>So this is one time, probably not the first or last, that I would
>strongly advocate complete ignorance is the best policy--ignorance of
>outcome. Any choices made over abortion, which should include the
>father but not depend on him (since we are inherently undependable),
>should be made in an absolutely un-informed condition.
>
>If you want an abortion, then have an abortion. If you don't, then
>don't. Make those decision without knowing anything about the
>baby. Because the truth of the matter is you can not know about the
>baby.
>
>If you decide to carry the baby to term, then part of that decision
>has to be, something like a vow to cherish in sickness, in health, for
>better, and poorer. If your baby is disabled, then you simply carry on
>and see what that means. What that means can not and in principle will
>not be known in advance. But every life is this kind of gamble, which
>is the reason to make the vow in the first place. What if he or she,
>isn't disabled? Is there any better or worse chance that they will be
>loving and enjoyable, or a constant nagging nightmare; that they will
>have a happy life or a tragic one? No. This ridiculous need to know
>in advance is a complete illusion and masks a kind of absurd pretense
>of control over what is uncontrollable.
I understand your sentiment, but the advocacy of complete ignorance is impractical, because pregnant women, assisted by doctors, may want to know the conditions of their own pregnant bodies & fetuses for reasons other than selectively aborting socially undesirable ones. The same fetal diagnostics used for selective abortion may be also used to improve medical treatment of fetuses during gestation & neonates & infants after birth. In general, economic development, progress in public health, & advance in prenatal & postnatal care -- the same social conditions that have given us a possibility of selective abortion, infertility treatment, etc. that are problematic -- have also given disabled fetuses a better chance of survival. For instance, on one hand, even premature babies born during the 23-24 weeks of gestation can today survive with intensive care, & premature births are said to be the leading cause of infant disability. With complete ignorance of the conditions of pregnant women & their fetuses, it is likely that there will be less births & survivals of disabled babies. On the other hand, well informed attempts to prevent premature births are likely to decrease the incidence of disability in the newborn population. From the same cause (= increased medical knowledge, better health care, & more importantly more democratic economic development), there comes a trend (a possibility of a higher survival rate of the disabled) & a counter-trend (a possibility of a lesser incidence & degree of disability). Dialectical, in short.
Knowledge is not our enemy; social relations that unnecessarily disable us & make disabled lives more difficult than otherwise are the problems -- the problems that we can eliminate politically.
Yoshie