Debate heats up over proposal to ban gender-based abortions

[WillowTree]

The debate over a bill that would ban sex-selective abortions became red-hot Thursday in the run-up to an expected floor vote, as Republicans used the vote to try to shame Democrats who might oppose it.
The proposal would make it a federal crime to carry out an abortion based on the gender of the fetus. The measure takes aim at the aborting of female fetuses, a practice more common to countries such India and China, where there is a strong preference for sons, but which is also thought to take place in the U.S.
The White House and Democratic lawmakers oppose the bill out of concern that it could end up subjecting doctors to strict punishment, suggesting the law would be difficult to follow.
"The administration opposes gender discrimination in all forms, but the end result of this legislation would be to subject doctors to criminal prosecution if they fail to determine the motivations behind a very personal and private decision," White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said Thursday.


Read more: Debate heats up over proposal to ban gender-based abortions | Fox News

 

[Kiki Cannoli]

The movie Gattaca comes to mind

 

[WillowTree]

"It is inconceivable to me how our Nobel Prize-winning president can refuse to protect little girls from the violence of sex-selection abortion," Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J., said Thursday.

Read more: Debate heats up over proposal to ban gender-based abortions | Fox News

 

[Ravi]

Is it possible that Republicans have reached the outer limits of hysteria?

I doubt it.

 

[LogikAndReazon]

Eugenics and abortion have always been inter-related........

Dont expect that to have an ounce of impact on the morally bankrupt

 

[BlindBoo]

Help it's the thought police.

Where is Libo-Pauli to protect us from the nanny police statist????

 

[waltky]

It's a sign o' the times...

European court ruling creates 'right to eugenics'
'Wish to have a child free from the disease ... imposes obligations to the state'

Legal experts are expressing their concerns over the decision of the European Court of Human Rights this month that Italy’s law against eugenic screening of embryos conceived by in vitro fertilization must be overturned. The Strasbourg-based court said that Italy’s prohibition of pre-implantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) was “incoherent” in the face of existing laws allowing abortion for eugenic purposes. It awarded a couple who had chosen to abort their child, who was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis, 15,000 Euros. Italian commentators have pointed out that the court’s ruling shows a predisposition to accept eugenic abortion as the default legal position. The court, said Rome-based biologist and ethicist Enzo Pennetta, revealed its presumptive bias by ruling that the conflict must be resolved by changing the IVF law to coincide with the abortion law, not the other way around.

The European Centre for Law and Justice intervened in the case as an amicus curiae brief and submitted written observations. Gregor Puppinck, the head of the ECLJ wrote that the court had created a new “right” out of whole cloth. The court said that the “wish” to have a healthy child “constitutes an aspect of their private and family life and comes under the protection of Article 8” of the European Convention on Human Rights. Therefore the law prohibiting PGD gives the applicants the status of “victims” and infringes their rights—which, for the ECHR, includes a “right to give birth to a child who does not suffer from the disease they are carriers of.”

In plain language, Puppinck wrote, this means that the court has declared that the “wish to have a child free from the disease constitutes a right, which imposes obligations to the State.” “Identifying a wish with a right reveals a conception of human rights as a projection of the individual will in the social order,” Puppinck added. The ruling effectively creates “a right not to transmit bad genes, a right to eugenics.” Moreover, he said, the ruling vastly oversteps the statutory limits of the ECHR’s jurisdiction. By claiming that the case rests upon the “incoherence” of two contradictory domestic laws, neither of which contravene the Convention, “the control of the European Court thus goes very far.”

The matter, however, may not be settled, and the ECLJ is asking that the case be referred to the next stage of the Grand Chamber. In another case before the ECHR, a Latvian mother of a child with Down syndrome is arguing that her rights were violated when she was not offered genetic screening to help her decide whether to abort her daughter. ECLJ said in its submission to the court that the question behind the complaint is, “Does the Convention guarantee a right to eugenics for parents, and in particular to the procedure of prenatal screening-elimination of sick or disabled fetuses? If so, does the State have a positive obligation in this regard?”

More LifeSiteNews Mobile | European court ruling creates ‘right to eugenics’

 

[Noomi]

You can make gender abortion illegal, but you can't police it.

 

[Unkotare]

Of course you can.

 

[C_Clayton_Jones]

Of course you can.

Obviously you didn’t read the article:

The White House and Democratic lawmakers opposed the bill out of concern that it could end up subjecting doctors to strict punishment, suggesting the law would be difficult to follow.

"The administration opposes gender discrimination in all forms, but the end result of this legislation would be to subject doctors to criminal prosecution if they fail to determine the motivations behind a very personal and private decision," White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said Thursday.

Marcia Greenberger, co-president of the National Women's Law Center, said the bill fosters discrimination by "subjecting women from certain racial and ethnic backgrounds to additional scrutiny about their decision to terminate a pregnancy."

Which would constitute a violation of one’s right to privacy, compelling the courts to invalidate the measure had it become law.

 

[Unkotare]

Of course you can.

 

[Noomi]

Of course you can.

No, you cannot. There is no way for you to know if a woman is having an abortion because the fetus is the 'wrong' sex.

 

[Unkotare]

Of course you can.

No, you cannot. There is no way for you to know if a woman is having an abortion because the fetus is the 'wrong' sex.

You can investigate it like any other crime, you moron.

 

[Sherry]

Legislating morality is bound to fail...but people are motivated to vote on these issues because they want a cultural message expressed of what they consider to be right vs wrong values.

 

[uscitizen]

Debate heats up over proposal to ban gender-based abortions


Yes men should get abortions as well.

 

[Noomi]

Of course you can.

No, you cannot. There is no way for you to know if a woman is having an abortion because the fetus is the 'wrong' sex.

You can investigate it like any other crime, you moron.

Investigate every single abortion then? Yeah, so treat every woman like a fucking criminal.

 

[Unkotare]

Legislating morality is bound to fail....

By that reasoning all laws are invalid.

 

[tinydancer]

Gendercide is a world wide concern at the moment. Really distorted sex ratios. Quite disturbing. America will no doubt have to deal with this issue sooner or later.

 

[uscitizen]

Every pregnancy should be investigated to be sure the father pays child support and there is no immorality involved.

 

[Unkotare]

No, you cannot. There is no way for you to know if a woman is having an abortion because the fetus is the 'wrong' sex.

You can investigate it like any other crime, you moron.

Investigate every single abortion then? Yeah, so treat every woman like a fucking criminal.

Are you saying women never commit crimes? Only men?