Feminism has gone too far now

I don't know what on earth makes you think this is to do with feminism, which is the promotion of gender equality. This issue is to do with bodily autonomy. I personally think that the mother should have been prosecuted, not for injuring the foetus per se (as a foetus in its early stages isn't a human being any more than a skin cell is a human being), but for allowing the injured foetus to develop and giving birth to a severely affected child.

So according to you drinking to excess and damaging the foetus is fine for any pregnant woman as long as she makes sure to abort it before giving birth (and before the abortion cutoff date)? But if she does miss the cutoff date and carry to term, she should be punished?

I'm not saying I disagree with you necessarily; your proposal is absolutely logical if you begin from the assumption that a foetus is categorically not a human being before 24 weeks, and categorically IS a human being after 24 weeks. However, there is an overall sense in which this doesn't quite seem to be a satisfactory state of affairs . . .

On the grounds that it is a womans absolute right to choose what they do with their body if they choose to carry a baby full term they are choosing to take on the responsibility of giving that child the best chance in life. ie not drinking and causing illness.

So a baby being a human has nothing to do with the present physical state of the baby, but rather the possible future state of it exiting the womb by birth as determined by the mother's choice?

What if the mother changes her mind? Does the baby suddenly lose its personhood? And once it's born, what renders the mother's opinion on its classification as a human being irrelevant?

However, saying that damaging the foetus is bad no matter how developed it is would lead to a conflict with my views on abortion, and I believe that the freedom to choose to terminate the pregnancy is more important than the welfare of a foetus that is little more than a blob of cells.

At this stage, foetal damage is somewhat analogous to liver damage - it's damage to a non-sentient part of an organism, although the liver may recover and the foetus won't. The problem is when a mother intends to carry the child to term and then deliberately acts in a manner that will severely affect the child after birth.

And this is why it is a Feminist issue and not just a loophole in the law. Besides it isn't a loophole, it's entirely deliberate: there has been a movement for some time now in the Feminist community to stress that foetuses are not humans until they are born, or at least until 28 weeks, and this is the logical conclusion of that opinion, as you can see above. Of course it makes no difference to the baby if you poison it before or after 24 weeks, its still going to be irreparably damaged, but try telling a Feminist that something which depends on her for its survival might somehow incur a duty of care. We afford more legal protection to goldfish than we do to our own children pre-24 weeks.

Which is rather ironic, since with that logic you'd think they'd also be in favour of Sharia law, since if a woman is the property of her husband and not a full human being then he should have full rights to treat her how he wishes. But no, women need the freedom to drink and take drugs and all those other important things, never mind if the direct consequence of that is the murder or grievous torture of their own future child(!)



I am trying to keep this civil, but I really struggle to have anything but for contempt for someone who seriously compares one's own liver with a living organism that is going to grow into a human.

Think about it: foetuses are objectively not internal organs, they are effectively the larval stage of the human being. Are you seriously saying, that if we were all superintelligent butterflies rather than superintelligent apes, that killing a caterpillar would not be considered murder, just because it wasn't a full butterfly yet? It's an early stage of the same lifeform. It makes no sense to say that foetuses are part of the female body, it just doesn't make sense scientifically. They are incubated within it and depend on it, they're even directly connected to it, but even at the very earliest stage they are cohesive, individual lifeforms with different DNA to their mother, no more a part of the body than the millions of other distinct lifeforms that exist within the human body (bacteria, viruses, the odd parasite, etc).

Conjoined twins are not considered 'the same person' just because they share the same space and the same nourishment, and they are actually even more connected to each other than a foetus to its mother, they share the same internal organs and DNA.

I'm acting on the assumption that it isn't "human" until the point at which abortions are generally illegal (although I understand it's a bit of an arbitrary deadline as some babies will develop more quickly than others). I don't think it's wise to drink during pregnancy if you intend on carrying the baby to term. However, saying that damaging the foetus is bad no matter how developed it is would lead to a conflict with my views on abortion, and I believe that the freedom to choose to terminate the pregnancy is more important than the welfare of a foetus that is little more than a blob of cells. At this stage, foetal damage is somewhat analogous to liver damage - it's damage to a non-sentient part of an organism, although the liver may recover and the foetus won't. The problem is when a mother intends to carry the child to term and then deliberately acts in a manner that will severely affect the child after birth.

She consumed eight cans of strong lager and half a bottle of vodka a day

her mother drank the equivalent of 40-57 units of alcohol a day

I am not quite sure what this has to do with feminism. I don't even think this is even an issue of bodily autonomy. The article clearly says this of the women:




So essentially she was an alcoholic? To what extent does an alcoholic or drug addict have control over their addiction? Can an alcoholic or drug addict be held accountable for harm caused to their baby when pregnant? Can we really expect a drug addict or alcoholic to steer clear of these substances? Maybe the real issue is to ask whether it would be morally acceptable/reprehensible to enforce an abortion on those individuals who are unable to undergo pregnancy without causing the baby harm, such as is the case with alcoholics and drug addicts? Drug addicts and alcoholics harm themselves on a daily basis through their addictions, and so obviously will cause harm towards any baby if they were pregnant.

While I agree this woman should ne seeing some serious jail time, wasnt the decision because they didn't want to set a precedent that could result in women getting sued who didn't know they were pregnant or who suffered side effects from medication?

Utterly disgusting: a ruling by the court of appeal has set one of the most appalling precedents I have ever seen. It's irresponsible, sadistic, and diabolically, maliciously stupid. This country has actually managed to make Sharia law look rather tame compared with the extremes of liberalism, all in the name of Feminism. Here it is:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-30327893

It has been decided that a woman has absolutely NO obligation to her child while it is inside her body, and she can drink and take drugs with total freedom while pregnant without fear of any criminal repercussion, even when that leads to the child being forced by the selfishness of the mother to live a life of misery with severe development problems. A girl has been cripplingly disabled by her mother, and the mother gets off Scot free. If you were to punch a pregnant woman in the stomach you'd be liable for jail time, but if she did it too herself it would be totally OK.

I don't care what your opinion on abortion is, or contraception, or even Feminism: anyone who seriously argues that a woman has total freedom over her own body, even in the certain knowledge that her body contains another body that will soon be a human being, is a vicious monster who has no place in a civilised society. Ignoring all of the ethical issues, from a civil perspective, we can't seriously expect to have a functioning society when we are allowing thousands of our children to be irreversibly crippled for life without any sort of deterrent. Whether or not you believe a foetus is a human, to poison one by drinking whole bottles of vodka every week while pregnant is to create a child with severe problems as surely as battering a baby over the head with a brick. I'd like to see anyone defend this in the name of 'pro-choice'.

-The CICA administers a scheme which considers claims for compensation "from people who have been physically or mentally injured because they were the innocent -victim of a violent crime ..." (paragraph 6);
The mother was alleged to have committed is from s23 of the Offences Against the Persons Act 1861: "Whosoever shall unlawfully administer to ... any other person, any poison or destructive or noxious thing, so as thereby ... to inflict upon such person any grievous bodily harm, shall be guilty of felony" (paragraph 12);
-The House of Lords has previously judged that although a foetus is a "unique organism and ... neither a distinct person nor an adjunct of the mother" there can be charges of manslaughter in where damage to the foetus is concerned, although there cannot be charges of murder (paragraph 18);
-One of the established rules of criminal liability is "in the absence of a specific statutory provision, an embryo or foetus in utero does not have a human personality and cannot be the victim of a crime of violence. Although the foetus is a unique organism it does not have the attributes that make it a person." (paragraph 19);

Conclusion: Because the foetus cannot be said to be 'any other person' under s23 of the Offences Against the Persons Act 1861, and because the case does not involve manslaughter but only damage to the child, in this case it is not possible to claim for compensation "from people who have been physically or mentally injured because they were the innocent victim of a violent crime ..."

Maybe it wouldnt be morally acceptable to enforce an abortion but I do think that they should certainly face prosecution for doing harm to a child they choose to carry

I personally do not agree at all with the ruling. It's a stupid ruling that's just going to lead to more strain on the nhs. It's tough enough raising disabled children. This ruling is perfect for the drug addicts and unkempt mothers, they're just gonna produce disabled kids that will be thrown into the system for the tax payer to pay for.

There should be an offence created specifically for this and women that abuse their bodies while pregnant in terms of drinking and drugs should be prosecuted.

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It's clearly a product of the pro-choice movement, the movement which claims that women should be treated exactly the same as men. This ignores the small problem that men and women are not the same, because men don't grow people inside them, so allowing a man freedom over his own body is not the same as allowing a woman freedom over her own body.

And depending on the period of pregnancy, a foetus can a highly developed animal, about the level of a lizard or a bird, and it is going to become a human, so it's a lot more than a 'skin cell'.