I have a few scattered thoughts.
I absolutely reject and detest the blossoming narrative of "Democrats support infanticide." As Tess mentioned, there are also some Republicans who do. Some. It is maddeningly dense to spread the narrative that this characterizes the party, any more than Republicans can be fairly characterized as not caring about children bombed in foreign wars (or for that matter that anyone who believes in charity rather than government hates children and wants them to die on the streets). It's a lie.
As far as I can tell, Democratic senators were baited with a bill that calls for protecting babies born alive after abortion. All but three Democratic senators voted against this. And a lot of pro-life people genuinely believe this means the party is okay with killing babies, because the born alive infant protection act of 2002 was infamously stripped of anything resembling punishment for abortion providers who flouted the law and this sought to change that.
However. My personal question is, can a doctor legally just let a newborn die when intervention could save it in other cases? Like, baby is born black, white dad storms out, white mom goes ummm nevermind I don't want it, could a doctor willing to just legally let that baby die alone? Or, baby is born with down syndrome that went undetected - in the 80s there was a discrimination case over a baby that died because the parents and doctor together decided against a life-saving operation. Disability rights advocates were outraged and argued that it amounted to discrimination. It was ruled that this was not discrimination against those with disabilities. And this is the kind of thing that prolifers like myself are wondering about with comments like that - a baby born with cleft pallet so severe they will die without surgery, but such that surgery will save them, should that baby be denied this life saving technology? Does it amount to infanticide to let disabled, imperfect children die when we have the means to save them?
So where is this legally? Can a doctor legally just let a baby die?
I doubt any doctors would allow a baby to be left without food or minor interventions like oxygen or bili lights just because they were born the wrong race or gender or whatever for mom's preference. I know there are doctors who would in the case of a severe disability that went undiagnosed; I've met them. They make compelling cases along the usual lines of quality of life, burden on parents, drain of resources, etc. They don't convince me, but as sellers pointed out, those don't really convince me for killing any person without their consent and personhood for me extends to cover all human beings regardless of age or level of development.
This got kind of off track. But back to the infanticide legislation.
People who object to it aren't objecting because they are cool with infanticide. They do not believe it is necessary. The Born Alive Infant Protection Act did that it needed to do; babies born alive after abortions are now people with rights. If you can't do it to a non-aborted newborn, you can't do it to an aborted baby either. If that wasn't enough and babies born alive after abortions are left to die when intervention could save them, then the laws regarding all babies as this age need to change, not just one targeted at abortion providers. Though I do like that it allows moms to sue if they find out this happened without their knowledge. So what does this do besides make it look like Democrats hate babies? If someone has a good case for why it's necessary, they haven't presented it to me yet.
https://jme.bmj.com/content/39/5/261And of course Peter Singer, who is infamous for his support of infanticide by the reasoning that a newborn is basically the same as a fetus at that stage of development and abortion can be permissable then.
Really, maybe it's just those Australians we need to look out for.
And then, for the heartbreaking, I can give you a link for why some people want to go further than removing life support, and why some doctors and nurses will risk jailtime to facilitate it:
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/12/opin ... y-die.htmlWho can read this and not even entertain the idea of accepting infanticide sometimes, in some cases, if the parents and doctor think it's best?
And then again,
https://erlc.com/resource-library/artic ... an-dignityImagine having a child with down syndrome and then reading people explain why it was okay to kill your child past the time when you could kill a "normal" child. 24 weeks. 32 weeks. 40+ weeks. And some even say after birth.
It is an emotional argument no matter what. Children are dying either tragically or needlessly because life is complicated and because we aren't all born healthy. And people fall on a spectrum; from the person who says this is always wrong, to this could be okay but it is open to abuse and even one person killing a child who is healthy is unacceptable, to maybe this can be abused but it's an acceptable risk compared to what these children and their parents otherwise face, to this is always okay and if a mom decides she can't be a parent and adoption would be too harsh a life that's for her to decide.
And to take it even a step further, if it is okay to let a baby who could otherwise be saved die because of a disability, why not for hard life circumstances? Why not for the health of the mother, unable to raise a baby but tormented by wondering whether they will be miserable if adopted? At some point, tailoring it to only disabled babies becomes a statement on the value of disabled lives.
As to how I can accept that people are not awful people for debating whether to kill children, sellers really did nail it.
I fell in love with both of my sons on an ultrasound screen at a point in pregnancy where it is legal across the board in most countries. They bounced. They brought their little hands to their faces. Their little walnut brains were kind of creepy but also so intricate and amazing. Their little hearts beat steadily, letting me know they were okay, and I recognized those heartbeats from the 8 week appointment. They're faster, and the sound on the doppler is almost lyrical. It whooshes. And you worry between appointments whether the next one, it won't show up again. But there that baby is on the screen, moving in response to the pokes and prods. I knew already with the first that he was a boy, but had to wait for the second until the anatomy scan. And there he was again, but this time, there was a cyst on that little walnut. A tiny cyst I wouldn't have even noticed but that got the hems and the haws and the referral for a specialist who finds there's also a hole in one of the heart chamber walls, those perfect little chambers. Even I could tell the blood flow wasn't right. The red and the blue, incoming and outgoing all mixing together. And there was baby, bouncing still. Moving, rolling, I could feel him kicking, with me everywhere I went. My son. My son who might never be born alive. My son whom basically every one of my friends would have supported my right to have him killed even if there wasn't anything wrong with him, because this was still pre-viability. Whose little life didn't matter to anyone except for my sake, and any mom can tell you that's not really enough for a born child and no one questions that mama bear but here I am, the internalized mysoginist because of my despair that my son's little life was so vulnerable in so many ways, including ways we would never accept for children a little bit older. So yes. I do not like to debate this one. I recognize people who are pro-choice usually don't believe my children were people as early as I did. But when someone thinks your children aren't people, it's kind of hard to debate the way one should because on the one hand you might fly off the handle. And on the other, almost a million children are being killed every year in your country, why the hell aren't you flying off the handle? That's my reality. If I can understand you don't have any bad will towards my children and don't mean them harm at 12 weeks gestation, I can understand if you don't right after birth either.