Using deception to expose the truth and save lives

On Monday, Slate.com writer Will Saletan wrote the following on Twitter:

“What’s more disgusting than late-term abortion? This scheme to exploit it by hiring actors & secretly taping doctors. http://wapo.st/11wBHIW“

What an odd thing to think, let alone state publicly, even if you are a pro-abortion liberal. The hidden-camera exposure of what goes on behind the scenes at an organization in the business of killing unborn babies is worse than infanticide? Can you wrap your mind around such a sentiment or understand a man who expresses it?

And exploit is an odd choice of word. It means “to utilize, especially for profit; turn to practical account … to use selfishly for one’s own ends … to advance or further through exploitation; promote. …” The organization referenced in the Washington Post article Saletan linked to in his tweet is Live Action, whose purpose is to stop abortions. The “profit” of exposing Planned Parenthood is donations to keep the non-profit organization running. A “selfish” motive to stop the slaughter of the unborn is a righteous one, and I wholeheartedly support advancing or furthering the pro-life cause through “exploiting” infanticide.

Live Action has secretly recorded Planned Parenthood employees willing to cover up statutory rape and lying about fetal development. In a recently released undercover video, the abortionist (aka “doctor”) tells the “pregnant” operative that if the baby were born alive during an abortion attempt, “We would not help it. … I mean, technically, you know, legally, we would be obligated to help it, you know, to survive, but … it probably wouldn’t.” The abortionist told the Washington Post he was only trying to reassure the woman by telling her the abortion center wouldn’t help the tiny, breathing human, but he’d actually call 911. Right.

Does Saletan take issue with the deception? (I suspect he wouldn’t be disgusted with undercover video of a Christian pregnancy resource center.) Sometimes exposing the truth requires deception. Live Action’s operatives make false statements with the deliberate intent to deceive, and some Christians might take issue with that. Is lying for a righteous cause still a sin?

Recall in Exodus a pharaoh who didn’t know Joseph grew alarmed at the multitudes of Hebrews in his kingdom. He put them in bondage and ordered the Hebrew midwives to kill the male babies. But the midwives feared God and lied to pharaoh to save their lives. During the Nazi terror, Christians hid hunted Jews and lied about it to save their lives. Consider this: A man runs past you, fearful. Several seconds later, a man with a gun (not a cop) asks which way the first man ran. Will you deceive him to save a life or tell the truth?

The pro-abortion movement is fixated on making sure the “unwanted” infant dies, even if he’s born breathing and struggling to live. That is disgusting. It’s also macabre and disgraceful. But with God removed from the equation, people like Saletan can make such bold and blatantly appalling statements, in public, without shame. In plumbing the depths of human depravity, we don’t have to go too deep.