I should be terrified of having spoken out in favor of legal abortion because of the slim chance that some lunatic Christian extremist is going to come shoot me.

Lunatic Christian extremists have shot people in the US, so this fear would not be unfounded.

And actually, I was stalked by two people for a little while during the whole right-wing takeover of school board incident, especially when I chaired the committee that organized a pro & con Q&A session about sex education in public schools. It was a little scary, because I knew they ran a subscription newsletter to other people who are, shall we say, militantly opposed to reproductive choice. The woman used to come to meetings and knit, like Mme. Lafarge, and she wore one of her projects constantly: a woolen hat with citations of Bible verses knit into it. (yipe) People started taking pictures of them and they backed off.

I'm no hero, but I'm stubborn. I'll be damned if I'll let somebody else tell me what I may say and who I may associate with. I'll get a concealed carry permit if I have to.

And if everyone is shut up by fear of extremists, then the extremists win.

If the gallery owner is that scared that she has to pull an art exhibit, well, she's that scared. But they won, without even so much as a threat. Unless there's something she hasn't said.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is why they call it "terror".

Regards--
Mary Anne

PS-- If she's all alone in the gallery as a matter of regular practice, that's a random act of violence security issue right there. She could be killed by anybody. It wouldn't have to be a Muslim lunatic. A garden variety lunatic would do just fine.