That's the upshot of this column by Nicholas Provenzo.
Like many, I am troubled by the implications of Alaska governor and Republican Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin's decision to knowingly give birth to a child disabled with Down syndrome. Given that Palin's decision is being celebrated in some quarters, it is crucial to reaffirm the morality of aborting a fetus diagnosed with Down syndrome (or by extension, any unborn fetus)—a freedom that anti-abortion advocates seek to deny.
A parent has a moral obligation to provide for his or her children until these children are equipped to provide for themselves. Because a person afflicted with Down syndrome is only capable of being marginally productive (if at all) and requires constant care and supervision, unless a parent enjoys the wealth to provide for the lifetime of assistance that their child will require, they are essentially stranding the cost of their child's life upon others.
What a horrendous attitude regarding life. I guess Provenzo would approve of sticking old people on the ice and letting them float out to sea to fend for themselves once they are only "marginally productive."
I welcome columns like this one because it is important for people to understand what "pro-choice" really means. These people aren't just talking about saving a mother's life or babies who will never be able to live outside the womb. They are talking about the preference to get rid of imperfect or unplanned people "for the good of society."
The problem with this line of thought is that (a) testing isn't perfect and (b) who gets to decide who is imperfect?
To the first question, there has been plenty written by others regarding the accuracy rates of some of these tests. There are such things as false positives and there's no way of knowing which aborted babies were false positives and which were not.
Much has been made in some quarters regarding Sarah Palin's amniocentesis. If she hadn't considered abortion, why get the amnio, which can cause an abortion? This question is inappropriate on its face, but let's play that game. Believe it or not, a person can consider abortion, then determine that doing so violates some tenet of morality and reject the idea. This is not "hypocrisy." Suppose Sarah and Todd Palin wanted the amnio to be sure that the baby had Downs Syndrome. Is it unreasonable that they wanted to be sure so that they could be prepared for the birth? I don't think this is far-fetched at all.
But even if the tests were more accurate, who gets to determine what sort of abnormalities are acceptable? There's already evidence that many parents would abort homosexual children if there were tests for it. We know female babies are much more likely to be killed than male ones. There are even cases where babies were aborted for such easily fixed problems as a cleft palate. All of these persons could be productive citizens in one form or fashion, and yet there are people who consider them imperfect enough to kill. Is that really a good rationalization?
Provenzo's column is far more open about why the Left dislikes Sarah and Trig Palin. Their distaste for people who aren't perfect is horrifying.
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