Category: Infanticide

Peter Singer, who is a professor at Princeton University, wrote a book arguing for euthanasia and infanticide. He cites a survey of doctors to argue that it is hypocritical to allow late-term abortion but not infanticide:

(Note, the book was written in 1994, so the survey is no longer “recent.”)

“A recent survey asked paediatricians in senior positions in the United Kingdom to say whether they agreed or disagreed with a number of different statements among which were:

1. Abortion is morally permissible after 24 weeks if the fetus is abnormal;

2. There is no moral difference between the abortion of a fetus and the active termination of the life of a newborn infant when both have the same gestational age [that is, the same age dating from conception] and suffer from the same defects;

3. There are no circumstances in which it is morally permissible to take active steps to terminate the life of an infant with severe defects.

Nearly 40% of the senior paediatricians responding indicated that they agreed with all three of these statements, even though you can’t agree without contradicting yourself…

Senior paediatricians have come to accept prenatal diagnosis and late termination of pregnancy if a serious abnormality is found. They can also see there is no real difference between a late fetus and a newborn infant at the same gestational age.

But active euthanasia for severely disabled infants remains illegal and is not sanctioned by medical codes of ethics, no matter how premature the infants may be, or how serious their defects.”

Peter Singer Rethinking Life and Death: The Collapse of Our Traditional Ethics (New York: St. Martin’s Griffin, 1994) 2, 3

 

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Philosopher Peter Singer, who argues in favor of killing disabled babies, wrote about a poll about disabled children:

“In a 1983 Gallup poll, Americans were asked what they would do if they had a badly deformed baby in need of treatment. 43% said that they would ask the doctor not to keep the baby alive, and 40% said they would want the baby kept alive.”

Peter Singer Rethinking Life and Death: The Collapse of Our Traditional Ethics (New York: St. Martin’s Griffin, 1994) 119 – 120

This quote reveals the terrible ableism that was present in our society, with more parents wanting a “deformed” baby to die than to live. I’m not aware of any more recent surveys, so I don’t know if things have improved since then, but with the high rate of disabled babies aborted after fetal screenings show disabilities, I suspect that they haven’t.

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BD Colen argues for withholding medical treatment from disabled babies and letting them die. He writes:

“Perhaps decisions involving the care of hopelessly ill and defective newborns should be left to those traditional processes, to parents and physicians who do the best they can under difficult circumstances.

Until such time as society is willing to pay the bill for truly humane institutions or 24-hour home care for all such infants, to offer families alternatives other than death or living death, shouldn’t these decisions be left to those who will have to live with them?”

BD Colen, Hard Choices, 1986, quoted in Is Infant Euthanasia Ethical? (Greenhaven Press, Inc., 1989) 215

Disabled people aren’t “defective” and our family’s lives aren’t “living death.” ALL human beings deserve basic medical care, regardless of level of ability.

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The following quote is from Peter Singer, who the New York Times called “the world’s most influential living philosopher” in 2000.

JB Schneewind “Don’t Bring Home the Bacon” The New York Times, December 17, 2000

Peter Singer was asked, “Would you kill a disabled baby?”

He replied:

“Yes, if that was in the best interests of the baby and of the family as a whole. Many people find this shocking, yet they support a woman’s right to have an abortion. One point on which I agree with opponents of abortion is that – from the point of view of ethics rather than the law – there is no sharp distinction between the fetus and the newborn baby.”

“Peter Singer: You Ask the Questions” The Independent September 11, 2006

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Pro-Choice authors Harold J Morowitz and James S Trefil wrote:

“… We must discuss one further disagreeable fact. In the language of physicians, the term survivability means just that: the ability of the infant to remain alive. It says nothing about what we usually call the quality of life…

Many 750 gram infants who survive turn out to have disabilities like severe cerebral dysfunction and mental retardation, and there seems to be no way of predicting the outcome of intensive care procedures. This fact has led many in the field to question the usefulness of allocating scarce research funds to pursue survivability to earlier ages…

The question that is asked is whether it is justified to expend limited medical resources in heroic efforts to keep extremely premature infants alive when there is such a need for those resources elsewhere.”

Harold J Morowitz and James S Trefil The Facts of Life: Science in the Abortion Controversy (New York: Oxford University Press, 1992) 142

Since 1992 there have been many advances, and most premature babies born today do not become disabled. However, it is appalling that pro-choicers would support letting babies die because disabled people don’t deserve to have money spent on them.

 

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Two researchers wrote the following in a medical journal:

“Extremely low birth weight infants who require prolonged, often futile sojourns in neonatal intensive care units or who have poor long-term outcomes have been major consumers of healthcare resources and in some cases a major drain on health maintenance organizations. The allocation of limited resources may in the future mean denying care to some of these infants.”

EWD Young and DK Stevenson “Limiting Treatment for Extremely Premature Low Birth Weight Infants (500 – 750 g)” American Journal of Diseases of Children 1990 144:549

“Poor long-term outcomes” usually translates into a baby having a disability. These researchers suggest letting premature babies die so as not to take up medical resources.

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Philosopher and ethicsist Joseph Fletcher says:

“It is reasonable to describe infanticide as post-natal abortion … Infanticide is actually a very humane thing when you are dealing with misbegotten infants. We might have to encourage it under certain conditionalities of excess population, especially when you’re dealing with defective children.”

Joseph Fletcher. “Infanticide and the Ethics of Loving Concern” Infanticide and the Value of Life. (Prometheus Books, 1978)

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An article in The American Feminist says:

Nearly five infants under the age of 1 are killed in the United States each week, according to a 1997 CNN review of FBI statistic.

The article goes on to say:

“However, if criminal penalties assigned to perpetrators of infanticide are any indication of how society views the crime,the “slippery slope” concern is quite valid. After Louise Woodward was convicted of the murder of 8-month-old Matthew Eappen, Judge Hiller Zobel reduced her sentence to time served on the grounds that “she was ‘a little rough with him,’ under circumstances where another, perhaps wiser, person would have sought to restrain the physical impulse.” Most recently, Marie Noe was given 20 years’ probation for killing eight infants. Would she have been given the same penalty for killing eight adults? Not likely.”

Laura Ciampa “INFANTICIDE: Children as Chattel” The American Feminist Volume 6, Number 4 Winter 1999-2000

Does the ready availability of abortion contribute to a climate where the lives of babies are  not respected as much as the lives of adults?

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