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Okay, this is something that got me thinking after the thread in Sensationalist Headlines about the pictures of the baby with anencephaly. Gunfox cited their blog in which they said they apparently found out 3 months into the pregnancy that the baby had anencephaly yet they still chose to have it. This was followed by ak'z raising the following point:
Which raises an interesting point. The question this debate is about is:
If you're pregnant with a baby with a severe physical handicap and you know it very early into the pregnancy, what is the right decision to take? Is it better to abort it or should you keep going and give it, depending on the handicap, a much shorter and considerably worse life?
I side with the formerly mentioned part of this debate. Taking the anencephaly baby for example. You have brains bulging outside of his skull, eyes bulging out, a completely deformed head. Even if it did live to the same age a regular person does, that is going to be a fucking awful life. I doubt something like that doesn't hurt at least physically but I can't even imagine the psychological pain one would go through. Hell, the baby lived for 8 hours. 8 hours! And who knows what sort of 8 hours the baby went through.
So good fellows of FP, what do you think? Is it better to spare the child and abort it or to have it?
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Handicap is a very archaic word to use nowadays.
Ultimately, there is no 'right' or 'wrong' answer - it'd be easy to argue that for the above case, maybe it would have been the better option, especially considering the very low chance of survival. Yet, we cannot argue that every individual who is identified with a special need / disability from birth [that will be lifelong] does not deserve their chance to live.
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I'll bite.
I would spare the dignity of the child and abort it, although ultimately it is up to the parents whether they will commit to the responsibility. If that is the case, I would only have admiration for the parents.
Recently my parents told me that if I was born 'retarded' (pardon the bluntness of that statement) then I would've been put up for adoption; in other words, they wouldn't have considered me worth their parenting life. My ma has always had a weird view that she should get something in return for raising a kid, that it shouldn't be thankless work but that's going off the point somewhat.
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your parents sound like horrible people.
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If my baby was going to be born with some sort of PHYSICAL defect, I would probably go ahead with birth anyway, since you never know when there's going to be a scientific breakthrough and we find a cure for Diabetes or create replacement legs for people. To me, only the mental state of a person matters. If they're a near-cripple, I probably won't notice.
If my baby was going to be born with some sort of MENTAL defect, I'd likely abort. There is definitely the possibility of a scientific cure, but by the time they find one, it might be too late for my child to begin a normal education and advance to become a "normal" human being. And quite frankly, I don't want to be put through the mental and literal cost of raising a child that may not be able to hold a spoon at age 5 without flipping out and putting it in my eye. I'm not made of money and I don't have the most stable psyche to begin with.
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I would say I am for it. As cruel as it may sound I would rather end the child then let it have a painful life.
And @ Comrade Lurker
Why do you say "commit the responsibility" You're making it sound like a crime or something?
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Nah I didn't mean to make it sound like a crime. I meant it in the context of having a child, because there's no doubt having one will drastically change your life.
They're not, they just have weird views on things, that's all.
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I said no to weiners, little boy bum bums are good. ~ScottyPedo, 2013
April 2012
3,704 Posts
Personally I have a very loose opinion anout abortions. Any mental, sensory or limb defect will severely hurt their chances of leading a successful and independant life. That's an abortion.
For me it is all about the child's potential. If they can become a millionaire without medical assistance, I think the child should live unless the mother doesn't feel ready. If they don't feel ready, the child won't be raised properly and that will damage their potential.
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Scotty, many blind, deaf or people without some of their limbs can go on to lead sucessful lives. Mental, on the other hand, is different. People with sevre menal disabilities such as down syndrome or, as in the case of the OP, anencephaly. It's just some of the lessons i learned playing katawa Shoujo.
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Anencephalic babies are never conscious, so the baby never experienced anything.
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-snip
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Depends on the severity of the handicap.
I'm probably, in so many eyes, a terrible person for thinking this, but if the child has otherwise no chance of survival without assistance, why try? I would rather abort my own handicapped child than pump money in trying to save it. I can't in good conscience let a handicapped child try to fight its way to survival, especially through artificial means.
I guess what i'm saying is, if you take modern healthcare out of the equation and in those conditions the child would not survive, then what are you really accomplishing by using modern healthcare to save the child?
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This ideology really doesn't work at all considering in centuries past just how many infants died during & shortly after birth. C-sections, premature births, & so many other such predicaments are common place & essentially quite fixable in the modern world. Not so much in our pasts.
Also, what is accomplished? I'm pretty sure there are a number of diabetic individuals & those born prematurely who enjoy being alive thanks to big bad artificial means.
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It depends on what the parent feels.
It's fair to say we can't imagine what it must feel like to have life growing within us, and if we were to imagine this experience, I'm sure we'd hope for nothing more or less than a perfectly healthy child.
This argument is veering towards morality. Is it under our judgement for someone's choices when creating life.
The above parents give up the baby to adoption. There's nothing wrong with that, people who want to raise children, who can't have them have more opportunities, it would be more selfish to abort at that point.
The parents life would change completely anyway, it's definitely a more difficult challenge considering these children who are innocent are punished by biological flaws, and that aspect would frighten and dishearten all parents.
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You're using the wrong example. I was basing the example off the one in the OP.
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surely you can't be against western medicine.
"let nature take its course" is not a good answer when life expectency was in the 30s two hundred years ago.
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If you were not born perfect, should I cancel you?
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If you were born living in unending agony, should I force you to live?
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there wouldn't be a "you" in the first place.
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coathangers ftw
(User was banned for this post ("This is not debating." - Megafan))
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Did you not read the post immediately above yours or...?
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no.
You made the initial post that "artificial" medicine keeping someone alive is pointless. Regardless of what context, you still made that point.
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snip
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"people give DBS shit all the time but he's really a good guy and i'm glad he's my friend" -no one
March 2009
17,013 Posts
abort; you wouldn't take a healthy person and give them horrible disabilities so why create a person like that?
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You entirely missed the point of my post. It was a response to a response & not the OP, hence the big blue box above it. & both conditions would be quite fatal without modern medicine.
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It really depends on the severity of the condition. This is a very similar situation to euthanasia which I support so I guess I am on the side of having the choice to abort.
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If it is something that will end the child's life early to the point of the child not being able to enjoy anything, then yes, I think abortion would be the best way to go to spare the parents less grief and having to raise a child they know will never be able to have a career, family, etc. Any disease that makes someone not live past early adulthood or childhood makes me think that the child may eventually find out and realize that what they accomplish won't help them later in life, because they won't be there to experience it.
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my stance.
thanks
(User was banned for this post ("This is not debating." - Megafan))
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Oh missed that.
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there is absolutely no justification for murder under any circumstance. You cannot kill someone who's defenseless just because they (according to your subjective assessment) can or will develop some handicap in future. That is all.
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If I was pregnant and I knew the child was severely handicapped, I'd rather abort. Although for the sake of my own conscience I don't know if I could. But then again guilt is no good reason to bare a child, for for the my own, partners and childs sake I don't think I'd mentally be able to go through with it. I feel like a terrible person for even admitting it.
What I don't fully understand is how parents of their severely handicapped children can say "we wouldn't want them any other way", I mean sure, you love your child regardless... but there must be at least an ounce that wishes they didn't turn out that way.. whether it's for the benefit of the child or theirs.. or both. Raising a family is hard enough, but I couldn't even begin to imagine how difficult that'd be. props to them, is all I can say really.. but at the same time, in some cases they have no idea the child might be handicapped, so after the birth they can hardly change their minds just like that.
But personally, if I knew beforehand, and if it was going to be incredibly severe, for the sake of the child itself and for my own psychological well-being, I don't think I could go through with it.
Edited:
I can see your point, I do believe everyone should be given a fair chance. But if you know full well that it'll destroy your own happiness and the child won't live healthily or happily either, then why make the sacrifice
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Murder and abortion isn't the same. A fetus isn't a human being capable of thought and emotion. It doesn't even fit the definition of murder at all.
That aside, I actually agree that it's presumptuous of the parents to assume that the baby will live an unfulfilled life because of a handicap, it would be purely for reasons of my own concern if I (and whoever the partner was) decided to have an abortion. I would want a healthy child, and taking care of a handicapped person is hard work, both physically and psychologically, especially if you take care of them your whole life.
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pretty much what I was saying but in a shorter version. (although the whole murder/abortion thing is entirely a matter of opinion)
I've got a few heart and body complications that I've been told would be a pose a large risk during child birth (at least for now) so if I got pregnant regardless of the state of the child I would have no option but to abort. But even if it came to that I'd still struggle to bring myself to do it, it's difficult to imagine what having a life, that you made, inside of your own body feels like. Instinctively all you want to do is protect it and you'd do anything to do that. It's the most personal and greatest thing I feel anyone can achieve, and you just want your own to be perfectly healthy and happy. No one ever says "I want a handicapped child", but some people seem learn to live with that. I really don't know if I would and it wouldn't be reasonable to attempt it
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Nobody is saying they are going to murder the baby. We are discussing a scenario in which a potential human life that is known for a fact will be born with a physical defect that will negatively affect their life.
If I were to have a child, I would do my best to make sure he or she would have the best life possible. To me, knowingly letting my child go through life with more pain (and unnecessary pain) when we have the ability to detect such burdening defects is more immoral than stopping them from being born in the first place.
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Depends entirely on the hypothetical problem. Downs? I'd keep it. Autism? I'd keep it. If it was something bad however, I'd rather spare it the pain and hardship of a very difficult life.
But I would feel that any partner of mine should have the final say in it.
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Not that it directly has anything to do with this subject of debate, but the reality is that there's already too many children and not enough parents. People wanting more children is almost like selfish gene-spreading in my book.
Edited:
Abortion is very handy but kind of unnatural and wouldn't be needed if people didn't get pregnant to only have an abort. And adoption is always good.
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Accepting the hypothetical situation where my unborn child has a mental handicap of some sort, more than likely I would desire it never being born in the first place because of its obvious disabilities that would be a burden on his/herself and everyone else. Ultimately the decision would lie with whoever is having the child anyway and I would probably completely remove myself from that decision entirely because I don't have the suffer the burden of carrying the unborn child. Of course the severity of the mental handicap would influence my decision as well. A child with downs syndrome has no chance of impacting the world in a positive way. What is really important in this case is the opportunities he/she will have. And it is clear that some handicaps are more limiting than others.
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Please look up Andrea Fay Friedman & realize just how naive you are. & she is not the only example.
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I recant my statement about having no chance, however I will not appeal to unrealistic probabilistic fallacies. A child with down syndrome still has a very slim chance of succeeding in anything.
