Biomedical Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
The function of prenatal tests, despite protestations to the contrary, is to provide
parents the information necessary to assure that all pregnancies brought to term
are “normal.” I worry not only about the encouragement given to eliminating a
“whole category of persons” (the point you make), but also about the prospects
for respect and treatment of children who come to be brain-damaged either
through unexpected birth traumas or later accidents. And what about the pres-
sures to which parents like myself will be subject? How could you “choose” to
burden society in this way?
In the name of expanding choice, we are narrowing our definition of
humanity and, along the way, diminishing a felt responsibility to create
welcoming environments for all children. Can we simply declare that
they chose to have an “abnormal” child and now they must pay the con-
sequences? This declaration, if it is generalized, takes us, as individuals
and a society, off the hook for the purpose of social care and concern
for all persons, including those with bodies and minds that are not sup-
posedly normal. The trend I note here stitches together a cluster of views
under the rubric of expanding choice, enhancing control, and extending
freedom. The end result is a diminution of the sphere of the “unchosen”
and an expansion of the reign of control. Rather than viewing children
who are not considered normal in their development simply as a type of
child who occurs from time to time among us, and who, in common with
all children, makes a claim on our tenderest affections and most funda-
mental obligations, we see such children as beset by a “fixable” condi-
tion: there must be a cure. The cure, for the most part, is to gain sufficient
knowledge (or at least to claim to have such knowledge) that one can
predict the outcome of a pregnancy and move immediately to prevent a
“wrongful” birth in the first place. The fact that “curing” Down syn-
drome means one eliminates entirely a type of human being is no barrier
to this effort. People alive with Down syndrome must simply live with
the knowledge that our culture's dominant view is that it would be better
were no more of their “kind” to appear among us.
In a recent topic,
The Future of the Disabled in Liberal Society: An
Ethical Analysis
, philosopher Hans S. Reinders argues that, despite
public policy efforts to ensure equal opportunity and access for all,
liberal society (including our own) cannot sustain equal regard for
persons with disabilities. This is especially true if the disabilities in ques-
tion are “mental.” The liberal presupposition that privileges choice as
the primary category in public life and the apogee of human aspiration,
