Disability And Abortion: The Hardest Choice CHANNEL 4

[Wouldloveanother]

www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-11155443/DOMINIC-LAWSON-Doctors-stop-pushing-mothers-aborting-disabled-babies.html

I’m planning on watching this in the next few days, but I’m getting increasingly concerned about the amount of anti-choice activity going on under the guise of ‘disability equality’.

I have already made it clear upthread that I would have no cut off and let the women make the decision (assuming she has the mental capacity to do so), there is no perfect answer or solution and never will be, therefore in the absense of a definitive solution the responsibility for the decision should lie with the pregnant women, who I trust to make the best decision for her and her fetus unique to her circumstnaces.

Ginger, completely taking abortion out of the equation, viability is the gestation at which a baby can be said to have been born. All birth statistics will be based on this, regardless of the level of care the baby will need to survive. In the U.K. it is also the legal cut off for abortion (in many other countries it is different). If you want to change the law, go ahead, lobby for it.

Why does it sound reasonable to you? What makes a 26 week old different from a 25 week old foetus?

If it's your personal opinion on viability then perhaps that gives you a clue as to who it should apply to.

Thats great for him. His mum wanted that pregnancy, and is doing ok. Wasnt forced into anything hopefully.

I know that child destruction doesn't apply to born infants-that's why I used the example of the destruction of an unborn child for you. Child destruction recognises that an unborn baby is a child, and that to destroy that child is illegal and, in Davison's case, resulted in a life-sentence. Personhood is a red herring-the unborn child has legal rights-these legal rights were violated when Davison destroyed the child-this was why a jury convicted him.

And to use an example from my own practice, child protection proceedings frequently place unborn children under a child protection order, in order to safeguard them from harm, and to promote their welfare up to, including, and after birth. The courts don't consider an abstract notion of personhood; they correctly acknowledge that an an unborn child (irrespective of gestational age or development) has rights which must be protected. In fact, when the rights of the mother come into conflict with the rights of her unborn child to remain free from harm, the rights of the child become paramount, under the Children Act, and may result in removal at birth.

Why not removal before @GerronBuzanDoThaWomwok ?

Personhood is not a red herring. Read the Crowter JR ruling.

https://www.judiciary.uk/judgments/crowter-v-secretary-of-state-for-health-and-social-care/

RTFT, or at least go back 3 or 4 posts!

That’s removal at birth, when personhood is established. You’ll notice that they have no power to stop a pregnant drinking or smoking for example, on account of the unborn having rights.

anyway, like I said earlier, I don’t think personhood honestly matters. No person has the right to someone else’s body. Hell, no person has the right to someone else’s corpse.

to what bit? I have been reading the thread and commenting. If someones using the existence of a child born at 26 weeks just passing their GCSEs, as any kind of reason that women shouldnt be able to choose to terminate an unwanted pregnancy, then it still doesnt add up to me. I dont want people forced into abortions they dont want, or into pregnancies they dont want. I have very little interest in the foetuses themselves or their human rights, until theyre born.
Actually thats not 100% true, because I think if a woman decides shes going to continue the pregnancy then she should have a responsibility towards making sure she is not harming it and then birthing it into shitty situations on purpose.
I know drug addicts that will have baby after baby into abusive situations, born addicted, because they dont believe in abortion. Its fucked up. Its looking at it the wrong way round. The planet is full of people and we are destroying it. Its normal to love babies and I love babies and children, but I just cant get my head round why people want other women to continue pregnancies they dont want or dont feel they can manage the commitment, because theyve anthropomorphised a foetus in utero, thats in a dream state, with no knowledge of the world and no awareness.
This weird fetish about baby innocence is so harmful to women and is contributing to a much wider problem in the world. #
We need to concentrate on the ones already here.

Its in the eye of the beholder though isnt it. The mother wanted her child and she was beaten and abused by a man that caused the death of the baby she was pregant with, violently against her will. They werent able to charge him with murder, but they managed to get him for something thankfully. This does not in any way conflct with a pro-choice stance.
Believing that a foetus doesnt become a person with human rights until its born safely does not in any way conflict with acknowledging the tragedy of a pregnant woman beaten and assaulted so severely by a man that the child was killed.
Ive had 3 kids, a couple of miscarriages and an abortion. My wanted children were "babies" to me long before official personhood, but In the eyes of the law and for medical reasons, its not until birth, and the "loss" of the other pregnancies whilst upsetting in some ways for various reasons, is not the same as losing a child that was born and existed as a person in their own right. Obviously.

surely what matters is what you would do - get your nose out of other womens bodies

@averageavocado I think that's quite silly. A fully developed foetus is not an inanimate thing, like a disposable tampon or whatever you think it is. Of course people will feel some empathy for its humanness and not think such a law is acceptable.

It’s not an inanimate object, but it’s not an independent entity. It exists in someone else’s body, and that someone else should retain full autonomy. You can’t demand organs from a corpse to benefit a born human, even to save their life, yet a fetus should have rights over the woman carrying it?

@whumpthereitis we have good laws in the UK that balance rights and harms. Pushing to remove any limits whatsoever trivialises the issue and doesn't seem serious. I believe there will be little appetite for it amongst most people.

Well, I don’t believe it’s an issue with inherent weight. That weight is going to vary depending on individual, and the only opinions that should matter are those of women towards their own pregnancies.

@whumpthereitis I believe the law should state a good reason is needed for the abortion of full term healthy babies. Any old reason won't do. It is complex, and things change as our understanding and society changes. But I imagine current guidelines were reached with serious consideration of what abortion entails. I don't see lawmakers throwing that out the window and saying 'you know what, it doesn't matter. Any time for any reason is fine.' We will agree to disagree, I suppose!

I am in favour of abortion to term.

I was using that example to demonstrate how arbitrary the various abortion cut off limits already are. There are children out there who were born at 22 weeks, but that does not, in my opinion, mean that a 22 week fetus is remotely "viable", it means that with enough money medical science can achieve some very unnatural things.

Without sophisticated neonatal medical care, the point of gestation at which the majority of babies would survive naturally is approximatly 32 weeks. My post was in reply to someone stating 26 weeks, where they got 26 weeks from is anybody's guess.

However no fetus is viable for very long at all without a live women's body as its life support system, as is clear when fullterm mum's of health fetuses tragically have large placental abruptions. Therefore it is the mother's body that is the key factor, and I believe in bodily autonomy, hence full term abortion.

Do you think that little of your (presumably) fellow women, to think that that is really necessary?

We already have The Mental Capcity Act and the Mental Health Act there to safeguard vulnerable women from themselves and from others who my be acting with spurious intentions. Beyond that I think we need to trust that women know what is best for their own body and through attachment the fetus inside them.

@GingerCake2018 I can't take this slightly mystical approach where I know the workings of everyone's mind, and can predict all their future actions. I don't believe laws should be made with the aid of fortune tellers or psychics. My view is the law should spell out what is and isn't acceptable, regardless of what we might think half the population will do.

This is not a mystical approach, the legislation is already in place and used every day in healthcare and in court to assess someones suitability to make a decision. I don't think anyone would have any objection to the requirement that a MCA and mental health assessment should be carried out by 2 independent specialist MCA HCPs and two independent Psychiatrist in what will be extremely rare cases, and if any doubt reviewed in court, but beyond that, if the women has capacity, Her body; Her Choice. End of.

@GingerCake2018 Maybe you will have your way, and it's your right to your view. I maintain that many people will regard it as unacceptable, and that the work done by lawmakers so far will not be thrown out the window. I imagine they have given considerable thought to the guidelines, because not everyone sees the ending of life as insignificant in relation to a woman's choice.

I found it to be an incredibly one sided programme. Both presenters were extremely high functioning and didn't appear to have the plethora of wonderful issues that go with a lot of disabilities.

It's not just the life of painful shit that a hell of a lot of disabled people have to contend with. It's the knock on effect onto the parents, the siblings and so on.

Brothers and sisters who have to give up their childhood and access to parents.

It's the way the system appears to consider disabilities stopping the second you leave education when loads of support disappears.

It's the total lack of accessible properties should the individual be able to live at all independently.

It's the thought that your child is absolutely screwed when you die because they won't be getting that level of care from anyone else.

Life at any costs is an ill thought out policy and is extremely cruel in far too many cases.

How many women would abort a baby "for any old reason" though?