January 14, 2013

"If he could smile and play and feel then despite his disabilities he deserved to enjoy whatever life he had left, no matter how short."

"Just because his life would be shorter or different, didn’t mean he didn’t deserve to experience it. As long as he was pain free I vowed to let him enjoy his life both while inside me and outside, no matter how long that be."

20 comments:

David said...

Wow.

I'm not sure the child was smiling, but mother knows best. I don't think this is a decision the parents will regret.

edutcher said...

And there will be all manner of Lefty snark about "what kind of woman is she?".

This is a big reason they hate Sarah Palin.

Maybe the bad guys really are losing; as I say, ultrasound is the worst thing to ever happen to feminism.

Richard Dolan said...

In a God-is-dead world, people have such difficulty even finding the words to express the value of life. This mother talks about what her baby deserved -- the word appears twice in her short statement. Weird. The baby didn't earn the right to his brief life by smiling at an opportune moment, nor did he forfeit it by having a defective brain. The whole idea of 'just desserts' simply doesn't fit. Equally out of place is any utilitarian calculus of the greater good.

The Judeo-Christian tradition was always that life is a gift from God which we must not spurn. Pity that this mother like so many others has lost the instinctive connection to that idea.

Richard Dolan said...
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YoungHegelian said...

I thought this whole business was about a woman's choice.

She & her partner made their choice. If we don't like it, we can just go fuck off.

Hard cases make for bad moral philosophy as well as bad law. May she & her partner find some measure of closure from this.

Unknown said...

I honor her choice. Surely it's as legitimate as choosing to abort. Even to pro abortion people.

Anonymous said...

Yes Wyo Sis, it is.

The Godfather said...

The mother's decision not to kill her child is described in the news story as "heartbreaking" and an "ordeal". How do you describe the decision of a mother to kill a healthy but inconvenient child?

mariner said...

The Godfather,
How do you describe the decision of a mother to kill a healthy but inconvenient child?

As every woman's unfettered right.

Didn't you get the memo?

m stone said...

Pure courage.

I Have Misplaced My Pants said...

I don't know that I agree with your final sentence, Richard--I would say that she surprised herself and many others with a stirring of awareness that her child's life was a gift.

Phil 314 said...

A tough story. I didn't note any particular religious reason behind the decision, either. (Though that could also be the journalist)

If so it demonstrates a, dare I say it, pro-life urge, especially when the pregnancy is "humanized".

Unknown said...

Mothers don't want to see their children suffer. I don't think she is saying the baby deserves to live simply because of the smile, but that the smile set her mind at ease about the life her child would have.

kentuckyliz said...

What if the fetus didn't smile while being ultra sounded? Would she have aborted?

What an odd reason to choose life.

Leon said...

We are walking amongst giants, everyday heroes.

tim maguire said...
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tim maguire said...

This is a nice example of why I oppose both abortion and capital punishment. No one as a right to decide whether another's life is worth living.

n.n said...
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n.n said...
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n.n said...

The child may or may not be suffering. The child may or may not die. The child is innocent. The mother and father exhibited extraordinary courage and responsibility for the care of the human life they brought into this world. If only, ultimately, for a shorter time than commonly expected or hoped.