I can’t pretend to be an expert in gymnastics, but I don’t need to be an expert to know that Simone Biles is, for lack of a better term, ridiculous. The decorated American Olympian does things that don’t appear physically possible. If I saw Captain America perform this crazy leaping twisty tumbling ninja flip (sorry for the technical jargon) in an Avengers movie, I’d complain that it was too unrealistic.
But I suppose that’s the definition of greatness: a human being doing something completely unrealistic. And what’s really awesome and exciting is that we all have the capacity to achieve our own sort of greatness. Maybe not gymnastic greatness – I’m sure I could practice for a decade and never quite master the cartwheel, let alone this madness — but, by nature of being humans, we can all do things that seem almost superhuman. That’s why we admire famous athletes and artists. They’ve realized their potential, and in doing so, reminded us of our own.
There are no other creatures in the known physical universe who can reach above themselves and perform feats that make the other members of their species stop and say, “Whoa. Wait a minute. We cando that?” Ants will dig anthills, beavers will build dams, birds will make bird’s nests. All of that is pretty cool in its own way, but they won’t impress the other ants, beavers, and birds with their talents. It’s not transcendent. They’re just doing exactly what every other ant, beaver, and bird does. What they’re programmed to do. What they have no choice but to do.
United States' Simone Biles smiles on the podium after winning vault gold during the artistic gymnastics women's apparatus final at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Sunday, Aug. 14, 2016. (AP Photo/Dmitri Lovetsky
United States’ Simone Biles smiles on the podium after winning vault gold during the artistic gymnastics women’s apparatus final at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Sunday, Aug. 14, 2016. (AP Photo/Dmitri Lovetsky
What would be truly transcendent is an ant building a dam or a beaver making a bird’s nest, but that will never happen. The potential of beasts and bugs is very limited. The potential of a human, on the other hand, is so vast and spectacular that it may as well be limitless. And it’s because of this near-infinite potential that we end up with Leonardo da Vinci, and Shakespeare, and Jimi Hendrix, and Nikola Tesla, and Simone Biles. There are no Simones in the ant world. Only the human race makes those. And any human has the chance to be one, in their own way.
This is why abortion is such a devastating tragedy. Every year, there are about a million babies snuffed out in the womb, and every one of them had the potential to contribute something beautiful and impossible to the world. They were all made specifically for that purpose – to give what only they can give – but now whatever work they were meant to do, whatever art they were meant to make, whatever obstacles they were meant to conquer, whatever sort of greatness they were meant to achieve, will be left on the cutting room floor. Undone. Incomplete. Unfulfilled. Only emptiness and silence will take their place. Nobody will ever be what they were meant to be — what they were, already, even as children in the womb — and the world suffers terribly because of it.
I think this is especially relevant to consider in the case of Simone Biles. As has been discussed many times over the past week, Biles is a child of poverty and misfortune. She was born to a poor, drug addicted, alcoholic single mother. Her father wasn’t in the picture. Her mother wasn’t able to care for her. She and her siblings bounced in and out of foster care for the first five years of her life, until she was finally adopted by her grandparents. Nonetheless, within 10 years, Biles would be competing in international gymnastic competitions. Within 15, she would be amassing a treasure chest of gold medals at the Olympics, and many people would be calling her the greatest gymnast of all time.
But if Planned Parenthood and the abortion industry had their way, she never would have made it to the podium. She never would have seen the light of day. She wouldn’t even have a name, let alone Olympic gold medals and approximately a zillion dollars in upcoming endorsement deals. She would be one of the untold millions; dead, discarded, decomposing in a medical waste dumpster behind an inner city abortion clinic. That’s what the abortion industry thinks of human potential. Not worth the trouble, it says. These babies — these future Olympians and doctors and engineers and missionaries and artists and builders and soldiers and presidents and mothers and fathers, etc. — are inconveniences. Burdens. Parasites. Not worthy of even the most basic legal protections. Not worthy of anything but a scalpel to the skull.
And let’s remember that the abortion industry specializes in killing humans just like Simone. The vastmajority of abortions are performed on unwed mothers just like Simone’s mother. Black women are four times as likely to have abortions — especially single black women — and if they live in the inner city, the probability is even higher. In some cities, little Simones are more likely to be aborted than born.
Planned Parenthood has been publicly cheering for Simone and the other female Olympians, claiming their success is a victory for feminism. I’d say it’s more a victory for themselves, their families, and their country, but either way, Planned Parenthood is not in the business of supporting and helping the Simones of the world. It’s in the business of murdering them. And business is good.
Reports have confirmed that the abortion conglomerate specifically targets poor black babies for extermination. Granted, this is probably more a marketing decision than racism. Planned Parenthood concentrates its abortion enterprise in poor areas with heavy minority populations simply because it knows it can make a fast buck off of scared and desperate women like Simone’s mother. Planned Parenthood has centered its entire business around killing babies like Simone Biles. The poor black woman market is as important to Planned Parenthood as the white suburban millennial market is to Apple. Neither could exist without their key demo. The only difference, of course, is that Apple sells electronic gadgets to its clientele, whereas Planned Parenthood sells extinction.
Fortunately, Shannon Biles chose life for her daughter. But if she’d consulted with a Planned Parenthood, they wouldn’t have told her to think of what awe inspiring things that innocent child in her womb might do with her life if only given the chance. They wouldn’t have told her that a child born into poverty and domestic turmoil can survive those challenges and thrive in spite of them, or because of them. They wouldn’t have told her to see her precious offspring as a human being bursting with life and hope and potential. They wouldn’t have told her any of that. They would have laid her on the operating table, extracted the infant piece by piece, thrown most of her away and saved the rest for resale on the black market. And that would have been the end of Simone Biles. A human life with all of its promise, gone forever. “That’ll be 400 dollars,” they would have said when the deed was done. “See you next time.”
The universe would tremble and heave, weeping over the magnificent life it lost. Planned Parenthood would fill out some forms, file them in a folder, and get ready for its 9:45 appointment. Just another day at the office.
Now, I don’t want to give the impression that babies born into hardship only justify their mother’s decision to choose life if they go off and become famous athletes or artists or entrepreneurs or whatever. There are plenty of children who will have a life very similar to Simone’s first 14 or 15 challenging years on Earth, but nothing like the last four or five acclaimed ones. That doesn’t make them any less important, nor does it make their lives any less sacred.
When we see someone win a gold medal, climb a tall mountain, paint a beautiful picture, or start a successful business, we witness only a proof of the breathtaking potential all human beings share. Some of us may express it in quieter, less flashy ways, but we all have it. We are all human beings, so we were all made to explore and harness that potential. We were all made to do and think and accomplish things that are distinct and unique to us. We were all made to be something nobody else could be.  In a word, we were all made for life. I can say with absolute certainty that not a single baby in the history of the world was made for the purpose of being vacuumed out of her mother’s womb like a clump of dust under the sofa.
It’s very fortunate that Simone’s life was not vacuumed away before she had the opportunity to show us what incredible things she could do with it. If only the 50 million other babies the abortion industry has stolen from the world had been given the same opportunity. Think of how much brighter the world might be.