A Russian journalist set off a firestorm in calling for infanticide of developmentally disabled babies, using extremely crass and dehumanizing language. From the story:
The author, Aleksandr Nikonov, used the word “debil” — a deeply offensive term in Russian — to characterize such children. He argued that parents should have the right to euthanize newborns diagnosed with mental retardation and other developmental disabilities. The article, which ran under the headline “Finish Them Off, So They Don’t Suffer,” went on to describe what Nikonov termed “postnatal abortion” as an act of mercy.
That’s awful, I agree. But why the fuss? Dutch doctors now actually kill disabled and terminally ill babes–and they end up having their death protocol published respectfully by the New England Journal of Medicine. But since they don’t use hateful language, I guess it’s okay:
And lest we forget, in the USA, you are not disdained in the least for advocating infanticide: To the contrary: You are lauded and given a prestigious tenured chair in bioethics at Princeton University!
February 9th, 2010 | 4:26 pm
Could he be trying to emulate Jonathan Swift and his “Modest Proposal” for cooking and eating the Irish babies?
February 9th, 2010 | 8:48 pm
Tom-no, he has said that he stands by his words and that indicates that it was not a satirical piece. People like that should take a dose of their own medicine by euthanizing themselves.
February 9th, 2010 | 9:00 pm
I wonder if Peter Singer was ever in a position of powerlessness? His heart is obviously not open towards a moral conversion and I wonder if there is ever hope for people like him. In other words, what do you with someone who is spiritually dead?
February 9th, 2010 | 9:19 pm
What bothered me more about the article wasn’t that a single author promoted infanticide, but such a large majority of Russians believe along the same lines. Yet, there seems to be an internal struggle between those supporting human exceptionalism and those pushing its demise. I have hope the former will win out.
February 10th, 2010 | 3:22 am
“Finish them off, so they don’t suffer.” But they don’t “suffer” from their conditions in the ouch-ouch sense of the word. I have worked with Special Ed kids. The ones among them who suffer the least are the ones who have the least cognitive abilities. This is because they don’t know what they’re missing, don’t know that they’re different form other people. The ones among them who suffer the most are the ones who have some awareness of the people around them, and have to put up with the hatefulness of people like this Nikonov jerk.
It’s not disability that creates suffering. It’s hatefulness. And when that hatefulness prattles away about mercy and compassion, it becomes all the more repulsive for it’s hypocracy.
I wish this anti-life mind set finish itself off, so the rest of us won’t suffer.
February 10th, 2010 | 10:49 am
Why All The Fuss About Russian Journalist’s Call for Infanticide?
I’ll answer: Double-standard prejudice – based on WHERE a person happens to live (en vivo, en utero, or in a crib).
LOL
I’m Gordon Watts, and I approve this message.
February 10th, 2010 | 12:39 pm
Mercy for whom. This article reminds me of the Flannery O’Connor Quote, “In the absence of faith, we govern by tenderness. And tenderness leads to the Gas Chamber”. Compassion is the word we use today. It is used to color and cover things that in a different world and time were known by their true nature as abominations.With Christ we are to bind ourselves with the marginal, the outcast and the suffering. Whenever I hear these people talk of compassion I wonder who they plan on eliminating.
February 10th, 2010 | 4:20 pm
Emina – for man it is impossible. With God, all things are possible.
February 11th, 2010 | 3:10 pm
Enima-I have wondered the same thing. Are people like Singer so dead to the prejudice they espouse that they are completely beyond “salvation,” as it where? Is it even worth arguing with someone like that, or is it like trying to convince an avowed white supremacist that racism is wrong? Spirtually, the man needs SERIOUS prayer. It seems to me that God could literally drop a miracle on Singer’s lap or appear to him in a vision telling him not to persecute the handicapped, and Singer still woudln’t get it.
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