Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Will it be this way, or will it be that way?

Two Canadian medical experts want new guidelines that would bar doctors from telling parents the sex of their fetus until late in a pregnancy to curb the practice of sex selection:
http://www.nationalpost.com/news/story.html?id=2790685

Of course, sex selection is a huge global problem as identified in a recent cover story in The Economist:
"In China the imbalance between the sexes was 108 boys to 100 girls for the generation born in the late 1980s; for the generation of the early 2000s, it was 124 to 100. In some Chinese provinces the ratio is an unprecedented 130 to 100. The destruction is worst in China but has spread far beyond. Other East Asian countries, including Taiwan and Singapore, former communist states in the western Balkans and the Caucasus, and even sections of America’s population (Chinese- and Japanese-Americans, for example): all these have distorted sex ratios. Gendercide exists on almost every continent. It affects rich and poor; educated and illiterate; Hindu, Muslim, Confucian and Christian alike."
http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=15606229

Note that this story is prefaced with the fact that the Economist is pro-choice, yet they call this tragedy Gendercide.

Kelly McParland argues in the National Post that:

"if the right to choose is absolute, what's the big deal about sex selection...if a fetus isn't human, its sex becomes irrelevant. You can't have it both ways."
http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/blogs/fullcomment/archive/2010/04/13/kelly-mcparland-putting-abortion-advocates-in-a-box.aspx

Touche. Now that we've gone down the slippery 24/7 abortion slope, for those who think unborn babies aren't human, why should we even care if 100 million babies are destroyed through sex selection?

Then we have Joyce Arthur who claims that it is 'paternalistic' to withhold information such as gender from the pregnant woman:
"To restrict people's freedoms, withholding information in that way, I think is unethical and unnecessary and is not going to prevent anything," Ms. Arthur said. "It's a little bit paternalistic and authoritarian."

That's rich -- this from someone who screams at informing women of the true risks of abortion, and the well-developed stage of the fetus.

Arthur doesn't want the doctor to withhold the sex of the baby from the mother. But please, do refrain from telling the same mother about the excruciating pain for the baby in a second trimester abortion, or how the mother will increase her risk of breast cancer, or...etc. etc. etc.

Yup, you can't have it both ways.

10 comments:

  1. It's almost laughable; Joyce Arthur talking about ethics? Good article Pat.

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  2. "If moral value is a subjective personal opinion, that means if I say that murder is okay, because I say it’s okay, then it’s okay, right?

    Or, if I say that it is okay for me to steal from you and therefore when I tell the judge it’s all right for me to steal your car, he’ll say "No problem, since morality is subjective, and you think it’s okay, hey I’m good with that. You’re free to go".

    No, the judge will not tell you it's alright, because it is not. It is against the law. Abortion is not.

    You may think it's okay to steal a car, but most people don't and we have decided as a society that we will have laws stopping people like you from stealing. Or at least giving you a consequence if you do steal.

    Not so much with abortion.

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  3. Just because something is legal does not make it ethical or moral. And in many countries where abortion is illegal, this would never deter the pro-abortions from advocating abortion in these countries. In fact the pro-abortions lobbied strongly to have our government fund abortions in African countries in our Maternal Health initiative. If we follow your logic, then, abortion advocates must cease and desist pushing our abortion ideology on any other country where it is illegal. They do not because the pro-abortions' advocacy for abortion has nothing to do with legality.

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  4. "Just because something is legal does not make it ethical or moral". No, but generally if something is legal it is ethical or moral with most people or even all people.

    And there is really nothing wrong with people advocating a change in a law. Happens all the time. That's how laws change with time.

    There are countries that are still patriarchal and pro-choicers are helping women advance abortion rights. And in developing countries where abortion is legal but women cannot afford to pay for them, prochoicers are advocating for foreign assistance. Nothing wrong with that.

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  5. Ginny, don't lose site of what abortion is: it is the deliberate taking of anothers life. Because a human being is not able to self protect does not give some else the right to kill them. It is beyond comphrension that so many Canadians have been sucked into the whirlpool of believing that because there is no law prohibiting this killing that it is OK to do it. Permit me to ask you if you think it would be OK to kill an infant because the responsibility of caring for him would be difficult or cause problems for the parent(s.) When you are thinking about a response, don't lose site of the fact that you were born into this world because your mother chose to give you life.

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  6. "Permit me to ask you if you think it would be OK to kill an infant because the responsibility of caring for him would be difficult or cause problems for the parent(s.)"

    It should not surprise you that my answer to that is no. Whether I am the parent or not, it is not okay to kill an infant. But that does not mean that it cannot be okay to abort a pregnancy. We do not all place the same value on an embryo or fetus as we do an infant. I understand that you do, but not everyone does.

    I am grateful for the life my mother gave me. To be clear though in her case it was not a choice. She did not control her fertility not was abortion an option. That does not mean I am any more or less grateful though.

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  7. Hello again Ginny, Just want to ask about the difficulty in your response when it says...it is OK to abort a fetus or an embryo. Let's define the words. abort: in simple terms it means to kill, now for fetus: baby. So you see we are saying the same thing but just using different words. A doctor once told me that when she did abortions she never used any other words other than abortion or termination and embryo or clump of tissue and she could never look at the contents in the tubing leading to the suction container. She doesn't own a vacum cleaner because even five years post abortion practice, she can't stand to hear suction of any kind because of the memories of what she did to babies. For you and I, well we are adults. You mentioned before that you too have children. Follow me here and place your children alongside mine, mine are young adults, before that they were teenagers, pre teens, school age, pre school, todlers, infants, a fetus, an embryo, a zygote and so it goes. Yes, Ginny we are really speaking about living children whose lives are being destroyed by ripping them apart, limb by limb, by burning them to death with potassium and sodium soluntions etc etc...I'm sorry if this disturbs you Ginny but abortion is disturbing!! So when pro-abortion advocates speak of choice to abort it would be good for them to know what abortion really means to a child who is supposedly living in the safest, warmest and cozied place on earth, their mothers womb. Thanks for listening Ginny.

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  8. No Jennifer we aren't saying the same thing. For you a zygote, an embryo, a fetus are all of eaqual value as your born children. Sorry, I don't feel that way. I have been on the Pill for about 25 years. I know that it may interfere with implantation. Does that upset me that I may have "killed" embryos. Not at all.

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  9. Ginny you come across as a well informed woman so I have trouble in understanding the reluctance to accept science based authority re human development. Have that as you wish, but I have to admit in learning you have been 'on the pill' for 25 years is worriesome. Yes, you are correct, the 'pill' prevents implantation. This aside, are you aware of the significant increased risk of breast cancer when taking the pill. I trust that you are taking appropriate measures to detect any lumps or bumps in your tissue.

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  10. Thanks for the concern Jennifer but I am in perfect health. Sure there is some increased risk of breast cancer with the Pill just as there is a decreased risk of other cancers with the Pill. I do not have a family history nor any other factors that put me at elevated risk for breast cancer so that risk is low for me and one I am willing to take. I understand however that no matter how small the risk, you yourself would not take the Pill and that you use this risk to try to dissuade others, regardless of the fact that it is not the reason for your opposition to the Pill.

    Oh, and btw, the value of a zygote versus a child is not science based.

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