On an episode of Taboo, a woman suffering from Achondroplasia (dwarfism) was in a relationship with a man that was 6’5’. They decided to have a child despite the doctor’s warning. She endangered her life and her newly conceived baby’s life by doing so. She also had a greater than 50 percent chance of passing the condition on to her baby. Is this right or wrong and should the law be able to prevent her from making these life changing decision?

January 25, 2012

Anonymous asked: On an episode of Taboo, a woman suffering from Achondroplasia (dwarfism) was in a relationship with a man that was 6'5'. They decided to have a child despite the doctor's warning. She endangered her life and her newly conceived baby's life by doing so. She also had a greater than 50 percent chance of passing the condition on to her baby. Is this right or wrong and should the law be able to prevent her from making these life changing decision?

The real question would be: where are you drawing the line?

What about sickle cell anemia, in which the person could be guaranteeing their child a lifetime of pain, and a very dangerous 9 months for themselves? Cystic fibrosis? Tay-Sachs? For that matter, what about alcoholism?

Should women who get a screening at 20 weeks for genetic disorders be forced to abort when they discover their child will have something that will make their life difficult and painful?

And as for endangering her life, it doesn’t factor in for me. Women give up their lives for their children every day; most women are fully aware, going into pregnancy, that there is a chance of things going terribly wrong in even the healthiest pregnancy.

People are stupid, don’t get me wrong. But making a law won’t make them less stupid. If a woman wants to have a baby, by god - she’ll find a way to have a baby, law or not.

Making laws like that is a slippery slope, and somewhere a line would have to be drawn. Several states had eugenics boards only a few decades ago; in which they sterilized plenty of people under the call of “public good”. The case I just linked to - the woman was sterilized because she was raped at 13.

No board of people - be it federal congress, state eugenics boards, or a local commission - should be able to say whether you can have children or not.

Unimpressive

I sleep better.