Tag Archives: Bioethics

News

New paper in medical ethics journal argues for infanticide

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ECM sent me a link to this paper.

Here is the abstract:

Abortion is largely accepted even for reasons that do not have anything to do with the fetus’ health. By showing that (1) both fetuses and newborns do not have the same moral status as actual persons, (2) the fact that both are potential persons is morally irrelevant and (3) adoption is not always in the best interest of actual people, the authors argue that what we call ‘after-birth abortion’ (killing a newborn) should be permissible in all the cases where abortion is, including cases where the newborn is not disabled.

Wesley J. Smith says that this sort of thing is not uncommon in bioethics.

Excerpt:

So, if a woman has a mixed racial affair, she and her same race husband should be able to prevent gossip and embarrassment by killing the baby?  (I know of one such case, although the woman wasn’t married, she aborted simply because she didn’t want to have a mixed race child.)  Heck, if the baby’s life is worth so little, let’s harvest her organs and give them to those babies whose parents want them to live.

As just one other example of many I could give, the Journal of Medical Ethics also published an article claiming that scientists should be able to remove the kidneys from people diagnosed with PVS–denigrated as merely “living cadavers”–and transplant in pig organs in the place of their own organs to test the safety of pig-to-human xenotransplantation.  And it isn’t “just” the Journal of Medical Ethics.  Look at all the “respectable” bioethics journals that have published outright advocacy to allow doctors to kill for organs.

This doesn’t mean the law will accept come to accept the premise–although it could–this is precisely how the right to dehydrate the persistently unconscious started, with articles in bioethics and medical journals.  The point is that such arguments are deemed respectable in bioethics, which would reject racist or homophobic advocacy out of hand.

I don’t know why everyone is so interested in having fun all the time. Why do we have to be happy, even if our being happy means hurting other people?

Polemics

Scott Klusendorf: Five questions for pro-life candidates

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Pro-lifer Scott Klusendorf on pro-life issues and candidate selection. (H/T Scott)

Summary:

In 2008, a handful of notable pro-life evangelicals and Catholics threw their support behind a presidential candidate sworn to uphold elective abortion as a fundamental right. They argued that doing so constituted an enlightened pro-life vote that was morally superior to the narrow party politics of religious conservatives. Instead of passing laws against abortion, so the argument went, the candidate and his party would “reduce” it by addressing its underlying causes.1 True, he was mistaken on abortion, but he was right on other, important “whole-of-life” issues such as opposition to war, concern for the poor, and care for the environment. The candidate’s political strategy was simple: shrink the significance of abortion so it was more or less equal with other issues.2

It worked. Twice as many white evangelicals age eighteen through forty-four voted for Barack Obama in 2008 than voted for John Kerry in 2004. Catholics, meanwhile, supported Obama at fifty-four percent, up seven points from what they gave Kerry four years earlier. The candidate got just enough pro-life votes from these groups to tip the election his way.3

I submit that each of these alleged pro-life votes represents a profound misunderstanding of the pro-life position. The fundamental issue before us is not merely how to reduce abortion, but who counts as one of us. How we answer will determine whether embryos and fetuses enjoy the protection of law or remain candidates for the dumpster. As Francis Beckwith points out, a society that has fewer abortions but protects the legal killing of unborn humans is still deeply immoral.4 Given what’s at stake, it’s vital that pro-life Christians persuasively answer five key questions before the 2012 election

He makes 5 points in the article.

Here’s point #4:

4. Instead of passing laws against abortion, shouldn’t pro-life Christians focus on reducing its underlying causes?

First and foremost, the abortion debate turns on the question of human equality. That is, in a nation dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal, do the unborn count as members of the human family? With that fundamental question in mind, it’s unreasonable for liberals to insist that pro-lifers surrender the legal fight to focus on underlying causes. As my colleague Steve Weimar points out, this is like saying the “underlying cause” of spousal abuse is psychological, so instead of making it illegal for husbands to beat their wives, the solution is to provide counseling for men. There are “underlying causes” for rape, murder, theft, and so on, but that in no way makes it misguided to have laws banning such actions.8

Moreover, why are liberals even concerned about reducing the number of abortions in the first place? If destroying a human fetus is morally no different than cutting one’s fingernails, then who cares how many abortions there are? The reason to reduce elective abortion is that human life is unjustly taken-but if that’s the case, then restricting the practice makes perfect sense. Imagine a nineteenth-century lawmaker who said that slavery was a bad idea and we ought to reduce it, but owning slaves should remain legal. If those in power adopted his thinking, would this be a good society? True, politics isn’t a sufficient answer to injustice, but it’s certainly a necessary one. Martin Luther King, Jr., once said, “The law can’t make the white man love me, but it can stop him from lynching me.”9 Frankly, if Christians don’t think the government-sanctioned killing of unborn children merits a political response, then they not only misunderstand the moral gravity of the situation, but also their mandate to love their neighbor as themselves.

Underlying causes talk reminds me of how liberals, once in power, push contraception as a way of preventing unwanted pregnancy. The numbers from the UK show that this is like throwing gasoline on a fire – the number of abortions just goes up because contraception is not foolproof,  and it just normalizes sex all the more.

Point #5 is really worth reading, but too long to excerpt here.

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News

Canadian pro-life group gets fair TV coverage from CTV

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Wow, check out this amazing video showing the work being done by the Canadian Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform in southern Alberta.

WARNING: There are some images from actual abortions in this video.

This is very positive, considering how the pro-lifers are received on the university campuses in Canada. I like these pro-lifers – they’re young, they’re smart, and they’re determined. They engage their opponents with evidence face-to-face , and they are ready to debate the issue in a gentle and winsome way.

I understand that they were interviewed on television by CTV (above) but also by Global Television. These are secular, mainstream news sources.

Here is the link to the Global television coverage.

You can donate to CCBR here. (WARNING: Graphic images of abortion)

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Learn about the pro-life case