Last night Jenni and I watched 3801 Lancaster: American Tragedy. It’s a fascinating, sad, infuriating hour-long documentary about Kermit Gosnell, a medical doctor who provided late-term abortions in Philadelphia but is now in prison for life.

3-minute trailer:

Two thoughts:

1. The film’s most fascinating parts are the audio interviews with Gosnell himself while he is in jail.

• He calmly and unrepentantly insists that he is innocent with a voice that sounds reasonable and intelligent. (The above trailer includes part of that interview.)
• His logic is appalling. He thinks the Bible clearly teaches that babies in the womb are not human until they breathe and that therefore it was more ethical for him to poison babies in the womb and then snip the back of their necks with scissors because that was better for those mothers and better for society. He thinks that history will vindicate how he practiced eugenics.

2. The documentary is understated.

• On the one hand, that makes it more powerful. Kermit Gosnell’s abortion practice should appall all people, not just those who are pro-life. (And some of the people the film features explain that they both favor abortion and oppose Gosnell.)
• On the other hand, the film is so understated that it doesn’t directly address the elephant in the room. It’s like expressing outrage that at Auschwitz the Nazi doctors and their assistants did not properly sanitize the gas chambers. Gosnell’s abortion clinic was filthy and unprofessional, but that is not what makes it so evil. It’s just that a more sterilized and professional abortion clinic more effectively soothes and suppresses consciences when humans murder innocent, defenseless fellow humans in the womb. (I’m guessing that the filmmakers agree with my point but that they intentionally took the more understated, relatively impartial approach for effect.)

More info here.