Okay, that's another way to view it.
But we're in the abortion thread, and so you have to be able to recognise that restricting someone's ability to have children effects both the children that they might have had as well as that person themselves. It can be both of these things, and we can consider both of them.
I don't think it's fair to dismiss the effects on the adult who would potentially be banned from having children, in much the same way that enforcing pro-life laws requires adults to have children. You're proposing legally restricting what is arguably one of the core parts of the human experience due to factors that are totally out of people's control, and I say that as someone who doesn't have children and never will.
Who is being banned from having children? I said that selection of certain genetics harms a child, I didn't say people weren't allowed to have children. Even if we're not talking
raising children (such as through adoption), you can still
biologically procreate by borrowing genetics from other places. The only thing our huntington's example would be doing is preventing the use of that person's particular genetic material in the creation of a child.
Sure, that seems like a reasonable axiom if we're going to be talking about this. The whole point of making something illegal is to define responsibility and consequences.
What I was trying to get at was that I feel like you're glossing over just how nebulous "harm" is as a concept here. If you want to hold people responsible, and that seems like a totally reasonable thing, then you need to be able to be clear about what it is that you're holding them responsible for and why.
Well I'm glad we can focus on this and not the entire concept. So in principle, we agree that choosing to create a child which is harmed should be prevented, it's just a matter of degree.
As long as "harm" is left as a generic and unexamined abstract, it's really hard to have a sensible conversation because I have no idea whether your "harm" and my "harm" and
@Shaun 's "harm" are even in the same ballpark, let alone similar. See the fact that we apparently disagree on whether Huntington's is a condition that should require termination of the foetus.
I think I've been careful to avoid saying that abortions should be required. I'd say my position is more like: if it can be determined that you knew you had a high likelihood of passing on huntington's disease, and you chose to create a child anyway, and if that child is afflicted with huntington's disease, you have committed a crime. The crime of negligently risking afflicting a child with huntingtons.
The fact that you did it before the child was born is not
particularly relevant to me. I'd be interested to see if someone can demonstrate why it should be. If your child was born without huntingtons and you opted to
give it huntingtons, that would be a crime would it not? Would it not also be a crime to subject the child to a 50% chance of receiving huntingtons?
And that matters for the same reasons that something like assault has pretty strict definitions, because it's important to recognise at least roughly where the line is between beating someone bloody with a baseball bat and bonking someone on the head with a pool noodle. There's always a bit of fuzziness because the real world is messy, and that's why we have judges, but that doesn't mean that you can't be pretty clear about what the intent of a law is if you want to be.
It would be a matter of "what did you know", "how great was the risk", and "how demonstrable is the harm". Which is basically the case in all legal analysis. You'd need to show intent, or reckless disregard for consequences, and significant demonstrable harm to the child.
I agree that it would be good to disincentivise people from doing harm to children. I probably shouldn't even have to type that, but it's there just in case. However, there's a valid discussion around whether laws are the best way to do that (hence me touching on libertarianism), and if it's actually practical to create and enforce them in a way that is reasonable and just.
One way to do it without the creation of new laws would be the one I alluded to with the botched abortion case. Let an afflicted adult bring a suit or case against their parent for their parent's harmful choices which have left them with a significantly diminished quality of life. There are a few obvious problems with that, one of which is that some children can be so afflicted that they do not survive to adulthood. And also that people can be so afflicted that as an adult they are incapable of taking action. In fact, I suspect that in many cases in the US, the person who made the decision to afflict their child with such a disease (or take that risk) can end up that child's legal guardian throughout their entire life.
In that situation I think it would make sense for the state to bring the case against the parent, even while the injured party is a minor.
It's more difficult to argue that people should be prevented from doing it in the first place, since the parent can argue all sorts of things, including that the risks are not correctly calculated, or that the test was faulty, etc. But if they have the information, and they act, and it turns out that harm did actually result, it's harder to argue those things. There's just a more clear legal case.
Assuming everything was done in good faith and without any particular negligence on the part of the doctor or parent, no, I don't think they should be able to sue just because the outcome wasn't as desired.
This isn't a case where someone got sick and the doctor wasn't able to save their life. Or where someone's nose job didn't turn out as pretty as they hoped. This is a case where one thing was desired - no baby - and a
completely different thing occurred - baby with no arm. It's like going in to get your leg amputated and having the wrong one amputated. Even in a purely accidental case, that kind of thing gets you awarded damages in the US. But perhaps that's not a strong enough scenario to make the point.
How about someone does drugs while pregnant and gives birth to a baby who has NAS, and lives a short life of pain, seizures, and ultimately dies. Any crime there?
