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Reproductive Rights vs Responsibilities
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In the modern age, the latest roaring battle cry from women is “Reproductive Rights”. I find myself questioning the whole notion, on a legal level and an ethical level. Here is your opportunity to speak out.
My first instinct is that yes women have reproductive rights. The more I think about it on a legal level I start to have my doubts about whether they should. Time and time again, the US population has said select groups don’t deserve special rights. To an extent I don’t disagree with that notion. In all practicality I realize the government often times has to step in and protect certain groups from mob mentality, but that is a different argument altogether. If women are afforded special reproductive rights, does this put them in a category of select individuals getting rights not available to the general public?
On the ethical side of things, if a woman has reproductive rights, what are her reproductive responsibilities? One can not have rights without having responsibilities to go along the exercising of those rights. I personally think that just because a woman can have babies doesn’t mean she should. I am not suggesting legal restrictions placed on reproduction, just yet. I am suggesting personal responsibility though.
When I talk about personal responsibility it isn’t just about having kids you can’t support though that certainly is one of them. The one responsibility I see most neglected these days is the genetic responsibility. Having a baby simply because you want one without regard to the quality (or even quantity) of life the child will have and how much it will cost the healthcare and welfare systems to support is completely irresponsible.
Three or four times in the last week I have seen articles on disabled women having babies when they shouldn’t have been. One was having her fourth child, trying for one that didn’t have her condition. This woman was all of three feet tall, with severe limb deformities, wheelchair bound, and had to use a ventilator most of her life. She had three kids with her condition 2 of which had survived before she had one that was just merely a carrier.
This woman was completely deluded when she suggested she takes care of and raises these kids. He arms were incapable of wiping her own ass much less changing a diaper. While the father(s) may be the type to take care of the kids and the mother, this woman has intentionally produced 2 kids that will require millions of dollars of special medical, education, and social services each by the time they are adults. Should they choose to follow in their mother’s selfish ways will likely produce more of the same burdens on society.
In the end women may or may not be legally entitled to something called reproductive rights. However the ones who can’t exercise that right responsibly certainly aren’t deserving of it.
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I agree that people with such blatant genetic issues should not reproduce themselves and if they had any sense they would not wish to. However your way of looking at the situation is all wrong. You view it as a women issue. It is in fact a social issue. That gimped up dwarf female did not get pregnant by wishing it. She had some degree of collusion from a male. Either he agreed to try for children with her (with all the attending responsibilities) or he was totally reneging *his* responsibility in favor of some quick pu**y from an individual whose sanity and mental competency is already questionable. And where would you have it stop?
This is where I must disagree. If reproductive rights exist, they are the sole purview of the one carrying the fetus. There is absolutely no “we are pregnant” to be had in the world. I can’t look at my pregnant wife and say “we are pregnant” with a straight face. There is also the fact she would have more than a few choice comments for me if I did…
I am not disagreeing that there was male involvement, or I hope to hell there was because any fertility clinic providing her services would be so far out of line I don’t even have words for it. The sperm donor certainly has a responsibility to the children after they are born, but none up until that point.
This is why I am not overly sure there should be a legal right to reproduce, because it doesn’t cross the gender line. If legal reproductive rights carried over to the man, he would be completely justified in insisting she have an abortion or that he shouldn’t have to financially support the child. Since we can’t do that, it is obvious the right does not transcend to us. If the right was equalaby the same token a woman would be able to tell the man who forbids her to have an abortion, fine you are completely responsible for the child after it is born and be able to legally walk away from both of them.
Not that it matters really there is a good chance the father(s) of these children is probably fetish minded. Disabled girls are a big one I am at a loss to explain.
The issue about disabled people having children is absolutely wrong. That is their personal choice to make and none of us should play any part in it. Disabled people should be equally as free as anyone else, free to have children and live whatever sort of life that they wish to live.
Really, when you talk about “Reproductive Responsibilities” you should be talking about people that are not disabled not living up to the responsibility that comes along with having children. Those people are the ones costing us millions and millions of dollars. Not the disabled.
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Going to have to disagree here. Just because they are free to make the choice doesn’t mean they should choose to do it. Intentionally creating children be they disabled or not that the system is forced to support is not the mark of responsibility.
However the point I made stands. Severely disabled women having child after child simply trying to get one right is one of the greatest marks of irresponsibility there is. It also as someone else on Digg pointed out makes a good legal case for child endangerment.
It is true that the rights vs. responsibility spectrum is oftentimes unbalanced, but that’s what Child Services was created for. I realize Child Services can’t catch everything (and in fact miss most things), but at least they try to do their job.
Meanwhile women who get pregnant without the ability or desire to take care of a child give a bad name to the rest of us. I personally want two kids, one boy and one girl, and one of those adopted, but I know that if I get pregnant before I’m ready, I better put that child up for adoption.