Law defined by people who believe in virgin birth
A 17-year-old pregnant Irish girl is going to the High Court in Dublin to press for the right to travel to Britain for an abortion. Doctors have told the girl that her four-month foetus will not live more than a few days beyond birth.
She is in the care of Ireland’s health service which has issued an order stopping her from going to Britain.
Miss D was informed last month that her foetus has anencephaly, a condition which means that a large part of the brain and skull is missing.
Babies with anencephaly live a maximum of just three days after birth.
A psychiatrist appointed by the HSE said that the teenager was distraught at the diagnosis, but not suicidal, and therefore did not meet the criteria for being allowed a termination.
Civil law pandering to religious dogma.
Sad
Praise Jesus. [/sarcasm]
Of course this should be allowed!! Denying this procedure under these circumstances is cruelty to both the woman and the fetus. This is why abortion should not be ruled out by law but must instead be a very personal decision made by the woman with the advice of her doctor.
Get that “Becky” girl to call up the demolition company again !!
http://www.dvorak.org/blog/?p=11203
Before jumping to conclusions and condemnations, understand these details;
This is a test case – it is being pursued specifically for the purpose of striking down the law. Ireland is not under martial law, nor is it a religious dictatorship (much to the chagrin of many religious clowns in Ireland and elsewhere); she can actually leave any time and go where she wishes for any procedure. She is doing this ‘by the book’ for the purpose challenging the law. I would bet you Euros to eclairs that most of the doctors and medical personnel involved (like most educated, i.e. non-peasant, Irish) are squarely behind her and her fight.
Rather than snipe at the Irish in general for having such a law on the books, it would be more seemly to note that this is actually a very encouraging news item indeed, as it shows how far Ireland has come in a very short time.
The Irish, collectively, are far from being either stupid or reactionary – although it’s never been a secret that there is a certain (and dwindling) percentage of the pop who are very much both…
No, this challenge is remarkable, since it amounts to, not “Catholic Ireland v. the modern world” but instead, “Modern, progressive Ireland v. the dying Irish Catholic hegemony”
The Church is fighting tooth and nail to hold on to what influence they still retain, since their once-absolute grip on Italy and Mexico is being broken as we speak…
A terrible thing having laws to protect babies. And the elderly. And the unfit.
So they want to make her give birth and then have the baby die, while she would like to hurry up the process?
“she can actually leave any time and go where she wishes for any procedure”
No she can’t. As a seventeen year old, she is not legally an adult and thus needs her parents permission to travel. But since she has been taken into care, it is the state social services (in Ireland, this is the Health Service Executive) who would have to give her permission to travel, and they are refusing to.
Leaving, and leaving legally are two entirely different things.
Just f’rexample, I’ve heard the rumor that’s been going ’round that someone somewhere on the (landlocked) Emerald Isle has recently purchased a boat…
Yes, Gawd knows, the laws forbidding people, particularly underage people, from doing things are 100% effective. Always have been.
#6 – Janky-o
“A terrible thing having laws to protect babies.”
Gee, you must be talking about some other law. This one only involves foetuses, which are not babies.
I mean, you can call a foetus a baby, if you like, just as you can call New York City a hot-fudge sundae – but it doesn’t make it so…
Yeah. anytime I see a pregnant woman, I might enquire about how her fetus is doing.
@ 10
( civil tone )
So when would you change the name ( from fetus to baby )? Would it be when the mother is fully dilated or maybe when the baby is half out or, better yet, when they cut the cord, right?
They have a heart, brains, lungs and most everything else you have except the power to protect themselves.
Inside – outside – for me this isn’t a real estate issue, location isn’t everything, Still a baby.
( /civil tone )
Just cracks me up when men debate abortion. If you don’t have the equipment, stay out of the debate.
@ 12
( civil tone )
“They have a heart, brains, lungs and most everything else you have except the power to protect themselves”.
Actually, this one does not have a brain.
Why should men stay out of the abortion debate? I was a baby once. Even a fetus!
Back to technical terms. Perhaps we should call them humans?
#12 ( civil tone ) …. (/civil tone )
So Shawn, does this mean your normal tone is NOT civil? 🙂
#12 “They have a heart, brains, lungs and most everything else you have except the power to protect themselves.”
So does a cockroach, or a leach.
16
Ha! – Dvorak is my idol, I’m an irritable old man too. I Just didn’t want to start a flame thread.
There’s nothing like a baseball bat swing at the belly to get rid of the problem.
#14 – Jeanne
“Actually, this one does not have a brain.”
Exactly. And it will never have one, and therefore, it may look like, and be in many ways similar to, a human baby (or foetus), but it is not. Was it objectively is, is a mass of inert tissue which rational thought prescribes be removed from the body of the otherwise healthy unfortunate who is now bearing it.
But, oh no! – huge sums of money must be spent and the girl must go through additional suffering – because it resembles a baby – right, fellas?
This comment is about the instant case – not the general issue of abortion.
This is a test case. Usually that is good. Roe v Wade was a test case and got the US out of the middle ages with respect to women’s rights.
I wish the young lady the best.
#12,
Inside – outside – for me this isn’t a real estate issue, location isn’t everything, Still a baby.
So when does the baby STOP being a fetus? At fertilized cell? At zygote? When they cut the cord? When they move out of the house?
#13
I was going to bust your balls for doing what you accused other men of doing until… I went to your site. Great site, great squirrel pic!
Hey, I lied, your balls need busting anyway. 🙂
@5
Lauren the Ghoti,
Great post. It really helped to understand what exactly is at stake and helped explain why she wasn’t just traveling to have the abortion.
I love the graphic for this blog entry. Where is it from? Who painted it?
The link goes to some new agey site but I don’t see an attribution.
But, oh no! – huge sums of money must be spent and the girl must go through additional suffering – because it resembles a baby – right, fellas?
Makes me wonder what would happen if a cancerous tumor looked like Jesus or Mary.
J/P=?
#13 – That’s a pretty stupid point.
#17 – #12 “They have a heart, brains, lungs and most everything else you have except the power to protect themselves.”
So does a cockroach, or a leach.
Comment by DaveW — 5/3/2007 @ 8:49 am
Your point isn’t lost on me, and I am sympathetic to your point…
But sadly, you are wrong on both counts. In the future, when in doubt, choose mammals.
Umm, I agree, boys debating abortion is so silly. How would any of YOU like to (if you can imagine this) have a blob growing in you, a parasite…that has absolutely NO ability to live because it’s lacking a brain. I has no hope, no inkling of rational thought, no thread of humanity. It’s a doomed conglomeration of cells growing in this girl. It’s like a cancer that has the ability to live outside the host for a few hours or days. To subject this girl to carry the fetus to term, knowing that the fetus will die is a horrible, horrible nightmare to endure. What do you have against 17 year old girls? I guess HER LIFE isn’t valuable…just your concepts of what abortion is and isn’t. I’ll tell you guys…a 4 month pregnancy termination is no walk in the park. It’s as, often MORE PAINFUL than a regular birth. Contrary to what most “right-to-lifers” will tell you, they don’t pull the baby out and rip it to pieces…. no. The main, most cost effective medical solution is to induce labor. The baby is born via a vaginal birth, whole. Now while that sounds easy..in that it’s small, starting the labor is rather difficult, and a lengthy process.
It’s going to die…so why not allow it to die NOW, instead of dooming the poor mother to have to live with that knowledge for the next 5 months. This isn’t a test case as much as it’s a humanitarian cas against stupid laws.
Why do you men hate women so much? That’s all it is…. try letting US MAKE THE DECISIONS about what’s best for us…
I think you do not understand the law. While I support abortion, I realize that in most countries (really all) you do not own your own body. Period. We all live within a societal construct, these communities set laws that dictate what we are free to do. There is no such thing as absolute freedom (because all choices reflect the moral governing codes of the day).
(some other examples)
Most countries control what sexual activities one can engage in with their body (no need to go into any graphic detail). They also control how you can advertise your body. Certain body modifications (like tattoos can be banned). It all depends on the society.
Finally, one does not actually have the right to terminate their own life or the life of a sick relative (euthanasia). This is simply left up for the state to decide.
Summary: You don’t actually own your own body, the autonomy is left up to the state (or city state) in which you partake your membership in.
Did you hear the one about the cannibal who passed his brother in the woods?