Above all, [nice people] keep alive the pleasures of the hunt. In the homogenous population, such as that of the English shire, people are condemned to hunt foxes. This is expensive and sometimes even dangerous – moreover, the fox cannot clearly explain how much he dislikes being hunted. In all these respects the hunting of the human beings is a better sport but if it were not for the nice people it would be difficult to hunt human beings with a good conscience.Those whom the nice people condemn are fair game; at their call of “Tally-Ho”, the hunt assembles and the victim is pursued to prison or death. It is especially good sport when the victim is a woman since this gratifies the jealousy of the women and the sadism of the men.
Bertrand Russell, Nice People, 1931 (Podcast from here)
The hunt is even better sport when there are two victims, both women, both lesbians, and suing their IVF specialist for lumbering them with one child too many. The only thing that detracts from the sport is that the identities of the women in question have been suppressed by court order. Nonetheless, the hounds have caught the scent and they’re in full cry.
They’ll have you understand, of course, that it’s not really about the hound’s primitive desire to sink his teeth into the fox, to rip and rend until the fox is a bloody, tattered mess. Oh no – it’s all for the sake of poor cubs, consigned to the care of a pair of unfit, ungrateful vixens:
Whether they involve lesbians or straights, I can’t help but think these cases are desperately stupid and selfish:
A lesbian woman felt violated and devastated when she learned she was pregnant with twins, after she had told a Canberra obstetrician she wanted only one child through IVF, a court heard yesterday.
Which child wants to learn they were so unwanted that their parents sued for the distress of having them? And which parents are helped by brooding over, listing and keeping alive such resentments until a judge rules on what compensation, if any, they deserve?
But the more I hear of this case, the more I wonder if the parents want to make a baby or a statement…
(Andrew Bolt)
Lesbians and other single women who have deliberately chosen a lifestyle that reduces the role of the father to carefully chosen but anonymous sperm donor have effectively decided to deny one half of the child’s genetic make-up, one half of who that child is. This tells us something about the basic ethical problem here, and it gives the lie to the politically correct argument that anyone should be able to form a family.
The rights of adults to become parents and found a family, to the exclusion of any consideration of the needs and rights of those who would be born, has caused the identity of the child to be negated. The child’s existence is subsumed to the whim of the mother who has bought the sperm and paid the IVF clinic. Ultimately the result is the child as product, robbed of its unique identity.
(Angela Shanahan)
Earlier in the same article, Shanahan notes:
What is more, the mother rejected the option of selective abortion. So the loss seems to be a straightforward one to the mother: the financial burden of raising two children instead of one and the mentally and physically stressful experience of carrying twins instead of a single pregnancy.
Yes, it’s all about what’s right for those poor little cubs – if the vixen had even the semblance of a sense of responsibility, she would have got rid of one of them earlier, instead of carrying them both to term.
If you’d rather read some real journalism on this story, check out Caroline Nader’s article in The Age. As for the nice people at News Limited – Andy and Angela and their ilk – I’ll give the last word to Bertrand Russell. In a word, nice people are those who have nasty minds.
The two women ask the doc for help? THEN sue him when they get twins?
Multiple births are far from unknown with IVF.
Steve,
I suggest you read Nader’s article (linked above) before you comment again.
You should also take note of this ABC News Report:
And you’re in moderation.
Lesbians and other single women who have deliberately chosen a lifestyle that reduces the role of the father to carefully chosen but anonymous sperm donor have effectively decided to deny one half of the child’s genetic make-up, one half of who that child is. This tells us something about the basic ethical problem here
This case is about a mistake in a medical procedure. Such a mistake could have happened to anyone, so the composition of the couple is irrelevant.
So next week she’ll be supporting a ban on straight, married couples who evilly conceive children with anonymous donors? I mean, this wouldn’t be a straw-clutching argument because it’s politically incorrect to say that lesbians are just gross, would it?
As Bertrand Russell concluded, nice people are those with nasty minds.
I can’t stand the way that most of the media are focussing on the fact that this is a lesbian couple, implying that a heterosexual couple would NEVER be uspet at having twins as a result of a bungled IVF procedure. Regardless of whose side you come down on in the lawsuit, the sexual orientation of the parents is irrelevant.
Anna: The more times I read that paragraph the more confused I become about where it is heading. If the writer believes that Lesbians are gross, why not just say so?
Sympathy for this pair will be very light. Not because they are lesbian (though that will automatically lose them support in some quarters), but because they have two live foals on the deck, and most will not understand what there is to complain about.
A serious issue which is common to this case and the “wrongful birth” case of 2003 (to which Nader refers) is the unwillingness of politicians and commentators to acknowledge that bearing and raising children entails costs, sacrifices and responsibilities, and that the reproduction of a society from one generation to the next is a public good which will be (and is being) underprovided if that society continues to let the costs be born privately by individual women rather than socialising them.
Definitely! Given how many people there are out there desperate to have kids but can’t, this case was always going to be controversial and get a lot of media attention whether they were a lesbian or hetrosexual couple.
Yeah it disappoints me that people are turning this into a story about same-sex ivf, or same-sex families (for Chee-rist’s sake, how many times do we have to have _that_ argument?).
That said, I’m still surprised these guys have a case. How will they prove what proportion of suffering was the first kids, and how much the second? Also, wanting an extra 30 000 or whatever so the second kid can go to Steiner school?!
Meh. I don’t care about the Lesbian angle. To me this seems like a couple of yuppies suing someone cause (gasp!) having kids is hard.
Try doing it on a joint income of 40 000 ladies, it gets a lot harder then.
I would (mostly) agree with Beppie – their sexual orientation should be irrelevant; but without it this is just another boring allegation of medical negligence. What is the story – OMG, they are lesbians.
I am conceited enough to believe that every child should have a father – but does that mean they must have one? To me, the answer is clear. No.
Nice own goal there, patrick. Here I am, bitching about conservative blue-noses getting all het up about IVF for lesbian couples and you have to go all lefty blue-nose about yuppie couples and their inflated expectations.
The difficult part of the case will be determining what they have experienced that normal parents don’t experience when first becoming parents. I don’t think that they will get what they are asking for. If they made it clear that they only wanted one embryo implanted they may have a medical neg case, but I think any type of compensation case based on stress will be very hard to prove.
SATP said
I think that’s right. The anger seems motivated by the thought that it is not fitting for a mother to resent the birth of a healthy child, even if, as a matter of fact, the birth of that child caused the mother to suffer. But it’s not straightforwardly obvious whether that is true or false. There’ve been comments like “having a healthy child is a blessing,” but that won’t do as a premise in an argument. On one interpretation, it just restates the conclusion (ie. having a healthy child is not the sort of thing you can resent). On another, it doesn’t support the conclusion (it’s possible to resent a blessing, eg. it might be a patronising gesture).
Thing is Gummo, I’m not het up about, though. I just think it’s silly.
Maybe it’s harder for me because I really do love kids, and when I get one, two or twenty, I’m not going to look that gift horse in the mouth. I do think they have inflated expectations. Not from a med neg perspective – that seems fairly clear cut – but from the perspective of being parents.
Interesting comment SRK, although your use of the word “resent” throughout does undermine your point a bit – there are plenty of attitudes to the arrival of an unexpected (and yes, initially unwanted) child, that fall well short of the rapturous joy befitting a proper mother – anxiety for example.
Apropos that, it’s interesting to note that Shanahan’s argument almost got away from her:
Evidently she didn’t like where consideration of that thought might take her argument, because she shuts it down, quick smart in the next sentence:
If I read that correctly patrick, you don’t as yet have kids of your own. If so I’d suggest that you take a leaf out of the book that Joe Hockey has set as prescribed as reading for his kids, despite his own difficulties in practicing its precepts himself.
Perhaps the difference between 1, 2 or 20 makes no difference to you patrickg because you don’t face the possibility of being pregnant with them. I love kids too, particularly my own, but the idea of having more than I personally am prepared for emotionally, physically and financially (for the lifestyle I want my kid/s to have) is horrifying. There’s a difference between having one kid at a time or a multiple birth, and there’s a risk these particular parents weren’t prepared to take (which is a ‘risk’ inherent if you have heterosexual sex or more than one embryo implanted). These women went to quite a bit of trouble and expense to control the conception of one child, they told their doctor specifically, one embryo at a time is standard anyway, and yet they have two.
It sounds like they plan to provide quite a bit more for their kids than I will, but that isn’t even remotely the point of the case.
Sorry Gummo, what book is that? The bible or something? I honestly don’t know.
So, you think the parents are right to set a financial cost for the pain and suffering involved with bringing up two kids instead of one? And that said cost would be in the hundreds of thousands? That the feelings of sleeplessness, depression and frustration were clearly the result of having two babies, not one? And that sending the kids to a Steiner school that costs five figures is a crucial part of its upbringing?
I am all for people not condemning these parents because of their sexuality. But I’m standing by my assertion that suing someone for the pain of raising kids is silly, especially when the family is one an income which would have easily accommodated the cost of a nanny or housekeeper.
I do think this couple are being precious, and frankly looking for someone to blame for their own shortcomings as parents. And that’s cool: as parents and humans we all have shortcomings, those negative feelings and actions are natural, and not at all uncommon, twin or no.
But the doctor did not shackle a second child to them. The parents choose not to abort the second embyro (because of the risks, but nonetheless a choice), and they chose not to give the kid up for adoptiom, etc. etc.
I do not have my own children, no, however I am well aware of how difficult it is raising babies.
The subtext to this controversy (and I make this point observationally, without endorsing it) seems to be that lesbians who resort to IVF are imposing on the public purse since they have entered into a relationship that precludes the conception of children in the usual cost-free manner. This is, of course, unfair because straight couples with fertility problems (even if known about prior to hooking up) do not attract any opprobrium. However, my feeling is that community attitudes to bringing children into homosexual unions are softening pretty quickly compared to even a few years ago.
The other issue is that of claiming for economic loss as a result of ‘wrongful birth’. These claims have been barred in Queensland and NSW (but not, as far as I can tell, in the ACT) for failed sterilisation and contraceptive procedures, although not for fertility treatment.
Until now there do not seem to have been any claims for wrongful birth arising from IVF, probably because most of those using IVF have been so desperate to conceive at all that suing for a multiple birth did not occur to them. The other anti-lesbian subtext (again, I am surmising, not endorsing the view) that arises from this is that lesbians are using IVF as a first, rather than last, resort (hence the ‘luxury’ of specifying that only one embryo be implanted) and that litigating does two things:
(1) makes IVF more expensive for the rest of the community; and
(2) arrogates to lesbians certain privileges denied to the rest of the community in the usual context in which wrongful birth complaints arise.
I think all the comments (in the media in general) about how this couple should be grateful for what they got actually indicate that the commenters view children as a commodity, not the other way around. The mothers in question have had to deal with a specific reality, not the rosy fantasy everyone else wants to project onto them. Of course the legal case necessitates them highlighting the negatives of their experience – I’m sure there have been many positives too.
What we think would be our own responses to any situation cannot be grafted onto other people.
Maybe the lesbian aspect is getting a run because people (like me) who oppose IVF for lesbians and single women argue that it represents treating life as a commodity if you create it in such an artificial way (bearing no resemble at all to what is even possible if nature was left to its course.) And indeed the arguments these women are putting forward seem consistent with this “commodification” view, as it sounds like “we went shopping for one and you handed us two by mistake; we are entitled to a refund.”
By the way, there are also people against IVF for lesbians who are against it for straight couples too. (Count me in again.) I would prefer to see no IVF, less abortion and more adoption. All those doctors into IVF can go and reduce the doctor shortage in areas of medical treatment of illnesses that actually cause death and disablement.
Kate,
I totally understand what you’re saying there. And as I say to me (non-lawyer) the medical neglience seems fairly clear cut.
But so much of the case seems to hinge on that. If it was a medical case, the compensation wouldn’t be anywhere near as high.
Also, how do address the previous point: how much of the suffering is from the second child, and how much from the first?
All of it? None of it? Probably somewhere in between, but it’s impossible to quantify, surely?
Gummy Trotsky said:
A few points. First, I agree that there are plenty of attitudes to the arrival of an unexpected child that fall well short of rapturous joy. Second, I agree that anxiety is an example of this. Third, I would disagree that being anxious about the arrival of an unexpected is not fitting – at least, I can’t see a mother’s anxiety eliciting public anger.
I don’t think any emotion with negative valence (or any attitude correlated with an emotion with negative valence) can be substituted for resentment, and that’s because resentment is a distinctively moral emotion. We can paraphrase the public anger as the rhetorical question: “How could you feel like you’ve been wronged by having an unexpected child?” The force of this is not that the public don’t understand (ie. can’t find a plausible explanation) why the mother resents having an unexpected child, but also that they think she is blameworthy for resenting having an unexpected child. If the mother was sad or fearful, I don’t think the reaction would be the same, because those emotions don’t have any moral implications. Many people might think it strange that a mother was sad or fearful by having an unexpected child, but I doubt that they’d also think the mother is blameworthy.
The other anti-lesbian subtext (again, I am surmising, not endorsing the view) that arises from this is that lesbians are using IVF as a first, rather than last, resort (hence the ‘luxury’ of specifying that only one embryo be implanted) and that litigating does two things:
(1) makes IVF more expensive for the rest of the community; and
(2) arrogates to lesbians certain privileges denied to the rest of the community in the usual context in which wrongful birth complaints arise.
Bismark, I’d be extremely surprised if IVF was their first attempt to get pregnant. I very much doubt that any IVF doctor would agree to that. IVF is an expensive invasive medical procedure which is for those who have had difficulty conceiving. No one rushes to have IVF willingly. Lesbians are as likely or unlikely as any other women to have physical problems which create infertility – eg blocked tubes, endometriosis, etc.
Specifying the number of embryos to be replaced is not a luxury, it is a routine part of IVF which every couple must go through. Many IVF clinics are now stipulating that all couples have only one embryo replaced, as the risk of twins has contributed to expense elsewhere in the medical system, that is, in a big increase in the number of premature babies who have to be cared for in hospital and who end up with medical problems.
that litigating does two things:
(1) makes IVF more expensive for the rest of the community;
How so? Any damages awarded from this case will presumably come from the doctor’s or clinic’s insurance.
Suz,
my understanding was that they had indeed, unsuccessfully tried artificial insemination first. And I believe, the clinic’s insurance are footing the bill.
Successful litigation will probably mean that insurance premiums rise for all Doctors performing IVF because the insurance companies will assume that more cases will be forthcoming. This cost will likely be passed on to consumers of IVF through increased costs to access the service. This of course has nothing to do with this couples’ sexuality and would have happened with any successful litigation.
IMHO Steve from Brisbane you don’t have the right to tell people that they can’t have their own children if they need medical intervention to do so. IVF isn’t something that people rush into. Abortion is a separate issue from IVF.
And where do the insurance premiums come from? And what happens to the insurance premiums of all other IVF practitioners?
Really, I think I can understand how some straight couples denied any remedy when their tubal ligation or vasectomies fail might feel about this.
The problem is that Mrs Donoghue, a married woman I should add, was having a ginger beer with a ‘friend’ in a ‘cafe’. Furthermore as I imagine she were thirsty, she should have been grateful for the drink. I know I would have been.
Oops! Wrong century! Tally Ho!
Patients suing a doctor for a botched job. Yawn. People routinely sue when a hysterectomy or vasectomy fails, so why should suing when a medico mistakenly implants two embryos instead of one be any different?
We tried for three years to get a second child. Fertility treatments, inter uterine implants, then two cycles of IVF. Heartbreaking when each attempt failed, or failed after a few weeks. My wife was inconsolable each time, seeing it as both a failure as a woman and as increasing the odds that we would never have another child again.
On the very day we were about to start the third (and final, we had decided) cycle of IVF, turns out we had somehow managed to conceive the old fashioned way. And now we have a beautiful little boy.
But, through all that heartbreak, if anyone dared to suggest to my wife that IVF wasn’t an option (which at the time seemed to be our last throw of the dice), she would have tore them a new one.
As I mentioned above, claims for economic loss for wrongful birth in these circumstances are barred in most Australian jurisdictions.
I should also add that we asked for two embryos implanted each cycle, and were prepared for twins (realistically, that’s all we could handle, both psychologically and financially).
But if the medicos stuffed up and implanted three embryos by mistake and we had triplets, then damn straight I would have sued as well.
Not that we would consider the “extra” child as a mistake or loved him/her any less than their siblings, but their quackery has consequences that we specifically wanted to avoid.
Um, with the greatest respect Jethro, wouldn’t many people, both conservative and progressive, suggest that the main problem here was with your wife’s feeling that she was a failure as a woman if she couldn’t have another child?
I suppose many people might indeed suggest that Steve. Nonetheless the unhappiness is genuine and, quite possibly, a source of deep distress.
It might be more useful – and less insulting to jethro and his wife – to consider how that feeling originates and the part that cultural norms have in fostering and reinforcing it.
Steve in Brisbane if we had your way, Jethro and his wife wouldn’t have had a second child – being unable to have had one by the way of teh penis.
And congratulations to you and your wife Jethro, it’s no easy feat and I’m really happy to hear it turned out for you both.
But you also would have known that it was still possible to have got triplets even if only two embryos were implanted if one of them split. I question whether this really is an appropriate situation to sue in, rather than just to try to get them to change procedures so the risk of similar mistakes in the future occurring.
And if you really want to start attaching a financial value to the cost of the raising the extra child (as opposed to just say cost of extra complications during pregnancy) then you also need to take into account the extra financial return that you may get in the future back from the child.
I do see this as a case of children being treated as a commodity (though I don’t see IVF by hetrosexual or lesbian couples in general as commodotisation) – They wanted exactly one child and because they ended up with two (which was a risk regardless of whether one or 2 embryos were implanted) they are suing, much like someone would sue if they got sent a red couch when they ordered a green couch.
Nonetheless the unhappiness is genuine and, quite possibly, a source of deep distress.
But is deep distress in itself a sufficient justification for IVF? Anti-depressant medication would seem to do the job just as well in those circumstances. I think that that observation is inaccurate – because obviously IVF is a treatment for a medical condition, and may go some way to alleviating deep distress, but the conception and birth of a child can’t really be interpreted in this paradigm.
It’s not that the couple is suing the doctor that allegedly made a mistake that causes the outcry it’s that the suit is for “wrongful birth” which pushes all sorts of buttons. Many “wrongful birth” suits get bad press because of this title.
But is deep distress in itself a sufficient justification for IVF? Anti-depressant medication would seem to do the job just as well in those circumstances. I think that that observation is inaccurate – because obviously IVF is a treatment for a medical condition, and may go some way to alleviating deep distress, but the conception and birth of a child can’t really be interpreted in this paradigm.
Surely the conception and birth of a child can only be considered in terms of that paradigm (If I’m understanding you correctly). Infertility isn’t a purely physical condition – it has extensive psychological/emotional dimensions. The deep distress caused by failure to conceive (or repeated miscarriage) is surely an important factor in the existence of IVF technology in the first place.
Doctors, especially good doctors, don’t just treat bodies, they treat the whole person.
wouldn’t many people, both conservative and progressive, suggest that the main problem here was with your wife’s feeling that she was a failure as a woman if she couldn’t have another child?
I’d suggest the main problem was the inability to have another child.
The two women have responded to their critics.
Sushi Das makes extraordinarily good sense in today’s Age.
Look, it is entirely true that the case itself will not be decided on the fact that they are lesbians.
It is also entirely true that the fact that they are lesbians is causing lots of people to think again about the whole idea of lesbians using IVF from a public policy point of view.
It is also entirely true that the fact that they are lesbians is causing lots of people to think again about the whole idea of lesbians using IVF from a public policy point of view.
I’d guess that those people aren’t thinking again, they never supported it in the first place.
It’s ridiculous to assert that because one lesbian couple have sued their doctor, all lesbians (Medicare-levy-paying taxpayers) should be banned from a particular medical procedure.
What this case might make IVF doctors think again about is the process of putting women under general anaesthetic for transfer of embryos. I underwent retrieval and transfer of embryos while wide awake and I believe that was my clinic’s policy in the majority of cases. Transfer takes only a few minutes and is no more uncomfortable (in fact less) than a Pap smear. When you’re awake, you get to see the embryos and see them going down the catheter into the uterus – you hear the doctor and embryologist checking with each other to make sure it’s all done correctly. If the woman in this case had been awake, this mistake probably wouldn’t have happened.
No, I’m arguing that while the doctors and clinicians responsible for the IVF treatment are obviously dealing with a medical condition, they are also partially responsible for bringing a new person into the world. The raising of a child, and the creation of a family, shouldn’t be interpreted principally in medical terms: children are not medicine (in fact, in some ways, they’re probably supremely unhealthy for their parents). You can view children and the raising of a family in a number of different ways – moral, spiritual, or even in a narrow legalistic sense – but viewing them as simply a treatment for a kind of maternal or paternal depression would seem to me to be supremely inadequate.
I do wish you’d stop going on about the lesbian angle, Steve – it’s true that this story and case does raise questions about how easy it should be for people to access IVF, but only in general terms. The couple could just as easily have been an infertile straight couple.
Successful litigation will probably mean that insurance premiums rise for all Doctors performing IVF because the insurance companies will assume that more cases will be forthcoming. This cost will likely be passed on to consumers of IVF through increased costs to access the service.
I’m no expert on medical insurance, but it seems to me that $400,000 is not a huge amount that is going to break the insurer’s bank, compared to the millions that are awarded in some medical malpractice claims. (Though I guess those are the ones that make the papers and most claims are for smaller amounts.)
Tim, sorry I didn’t make it clear that the reason I brought it up again was actually in response to the Sushi Das article that Paul linked to. She argues strongly that the case has nothing to do with the mother’s sexuality, and I’ve repeatedly agreed with that. It’s just that I think it is a bit silly to criticise public commentary (as Das does, I think) because it dares to go back to the whole public policy issue of you-know-what too.
It’s not about breaking an insurer’s bank, it’s about pricing and keeping services such as IVF accessible. For example, if there is a 1% risk that an individual IVF program could result in an unwanted multiple birth costing $400,000 a throw, that adds $4000 to the cost of each program. That money has to come from somewhere, and it comes from the insurance premiums IVF practitioners have to pay, which in turn comes from consumers (either when they pay their medical bills, their private health insurance or their tax). Isurance is not just some bottomless pot of money to provide a solution to the vicissitudes of life, it’s a business. When insurers get their risk assessments wrong they go broke.
For example, if there is a 1% risk that an individual IVF program could result in an unwanted multiple birth costing $400,000 a throw, that adds $4000 to the cost of each program. That money has to come from somewhere
It comes from the insurance premiums the doctors and clinics have been paying all along.
1. there isn’t a 1% risk that every single-embryo transfer would result in a multiple birth, I think it was put at 0.01%.
2. You can’t do that maths and simply add $4000 to every IVF! And even if you did, it would be $40, not $4000. You’re getting ridiculously carried away.
My example was a hypothetical to illustrate that cases such as this have an impact. The premiums that doctors and clinics have been paying all along will be adjusted whenever the risk is perceived to have risen. It only takes a single test case to do this.
In any case the risk isn’t 0.01%. That is the risk that a single-implant transfer results in a multiple birth (e.g., when the embryo splits). This is a case where a single-implant transfer was (apparently) requested and two implants were (allegedly) negligently transferred. That is a different risk altogether.
What interests me about this case is what a lottery it is. This couple get an extra (‘cherished’) child for free. Someone in Qld, NSW or SA could have a tubal ligation botched and recover a derisory amount in personal injuries and nothing for the costs of raising the child. Someone has sex with someone else who fraudulently tells them they have been sterilised – the custodial parent collects child support, but why should the defrauded partner not be able to claim damages or refuse child support on the basis of wrongful birth?
The premiums that doctors and clinics have been paying all along will be adjusted whenever the risk is perceived to have risen. It only takes a single test case to do this.
Perhaps. I’m not convinced that this case is of such magnitude, financially-speaking, to have any significant impact on premiums. Delivering babies rather than making them seems to be the area which has attracted much litigation and therefore higher premiums in the past decade.
In any case the risk isn’t 0.01%. That is the risk that a single-implant transfer results in a multiple birth (e.g., when the embryo splits). This is a case where a single-implant transfer was (apparently) requested and two implants were (allegedly) negligently transferred. That is a different risk altogether.
And given that this looks like the first case of that kind in Australia, after 20+ years of IVF, the risk would appear to be even tinier than 0.01%.
This couple get an extra (’cherished’) child for free.
Well, I believe the reason for their case is precisely that the child didn’t come ‘for free’, but with significant (to them) emotional, physical and financial costs, plus the psychological ‘cost’, if that’s the term to use, of having their express wishes ignored by their doctor.
[By the way, I have no interest in supporting their case per se but I do have an interest in how the issues are treated in the media and more generally.]
Edited by Gummo Trotsky to remind commenters that:
“Imputing ideas or motives to others or stereotyping them because of perceived group membership or ideological affiliation.” is unacceptable in comments.
And you’re back in moderation Steve.
They absolutely have the right to pursue through our legal system whether or not medical malpractice has occurred and to be compensated if proven to be the case.
Other than the hysteria which is served up everytime GAY and PARENTING are used in the same thought wave, I think the other issue here is the whole death/birth dichotomy.
If they were suing over wrongful death, everyone would be cheering them on.
But they’re not – they’re case surrounds the deeply-entrenched-in-our-psyches, “sanctity of life” and everyone knows we mustn’t fiddle with that.
Spelling error. Duh!
Their, not they’re. I hate that!
Stop the presses! Bolta declares that litigation is a danger to mental health.
Does Bolta get paid to write this nonsense?
meaning what exactly? This “moderation” is what?
That you have your hands over your ears shouting “I can’t hear you”?
The naive & the fringe unhinged who inhabit this site get stuck into me aplenty because of “Imputing ideas or motives to others or stereotyping them because of perceived group membership or ideological affiliation.�
Nor does this worry me, as such attacks from inferiors are something I can take.
Hehe, Don’t remember what I typed, but to get a petulant reaction I must have stepped on a very sensitive dishonesty in the LP hivemind!