Posted on 08/04/2005 6:03:45 PM PDT by Crackingham
Critics demanded an apology Thursday from the founder of the Christian ministry Focus on the Family after he compared the ethics of embryonic stem cell research to Nazi experiments on Holocaust victims. James Dobson made the comments Wednesday during his radio show, which reaches an estimated 220 million people worldwide.
Dobson was criticizing Sen. Bill Frist and others who support expanded stem cell research in hopes that stem cells one day could be used to replace cells damaged from such conditions as diabetes, spinal cord injury or Parkinson's disease.
Dobson and other opponents object to the research because embryos are destroyed to harvest the cells.
"We condemn what the Nazis did because there are some things that we always could do but we haven't done, because science always has to be guided by ethics and by morality," Dobson said. "And you remove ethics and morality, and you get what happened in Nazi Germany."
Abraham H. Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League, said Dobson should apologize.
"There is no legitimate comparison between stem-cell research, which seeks to find a cure for disease and to counter human suffering, and the perversion of science and morality represented by the actions of Nazi doctors who deliberately tortured their victims in medical 'experiments,'" Foxman said.
Dobson was not available for comment Thursday. Carrie Gordon Earll, senior analyst for bioethics for Focus on the Family, said Dobson would not apologize.
"The Nazi experiment analogy is accurate and appropriate," she said. "If any apologies are due, it is advocates of destroying embryonic humans who should be apologizing."
Rep. Diana DeGette, D-Colo., called Dobson's remarks "extremely ignorant and insulting," saying they "diminish the enormity of the Nazis' atrocities and are an appalling distortion of the debate."
Another truth that must be silenced.
I would say the analogy is quite apt.
God, please bless James Dobson, keep him safe, and keep him strong in the face of the evil that he must now withstand due to his righteous and Christian stance. I pray in Jesus' name.
In other words, it is fine if I kill you to harvest your organs to save somebody else's life but not if I intend to cause you any pain in the process?
No different than the enemy disguised as CAIR demanding an appology from Mr. Tancredo-- NO different than the illegals
demanding an appology from Mr. Tancredo for telling the truth about our unsecured borders.And No different than the
enemy disguised as the ACLU demanding the Honorable Roy S.Moore be removed from his appointed seat for acknowledging God.How the heathen rage and the people imagine a vain thing.
Amen to that!
The Nazi doctors (as easy as it might be to believe so) were not tortuing people just for fun but were doing research. The difference is few people (no major hollywood types) are making documentaries or movies about the exploitation of fertilized embryos.
The Nazi doctors (as easy as it might be to believe so) were not tortuing people just for fun but were doing research. The difference is few people (no major hollywood types) are making documentaries or movies about the exploitation of fertilized embryos.
sorry for the double post
This was an analogy. The end (improperly) justifying the means, and all that.
It's hard to remember that the Nazi doctors were legitimate physicians who believed they were in vanguard of "science." Their successors today are legion.
May I add my amen to your prayer.
I am a Jew, and the entire European branch of my families were murdered by Nazis to the best of my knowlege, and I agree with Dr. Dobson's point 100%.
I am not offended by his comment in the least. It's the most accurate comparison possible.
The shoe fits.
Let me get this straight.
It's appropriate for a Demoncrat to call our soldiers Nazis, but to compare the deliberate murder of the unborn to the slaughter of Jews by Nazis is inexcusable?
"There is a legitimate comparison between stem-cell research, which seeks to find a cure for disease and to counter human suffering, and Nazi medical 'experiments,' in trying to discover ways to protect their soldiers from the dangers of warfare, such as freezing to death in the ocean when shot down, and to counter human suffering of their troops, but the perversion of science and morality represented by the actions of Nazi doctors who deliberately tortured their victims went beyond this effort."
If the shoe fits..................
Dobson is right, but only if you pay careful attention to what he actually said. Few people are this careful, and therefore he was wrong. Religious-right leaders need to think long and hard about how their words will be heard.
They are, in fact, the spokesmen for a far more thoughtful point of view than the social liberals represent. But too often, they don't sound that way, even to their sympathizers like myself.
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