WaPo Op/Ed: Keep abortion legal so Down Syndrome babies can be eliminated

OPINION:

Ruth Marcus is being praised as “courageous” today for penning a deeply personal opinion piece in the Washington Post where she reveals that she would have aborted her unborn child had her prenatal testing uncovered the likelihood that her child would be born with Down Syndrome. 

I have had two children; I was old enough, when I became pregnant, that it made sense to do the testing for Down syndrome. Back then, it was amniocentesis, performed after 15 weeks; now, chorionic villus sampling can provide a conclusive determination as early as nine weeks. I can say without hesitation that, tragic as it would have felt and ghastly as a second-trimester abortion would have been, I would have terminated those pregnancies had the testing come back positive. I would have grieved the loss and moved on.

Marcus, WaPo’s deputy editorial page editor, lays out a clinical and sober analysis of current laws making their way through state houses and courts that would put restrictions on abortions for the sole purpose of exterminating a nascent life if it has a diagnosis like Down Syndrome. 

The argument is logical if one holds to the tenuous moral basis of Roe v. Wade: that a woman has the sole power to determine the worth of the unborn child developing in her womb and the decision to end the life of that fetus is protected by her “right to privacy.” 

That was not the child I wanted. That was not the choice I would have made. You can call me selfish, or worse, but I am in good company. The evidence is clear that most women confronted with the same unhappy alternative would make the same decision.

In laying out her argument though, Marcus seems unaware that she is dancing very close to the line of endorsing eugenics.

More than two-thirds of American women choose abortion in such circumstances. Isn’t that the point — or at least inherent in the point — of prenatal testing in the first place?

If you believe that abortion is equivalent to murder, the taking of a human life, then of course you would make a different choice. But that is not my belief, and the Supreme Court has affirmed my freedom to have that belief and act accordingly.

True facts. And compelling as the argument may be, it isn’t hard to slightly change a minor detail and see the kind of moral horror show Marcus is trying to protect, even celebrate. 

Use Marcus’ exact same argument while looking at China’s one child policy. In the Chinese culture boy babies are highly valued and as the government mandated that couples could only have one child, girl fetuses were aborted by the millions. Isn’t that the point - or at least inherent in the point - of prenatal gender testing in the first place? 

Of course, the Chinese government “affirmed (Chinese women’s right) to have that belief and act accordingly,” so by Marcus’ logic, aborting a fetus for the purpos of gender selection is not at all morally problematic and should be protected. 

Marcus delivers praise for children with Down Syndrome and the parents who have chosen to allow those children to live.

This is a difficult subject to discuss because there are so many parents who have — and cherish — a child with Down syndrome. Many people with Down syndrome live happy and fulfilled lives. The new Gerber baby with Down syndrome is awfully cute.

Awfully cute?  Well. 

I respect — I admire — families that knowingly welcome a baby with Down syndrome into their lives. Certainly, to be a parent is to take the risks that accompany parenting; you love your child for who she is, not what you want her to be.

But accepting that essential truth is different from compelling a woman to give birth to a child whose intellectual capacity will be impaired, whose life choices will be limited, whose health may be compromised. Most children with Down syndrome have mild to moderate cognitive impairment, meaning an IQ between 55 and 70 (mild) or between 35 and 55 (moderate). This means limited capacity for independent living and financial security; Down syndrome is life-altering for the entire family.

First of all, if the true measure of a person’s worth is how able they are to live an independent life with financial security we better start examining the worth of all those twenty-somethings still living in their parents’ house on their parents’ health insurance with mountains of student loans that paid for their Anthropology doctorate. 

More importantly, as a parent with two children with disabilities I can assure Ms. Marcus that her praise of my family for “welcoming” these children into the world is hard to accept when framed within an enthusiastic endorsement for eugenics.

Giving lip service to parents for raising children with special needs while simultaneously devaluing those children’s worth by hammering away at their IQ and ability to live an independent life is more damaging then saying nothing at all. We see through the real message in Ms. Marcus’ essay. 

For the past 16 years I have had the pleasure to be in the company of children and adults whose intellectual capacity is impaired and whose life choices are limited. These children will probably not have the opportunity to write for the Washington Post or regularly appear on MSNBC as Ms. Marcus does.

But, I can tell you that their contributions to our world and to my life are far more positive and relevant than yet another 700 word column on the dangers of President Trump. 

Perhaps if Ms. Marcus had spent some time volunteering with special needs children and their parents before penning her column she would have had a different understanding of the value of these lives to our society. Perhaps if she had done that before she had her children she would have had a different mindset when undergoing her prenatal screening. 

This January I spent a weekend with over a dozen children on the Autism spectrum who have just recently unlocked the mystery of communication through a newly discovered method. My son was one of these children. 

Until their ability to communicate was uncovered, their “intellectual capacity” was questioned by leagues of intellectuals like Ms. Marcus. Now they are able to do great things like attend a UN summit for children, even though narrow-minded intellectuals still have trouble accepting these children’s place in our world. 

I’ve had the pleasure of spending time in the green room at MSNBC with Ms. Marcus and she is a delightful person. I’ve also had the pleasure of being surrounded by children with special needs like Autism, Cerebal Palsy and Down Syndrome my entire adult life. As far as my own personal growth and fulfillment as a human being is concerned, I am a much better person because of my experience with the latter versus the former.