"Where do you draw the line?" said Mark A. Rothstein, director of the Bioethics Institute at the University of Louisville School of Medicine. "On the one hand we have to view this as a positive in terms of preventing disability and illness. But at what point are we engaging in eugenics and not accepting the normal diversity within a population?"Dear Mr. Rothstein,
You're engaging in eugenics when you remove the patients from their families, load them onto trains, unload them into camps, line them up, and herd them into gas ovens en masse. As long as you kill them one at a time, in a sanitary medical setting, in the presence of one or more family members, and they don't look afraid, and you can't hear them cry out, you can get away with referring to killing the patient as preventing a disability.*
* * * * * * *
Freedom of speech gives people the freedom to say unpleasant things, and to misrepresent the truth. I'm still thankful for it.
Further reading:
Rethinking Fetal Anomalies, Christianity Today
An extra chromosome isn't awful, Boston Globe
Down Syndrome Now Detectable In 1st Trimester, Washington Post
Screening for Abnormal Embryos Offers Couples Hope After Heartbreak, New York Times
The Down Dilemma, Time Magazine
The Abortion Debate No One Wants to Have, Washington Post
One Woman's Choice, Washington Post
*Note: This is one reason people first language continues to be so important. People with Down syndrome are not Down syndrome people. Even a big blogger like Evangelical Outpost still isn't getting this one right.
I sent Mr. Carter an e-mail regarding this tonight, by the way. I always love to throw my 2 cents worth in. One time I wrote to a newspaper in Michigan about their use of similar terms in an article I read online. They actually found me & published an interview with me! (I certainly wasn't expecting that. I don't even live in that state!) But at least they listened and published an apology in the paper.
ReplyDeleteGood for you, Lori.
ReplyDeleteI sent one to Time on their "Down Dilemma" article last week. "Is life with DS worth living?" was the subtitle. I wrote, "The answer to that question tells more about you than it does about life as a person with Down syndrome." :-)
That's inspiring, that you actually got a public response like that. Good motivation to keep doing it. I'd like to know if you get a response from Carter. He's a good guy; his prominent position gives him the ability to have a significant impact on the Christian internet community's use of this terminology.