Monday on MSNBC while discussing the shooting at the Colorado Springs, CO Planned Parenthood clinic that resulted in the deaths of three people, former Texas State Sen.Wendy Davis, the senator who in 2013 filibustered to block legislation that would restrict abortion, warned of “dangerous rhetoric” fueling these incidents.
Davis said, “You know, there are a lot of questions that still need to be answered about who this person truly is, and what his state of mind at the time was, but we do know that when he was taken into custody, he talked about dead baby parts. This is part of a political rhetoric, a very dangerous political rhetoric, that we’ve been hearing from most candidates on the Republican presidential primary side, and I think it is fueling this kind of behavior that we saw in this individual last week.”
She added, “I think that both sides of the aisle, all political candidates, and all office holders, have a responsibility to understand and be very careful with the language that they use. We see this often in political contests where people will dog whistle to voters and use terms, highly charged terms, that they know will appeal to people’s fears and sadly, people’s intolerance and sometimes their had hatred. We see it in Republican candidates right now, who are using very highly charged language about abortion. We see it in the conversation about immigration in this country. The understanding on the part of those candidates is that they are appealing to a particular type of voter, who is going to respond to that rhetoric and hopefully come their way when it comes time to vote. But the consequence of using language like that, can be very dangerous. I think candidates need to step back, take a deep breath, and understand, as I said before, we have a responsibility to use thoughtful and careful language. It is fine to disagree on this issue. Of course, abortion is a constitutionally protected right in this country, but I respect people who have a differing opinion on it. We have to be careful about the language that’s used when we discuss it.”
Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN
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