental notification for teenagers and to intimidate abortion providers. Between 1992 and 1996 the number of providers fell by 14 percent, leaving nearly one-third of American cities without a reproductive healthcare center. Rural areas often have none for hundreds of miles. According to a 1998 study by the New York-based Alan Guttmacher Institute that is cited by the authors, the drop in services is attributed to both anti-abortion terrorism and the antis legislative successes in curtailing access.