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Which is the greater burden on our society, an unwanted child or an abortion?
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- Common Sense Political Thought » Archives » Donviti crystalizes a question | September 5, 2008
Oh, that’s easy. An unwanted child. For if that unwanted child is kept by the parent who does not want him or her, than that child will grow up unloved, leading to psychological problems down the road.
Further, unwanted children tend to be born to mothers and fathers who cannot afford them, thus expanding poverty’s reach, and no doubt causing that child to be uneducated and malnourished.
Now, I hate abortion. I prefer that unwanted children are not aborted, but instead, are adopted by families that want them. In an effort to reduce abortion across this land, we should expand adoption programs and liberalize the standards about who can adopt. Gays and Lesbians should be able to adopt. A woman with health problems (like diabetes) should be able to adopt.
Older folks should be able to adopt…and foster care should be a quicker pipeline to adoption (although greatly improved thank you Clinton and Minner—see readers I am objective). There should be some waiver/ rebate/forgiveness of legal fees UP FRONT in the adoption process.
Its a sin that in this country that there is such a thing as an unwanted child when so many oterwise good parents to be adopt overseas to circumvent very strict adoption laws in this country
it is unfortunate but yes the greater burden on society would be an unwanted child
Which is the greater burden on our society, a criminal or a 6 foot hole in the ground?
Individual rights trump perceived (or real) burdens upon society.
No question that an abortion is because it is the robbing of society of human potential. Imagine if Senator Obama’s mother would have said, it is the the 1960’s and I am 17, pregnant with the child of a colored man and unmarried. I am thousands of miles from home. I should take care of this problem. Fortunately, she was not a selfish person who saw her child solely as a burden, but as a gift.
I think the real answer is the parents in either case who would produce a child and not be prepared to either step up to the plate or find some loving person who will.
We need better support systems in this country for families, and people who aren’t ashamed to have sex with someone not their spouse should get over being ashamed to get some birth control.
Tom, what’s your point? If an individual doesn’t see a criminal or a 6 foot hole in his path the encounter will lead to a burden either way.
I think Tom’s point is as well taken as David’s is assine. First, the argument from “potential” can be reduced to absurdity. (See Ronald Linsay’s “The Future of Bioethics”). The Obama analogy is simply specious. Barack was wanted, Ms. Dunham wanted to birth him, that’s #1, she was MARRIED to Mr. Obama (the so-called colored man), numero due, and finally she was thousands of miles from home by her own choice to attend university.
I know you wanted to personalize your dumb argument for us Obamamaniacs. You failed miserably.
Tom’s point is that you can’t simply legislate based on burdens. Allowing free speech is a big burden, for example, but nobody makes the argument presented in this post re: free speech.
On and Ann Dunham was 18 when she had Barack. Nit-picky, granted.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ann_Dunham
Oh and Ann Dunham was 3 months shy of 19 when she had Barack. Nit-picky, granted.
“Individual rights trump perceived (or real) burdens upon society”
Dorian – You are right that Tom’s point is that we can’t (or rather shouldn’t) legislated based on burdens to society.
Of course we do that all the time with gun control, despite its complete ineffectivness.
I think women in this country have a right to decide whether to have an abortion or give birth to an “unwanted child” regardless of the “burdens on society.”
Burdens to society are irrelevant. They don’t trump individual rights, whether those rights be guns, free speech, or a women’s right to do with her body as she pleases.
I have a mother and a sister who are both public school teachers. For years they have had young, mostly impoverished, female children tell them that they plan on having children as their occupation. The more they have, the more the government is willing to pay them. It’s not that abortion isn’t an option, its just not profitable. An entitlement society is our burden.
David – I agree, but the Dems are more than eager to continue the legacy of the government “helping” people, thereby increasing the entitlement society and exacerbating the problems they try to fix.
If government handouts and entitlement programs actually fixed the problems they were created to fix and did so effectively and efficiently I might consider supporting them. Instead they fail and create self-perpetuating wasteful burecracies that don’t solve problems and never go away.
DavidV, resurrecting Reagan’s “welfare queen”.
Clinton had something to say about that in ’96 with his Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act.
Yeah, that pesky gov’t always butting in making sure our food is safe, drinking water is clean, our automobiles don’t explode, etc., etc… If left to the market people would die because the cost of ten lawsuits is usually less than product safety.
I believe in free markets and personal responsibilty too but it is a balancing act not one or the other. A little liberal appreciation would be nice.
Simple – a burden must exist.
“Yeah, that pesky gov’t always butting in making sure our food is safe, drinking water is clean, our automobiles don’t explode, etc., etc…”
Of course some government regulation must exist, but if you actually read my comment you’d see I was discussing Federal entitlement programs not any of the crap you just brought up.
You get into all kinds of difficult arguments if you try to take this question seriously. Freakonomics author Steven Levitt made a statistical case several years ago that the precipitous drop in the crime rate in the 1990s was casually linked to Roe v Wade and decline in the birth of poorer, primarily African-American children. (You might recall Bill Bennett garbling that study and getting blasted a few years back.)
On the other hand, the “easing the barriers to adoption” argument is a favorite, but having been through that process, it’s a lot more complicated than people think. Yes there are millions of Americans out there willing to adopt, but the overwhelming majority of them want to adopt a healthy infant of the “correct” ethnicity.
Fourteen years ago, when we adopted our oldest daughter out of state custody in Kent County, we discovered an incredible fact. She was fourteen at the time, learning disabled and a victim of severe sexual abuse at the hands of her birth father. We discovered from DFS statistics that we were the first family in Kent County recorded history to try to adopt a child out of state custody over four years old.
(And then the authorities fought tooth and nail against letting us adopt her.)
There are huge bureaucratic barriers to adoption in the US, but the cultural barriers are even larger. It’s one thing for somebody (like Sarah Palin) to discover they are pregnant with a Downs Syndrome child and be willing to make the investment in their child. It’s quite another to look at a list of available children with cerebal palsy, blindness, hemophilia, and other special needs from mild to severe and step up.
We have the ethics we’re willing as a people (which has nothing to do with the government) to afford.
Which is why, as much as it really hurts to have to say it, I can’t disagree with the unwanted child answer to dv’s question.
Even as I remember (just about every day) that based on that argument the daughter I’ve now had for fourteen years would have died before she’d been born.
moving story, steve…seriously.
Steve has the unique ability to make his point in a way that everyone can relate. He shows all the shades of grey that come with most life choices.
Taking the question seriously, do those who stated that having an unwanted child is a greater burden on society concomitantly believe that women who are pregnant with a child they do not want have a societal obligation to have an abortion?
Dana,
Per Tom in comment 4 and Dorian in comment 8, I don’t think anybody has argued that point here.
I say it depends on the ‘family’ a child is born into. Take Sarah Palin’s Downs baby (they’re on the cover of People if you want a look see.)
Is she a politician or a celeb? Will we have a cover shot of her daughter’s baby when it’s born? How TomKat!
Her son was born into a family that has the ways and means to maintain him his entire life and he is a lucky little boy because of that.
Not all children, lo even conceptions , are in this up scale situtation.
It’s a matter of choice.