murder v. killing.

Marta Russell ap888 at lafn.org
Thu Aug 26 11:36:20 PDT 1999


Yoshie Furuhashi wrote:


> Marta:
> >I support abortion but take the Adrienne Asche's position that it crosses the
> >line when one aborts because one does not like the characteristic of the fetus
> >(sex, disability, hair color, whatever else they will know about us in the
> >womb) rather than having the abortion because the conditions in one's life
> >makes that choice necessary to abort ANY fetus. This way I challenge
> >assumptions about disablement as one would challenge the assumption that
> >having
> >a boy is more desirable than having a girl. I realize many many people view
> >disability as a primary reason to abort. Trouble is the more market oriented
> >our society becomes, the less willing parents are to have a non "perfect"
> >baby.
>
> We may ask what causes an abortion based upon the knowledge of the
> condition of a fetus. The causes must be two-fold: (1) material (under
> social conditions where parenting is a very much private affair, it takes
> more of everything -- time, money, and other resources -- to raise a
> disabled child); and (2) ideological (disabled persons are often regarded
> as less than fully human, and certainly unequal to non-disabled persons.
> The removal of these two causes must make any possible conflict between
> women's right to abortion and disability rights (as you conceive of it)
> disappear.

I don't extend disability rights to abortion. If I did I would be arguing for civil rights for the fetus. I am not, I am arguing for disability education of would be parents, attendant support services (which should also be made available to parents of children with disabilities), universal health coverage that includes coverage for disabled infants who may have been diagnosed in the womb as having a disability and therefore subject to pre-existing condition health care exclusions (yes, it has happened), etc. But otherwise, I would tend to agree that your suggestions would level the playing field re disablement and abortion decisions that people make.


> I think of the question of sex-selective abortion in favor of males in the
> same manner. In a society where men are not regarded as more valuable
> (materially and ideologically), sex selection in favor of men won't take
> place.

In a society where disabled people were the ones with the money (as opposed to being on the bottom of the economic ladder), there would probably be very little skew because money does translate into social and institutional power which influence what people think.

-- Marta



More information about the lbo-talk mailing list