Radosh.net

It was obvious to some of us from the start that the Help My Baby Live site was a hoax. But is it a meaningful hoax?

Eh, probably not. My initial suspicion was that it was a pro-choice message — you know, "let's see if they'll put their money where their mouths are" — or possibly a straightforward for-profit scam — but the snoops at Democratic Underground say the hoaxer is a pro-life wingnut, so I guess the message is supposed to be, "pro-choicers are even more sick than you imagined." Not that my version couldn't have worked. Indeed, Snopes says it was tried a year ago.

Interestingly (sort of) the pro-life message is undermined a bit by one of the e-mails sent to the site, which offers a pro-life evangelical's rationalization for abortion. It's a long message, so I won't reprint it all (if you want to read it, search for the author's name, "eve melancon"), but the key part is at the beginning.

I SAT HERE FOR A LONG TIME BEFORE I COULD ACTUALLY RESPOND TO YOUR REQUEST. I FELT CONVICTION FOR NOT WANTING TO SAVE A LIFE. (I AM PRO-LIFE) AND THEN I FELT ANGRY AT YOU FOR PUTTING ME IN THAT POSITION. THEN AS I THOUGHT ABOUT IT I CAME TO THE CONCLUSION THAT I FEEL COMFORTABLE IN ALLOWING THIS CHILD TO BE RETURNED TO ITS RIGHTFUL PLACE. LET IT GO!!

First of all, you know this is an authentic e-mail by her use of "conviction" in the sense of "made to feel bad," which is a Christianese phrase that a parodist is unlikely to know (caveat, I'd actually expect her to say "I felt convicted"). And then she gets to the heart of the argument: you guys will be such bad parents that the baby will be better off dead with Jesus. This is reiterated at the end.

SO PLEASE I BEG OF YOU LET IT GO!!!! GOD WILL TAKE CARE OF IT BETTER THAN YOU AND YOUR YOUNG WIFE EVER WILL.

Now, this should not be taken as pro-life doctrine — you'll never find an anti-abortion group endorsing this line of thinking — but it is revealing as an extreme case of how fundamentalists can find spiritual endorsement for any decision they want to reach (as well as a twist on the heresy of baby worship). Obviously the woman's real prayer is that the "couple" will go ahead and have the baby, but she's found a way to make peace with the idea of not paying the ransom. It's a slipperly slope. Lots of selfish, unfit, unhinged people get themselves accidentally pregnant every day — and, yes, the kids usually suffer for it. Wouldn't God take better care of those kids too? Come to think of it, God would probably take better care of my kids. I mean, I love 'em and everything, but He's perfect. It's hard to compete with that.

Posted by Daniel Radosh

3:00 PM