KILL unwanted or disabled babies at birth as they are not a real person'

Jimmy-J · 02-03-2012, 05:03

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Doctors should have the right to kill newborn babies because they are disabled, too expensive or simply unwanted by their mothers, an academic with links to Oxford University has claimed.

Francesca Minerva, a philosopher and medical ethicist, argues a young baby is not a real person and so killing it in the first days after birth is little different to aborting it in the womb.

Even a healthy baby could have its life snuffed out if the mother decides she canâ€™t afford to look after it, the article published by the British Medical Journal group states.

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Anti-abortion vicar: 'If infanticide is morally repulsive, then abortion is too'

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Sirius · 02-03-2012, 06:55

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Originally Posted by Jimmy-J

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I find this suggestion repulsive in the extreme.

denphone · 02-03-2012, 07:01

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Originally Posted by Sirius

I find this suggestion repulsive in the extreme.

Yes the suggestion is utterly shocking.

Osem · 02-03-2012, 07:02

I'd suggest anyone who advocates killing babies "is not a real person".

Ramrod · 02-03-2012, 07:34

It is a bit fecked up.......

Angua · 02-03-2012, 07:54

It is yet another attempt at back seat anti abortion horror.

martyh · 02-03-2012, 08:09

I think before everyone's heads explode in a rash of disgust it should be pointed out that the article is not meant to be an argument in favour of infanticide .It is a philosophical argument designed to promote debate about abortion of disabled fetuses which is legal in some cases.She appears to be suggesting in the hyperthetical argument that there is is cause in some cases to kill a badly deformed or otherwise disabled child after birth as in some countries it would be permitted to abort the same fetus before birth

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She said she believes her argument was taken out of its academic and theoretical context, and that 'I wish I could explain to people it is not a policy - and I'm not suggesting that and I'm not encouraging that'.

The full article is here

downquark1 · 02-03-2012, 08:18

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Originally Posted by Angua

It is yet another attempt at back seat anti abortion horror.

Yeah, if you can't find outrageous things in a moral philosophers work, then he or she isn't doing their job properly.

**Chris** · 02-03-2012, 08:41

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Originally Posted by Osem

I'd suggest anyone who advocates killing babies "is not a real person".

Almost 190,000 babies we killed - legally - in 2010 in England and Wales. We hide the fact behind the euphemism "abortion".

By your definition there are rather a lot of not-people out there...

Hom3r · 02-03-2012, 09:03

Even the devil wouldn't want these people. Hell has is own place for people who kill babies.

RizzyKing · 02-03-2012, 09:14

Is this the level of academia we have gotten too in this country where we ponder the killing of babies. Maybe i am not high brow enough but this is just tasteless and crass for so called intellectuals to be hypothesising on at a time when have so many other things to deal with. Thats putting aside the fact that while she might nnt regard it as anything more then an intellectual exercise there are people and groups who believe this type of thing and wil take this as intellectual endorsement. It is just not something any person i know would ever think about in anyway and anyone who can think like this in anyway is not someone i could be round.

martyh · 02-03-2012, 09:21

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Originally Posted by RizzyKing

Is this the level of academia we have gotten too in this country where we ponder the killing of babies. Maybe i am not high brow enough but this is just tasteless and crass for so called intellectuals to be hypothesising on at a time when have so many other things to deal with. Thats putting aside the fact that while she might nnt regard it as anything more then an intellectual exercise there are people and groups who believe this type of thing and wil take this as intellectual endorsement. It is just not something any person i know would ever think about in anyway and anyone who can think like this in anyway is not someone i could be round.

Without intellectual discussions such as this we would not have arrived at the laws we have now .Discussing abortion related topics is always going to be controversial but it needs to be done so that society as a whole can decide what it finds acceptable or not .

**Damien** · 02-03-2012, 10:19

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Originally Posted by Chris

Almost 190,000 babies we killed - legally - in 2010 in England and Wales. We hide the fact behind the euphemism "abortion".

By your definition there are rather a lot of not-people out there...

I think that depends on when you believe life begins. I don't think killing a baby that has been born is the same as aborting a fetus early on in it's development. I think the academics point is that the justification we sometimes use for that is fetus hasn't developed a sense of awareness but the same could be said of a young child. Still, I think it's different.

**Chris** · 02-03-2012, 10:32

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Originally Posted by Damien

I think that depends on when you believe life begins. I don't think killing a baby that has been born is the same as aborting a fetus early on in it's development. I think the academics point is that the justification we sometimes use for that is fetus hasn't developed a sense of awareness but the same could be said of a young child. Still, I think it's different.

The ethicists have raised a point that is very, very uncomfortable for those that advocate abortion IMO. The fact is, we have no scientific definition for when personhood begins. What we have is a fudged moral compromise, using a vaguely scientific measure of 'viability', to determine when abortion can happen and when it cannot. This definition isn't even universal, it applies in the UK but is different elsewhere.

The reason the argument is so uncomfortable for pro-choicers is that it exposes the arbitrary nature of our current law to cold, hard logic. There is no cold, hard, dispassionate reason why a severely disabled baby can be killed in the womb but not immediately post-birth. The reason for not killing such a child after birth is not scientific but moral. And if we accept the basis of the debate is a moral one, rather than hiding behind supposedly scientific arguments about "viability", what is that morality to be based on? Where should we draw the line, and why?

downquark1 · 02-03-2012, 10:42

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Originally Posted by Chris

The ethicists have raised a point that is very, very uncomfortable for those that advocate abortion IMO. The fact is, we have no scientific definition for when personhood begins. What we have is a fudged moral compromise, using a vaguely scientific measure of 'viability', to determine when abortion can happen and when it cannot. This definition isn't even universal, it applies in the UK but is different elsewhere.

The reason the argument is so uncomfortable for pro-choicers is that it exposes the arbitrary nature of our current law to cold, hard logic. There is no cold, hard, dispassionate reason why a severely disabled baby can be killed in the womb but not immediately post-birth. The reason for not killing such a child after birth is not scientific but moral. And if we accept the basis of the debate is a moral one, rather than hiding behind supposedly scientific arguments about "viability", what is that morality to be based on? Where should we draw the line, and why?

That's the case for any number of things, we draw arbitrary lines with animal rights all the time, so is the "adult"/"child" distinction.