From: garvin+@cs.cmu.edu (Susan Garvin)
Subject: Re: Medical Enforcers? (Was: Holtsinger on Harassment & Health)
Organization: School of Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon
Distribution: na
Date: Tue, 17 Nov 1992 00:00:53 GMT

This is like replying to a post from DODie - I had to go
re-read the original to see what was deleted.

In article <1992Nov15.063359.20603@midway.uchicago.edu> eeb1@midway.uchicago.edu writes:
#In article <Bxpvq2.Ms1.2@cs.cmu.edu> garvin+@cs.cmu.edu (Susan Garvin) writes:
##In article <1992Nov13.212414.23792@midway.uchicago.edu>
##E. Elizabeth Bartley (eeb1@quads.uchicago.edu) writes:
#
##I agreee with Suzanne-Lucia.  There's something odd about your
##version of "justice."  You believe that a doctor who performs
##a third trimester abortion is killing a possible person, yet
##the only punisment that you advocate is not letting that doctor
##do it again.
#
#As I told Suzanne-Lucia, I'm trying to come up with a system which
#*both* makes it unlikely that women will be denied medically necessary
#abortions and makes it difficult for women to obtain medically
#unnecessary abortions.  Putting doctors at significant risk for
#performing third-trimester abortions in non-emergency (and therefore
#less likely to be clear-cut) situations makes it extremely likely that
#women will be denied medically necessary abortions.

Your system makes it likely that a lot of women will be denied
medically necessary abortions, particularly since you seem to
be ignoring psychological indications.

###I think it will deny abortions in cases of rape and a handful of
###sex-selection abortions.
#
##This is the most chilling sentence in this article.  Your lack
##of compassion for rape victims is disgusting.  "I'm sorry, but
##your attempts to deal with this trauma took too long.  A woman
##in Chicago has decided that you must give birth to the rapist's
##child because you didn't meet her coping deadline."  
#
#I can't do it unless a majority of the voters agree with me, so don't
#accuse me of stopping third-trimester abortions singlehandedly.

I can be disgusted by your desires without seeing them enacted into
law.  

It's your proposal - you should be willing to accept responsibility
for it's effects.

#Above you chide me for allowing doctors to kill a possible person
#without significant risk if they claim medical necessity; here you say
#it's disgusting that I won't allow killing a what I consider a
#possible person because the woman was raped.  Do you see the
#contradiction?

No, there is no contradiction.  Above, I was chiding you for
advocating a law that would not serve the purpose for which
it was intended.  Here, I'm expressing my disgust for your
complete lack of compassion.

#I have said repeatedly that denying women the right to abortion in the
#third trimester is wrong; I'm willing to do it in non-medical cases
#because imo granting them the right to abortion is *more* wrong.

Sorry, this just doesn't fly with me.  If it's wrong to grant
women the right to late term abortions, then it's wrong to grant
doctors that right.  You keep deleting discussion of what "medical
necessity" means, which leads me to believe that you don't know
how it is defined by doctors and don't care.  

Susan



Newsgroups: talk.abortion,alt.abortion.inequity,soc.men,alt.dads-rights