Wednesday, May 09, 2007

Aborting Inconvenience--UPDATED

LANGUAGE ALERT: Film clip contains profanity.

90% of all Down's Syndrome babies, whose mothers have prenatal testing, are aborted. And now, early testing for all sorts of genetic problems--especially the important ones like whether or not the baby is a boy will bring us to the same place.

India and China have their female genocide. Here's why:

Last year, 20 children were born to the women of Xicun. Sixteen were boys. The year before, 24 were born and 19 were boys. There is a reason for the preponderance of males: In 1999, the medical center that serves Xicun bought a cheap, Chinese-made ultrasound machine that allowed doctors to determine the sex of a fetus. Sex-selective abortions followed. And now the town, like hundreds of others in China, is facing a boom in boys.

Recent census figures show that 117 boys are born in China for every 100 girls. Boys are even more prevalent in rural areas, where they are needed to work and eventually inherit the land. (Stephen Shaver - AFP)

Sex-selective abortions, infanticide and significant differences in children's access to medical care are contributing to an increasingly skewed sex ratio in China's countryside, Western and Chinese researchers say. Figures released this year as part of China's census show there are 117 boys born for every 100 girls.
The West has the Down's Syndrome genocide. And the worst thing is, there are some who will say that is a good thing. Moral depravity is an abstract that doesn't apply in the reality of a person's life.

It's going to turn out that the women who don't believe in abortion will have more children and more "defected" children because they won't abort. And then there will be those who abort all but the "perfect" child--the one true second coming for that perfect little aged family.

This phenomenon reminds me of the movie Idiocracy except for the depiction of the "producers". See if you can spot the generaliztions about the "breeders". Yup, we an ign'ant bunch, ya'll. (CAUTION!!! Language Alert! You have been warned!)



Update: As an aside, the article was about parents of Down's kids who want to talk to people considering aborting their baby and encouraging them to keep the Down's baby. Doctors routinely recommend abortion over the challenging work of parenting a special child. I can think of one exception to the "end it" recommendation. When a child is born severely prematurely (22 to 26 weeks), with the likelihood of a difficult life that makes Down's seem easy by comparison, the doctors let it be the "parent's choice". They don't tend to be as opinionated as when there's Downs. Of course, with preemies, there is all the fun technology to save lives (for which I'm grateful--I have my son because of it) even though the outcomes are far more severe. But then Down's can't be ameliorated by medicine. It just is.

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

90% of women who have amniocentisis abort their babies with Down's Syndrome, but what is the percentage of women over 35 who don't have the procedure at all. I didn't even consider having the procedure since there was a risk of miscarriage and the test revealed nothing that could help my baby's health. The whole thing seemed pointless to me. My guess is the only women who have the procedure want to abort "defective", their idea not mine I assure you, babies. Also two of my friends who had babies after 35 didn't bother with the test. one of them was badgered by her doctor for refusing the test. That is appalling as far as I am concerned. Badgering a woman to have a test that could kill her baby so she can find out information that will be used as an excuse to kill her baby. Doctors like that should have their liscenses pulled.

Antoinette

David Veksler said...

Choosing to have a child with severe mental and physical problems is a moral atrocity. There's no way to get around the fact that Down syndrome causes suffering in everyone involved, especially the child. The parents who support bringing more people burdened with this illness into the world only want to extend their and their children's suffering to everyone else. They should be named for what they are - evil.

Every child should be loved and valued - but a fetus is not a child until he or she is born - and what kind of monster do you have to be to want children to suffer their entire life? Only the religious dogma behind the hypocritical "culture of life" is capable of sinking people to this level.

Melissa Clouthier said...

Heroic Life,

How exactly, do Down's people suffer? My cousin had Down's Syndrome and had a wonderful, long life. She had brothers and sister and the whole community who loved her. She lived to be 54. You should have seen her funeral. Everyone in town came. She made a huge impact on the world.

And a fetus is not a child until he is born? Really? My son was born at 24 weeks--an age where many feel free to still abort the child. He felt pain. He interacted with his environment. He had brain activity. His heart and lungs worked.

My son survived, through medical advances. His twin did not. Are you against life-saving interventions for anyone? And who gets to define what is a defect? You do realize, that there will be people who will abort "gay" babies once the genetic "defects" can be identified.

As a "culture of life" person, I wouldn't abort a gay baby, because I believe abortion is morally repugnant. But there are a lot of people who would abort a "defected" baby (and that definition is obviously fluid depending on the "context").

And who would you be to judge? Life doesn't begin until birth anyway.

Oh, and people forget that amnio isn't 100%. I've had two friends who were told that they were going to have a Down's baby, one was told in all three pregnancies and went on to have three healthy babies, and the other family had a child who has slight developmental delays but is growing fine. How many perfectly "normal" babies are aborted just on the chance the baby might be less than by some arbitrary standard?

I find it fascinating how someone willing to sacrifice their own selfishness to care for a child who needs more help is considered a monster in your moral code book. The baby, make that fetus, killer is the noble person. Just wow.

You know, so many women are not nearly as certain as you and regret their decision immediately. They don't feel noble. And don't tell me it's society judging them. A pregnant woman is ending part of herself when she aborts. She often finds that out after the fact and she suffers the rest of her life with the guilt. That's a suffering too many in the Pro Choice camp fail to acknowledge.

jess said...

As a mother of another 24 weeker, a very happy special needs 7 year old... Amen, Melissa.

Anonymous said...

And then there will be those who abort all but the "perfect" child--the one true second coming for that perfect little aged family.

Let me tell you something about the "perfect" child, the "too wanted" child, the yin to the yang of the "unwanted child":

In avoiding a Baby Doe at all costs, they will get a Dallas Egbert III. Instead of aborting him, they will drive him to suicide 15-20 years later with the unrelenting demand for Perfection: Super Genius, Super Successful -- and always under Mommy & Daddy's thumb.

MaxedOutMama said...

"The parents who support bringing more people burdened with this illness into the world only want to extend their and their children's suffering to everyone else. They should be named for what they are - evil."

Sure sounds like a "I don't want to deal with this so don't you dare make me" type of thing. Parents do not "choose" to have a Downs syndrome child. They only get the choice whether to kill the child before birth or not.

I realize that standards may vary, but Down's Syndrome children do not usually suffer. They usually seem to be quite happy! Many are capable of working and living independently. I can barely understand the rationale behind that comment.

Christine said...

We chose not to get any genetic testing done because no matter what, we'd have this child.

There is absolutely no reason to kill an innocent child in utero--would we euthanize grown adults with Down's? Of course not. So why is it okay to kill children?

Anonymous said...

Wow! Are there really such people so lacking in the simplest humanity that they believe having a Down's Syndrome child is evil?! Surely this is a jest, a put on. Surely this person knows that before he started killing Jews, Gypsys, and all the other "subhumans," Hitler started with killing the mentally retarded. Surely heroiclife understands that once you have decided that some human lives aren't worth living you have opened the door for someone to say it is YOUR life that is not worth living.

Anonymous said...

This young man,"heroiclife" looks to be about college age. Is this opinion really thought out from his own frontal brain development...which are still developing at his age, or are these some weird philosophies a professor is teaching him?

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