To be or not to be? That is the question WINIFRED BARKER was horrified to hear being discussed in relation to whether to give birth to a young life
SHE was a smart, well presented lady in her early 30s. He was a conservatively dressed, well groomed young man on the staff of a Melbourne clinic.
This excellent facility provided counselling and treatment for people with emotional and mental needs. It is well regarded in medical circles and, as part of its contribution to the professionals whose clients used its services, the clinic held occasional dinner meetings and lectures.
It was at one of these that I observed this gentleman approach the lady and greet her in the pleasant, informal manner of old acquaintances.
“It’s so good to see you,” he said. “How are the family?”
“John’s fine and the children are great. They both love school, so that makes it easy for me to continue my work.”
“And what about you? How are you and how is your practice going?” was his next query.
“Oh I’m fine,” she responded, “Did you know I’m pregnant?”
“And are you going to keep it?” he asked casually.
“We haven’t decided yet,” she said. “There’s a lot to consider.
“We’re not sure whether we can afford to educate another child. It costs thousands to keep the other two at their colleges and it’s probably not fair to them to have another one.”
The conversation had taken place immediately behind me and it was impossible to move away for the crush of the people.
My first reaction was shock at the casual way the disposal of a human life was discussed.
Did I hear correctly that the life or death of this human being depended on whether its parents could afford to send it to college or not?
What were they thinking of to allow the creation of a life they could not sustain?
I know I had limited knowledge of the situation, but my powers of observation are not obstructed, nor are my ears deaf.
My husband and I have worked together in the field of human need for 40 years. We are trained counsellors, fully accredited in the area of marriage enrichment and have managed full-time care facilities for young children and young offenders in three states.
My husband has worked as a counsellor in industry for 15 years and is a qualified drug and alcohol lecturer, so we are not ignorant bystanders on social issues or on the subject of damaged humanity.
So here were two professional people, both fully employed, one with two children already at private schools and a baby on the way.
As the previously mentioned conversation progressed it was obvious that the lady was very fit and healthy, had a very nice home and a housekeeper to care for it. They were a two-car family who enjoyed their annual island holidays.
“So,” she said in conclusion, “it all comes down to whether we can afford a college education for it or not.”
He agreed it was a big problem and left her with, “You’ll need to decide soon. All the best.”
I was truly shaken by the casual attitudes of these two professional people who worked in the field of human need, yet held so lightly to the value of human life.
I am neither a scientist nor a doctor, and I do not intend to debate the issue of when is an embryo actually human life.
I do hold the view though that dead things don’t grow and for an embryo to begin to grow there must be life at conception.
However primitive that life form may be, we now know that in it is all the potential it needs to become a mature adult.
The personality, DNA, blood type, IQ, gender, and so much more is already encoded in that fertilised cell.
The fact that the medical profession now harvests embryos to use to sustain life in certain terminal illnesses should alert us to changing medical opinions in this field.
Without arguing the ethics of this issue I am concerned with attitudes and outcomes.
The decision to terminate life at any stage is traumatic, and when it becomes a matter of the mother or the baby the choice is horrendous.
The resulting trauma for the decision maker seldom leaves the mind entirely.
If life can be terminated so casually for such seemingly trivial reasons before it’s hardly begun, how long will it be before life can be terminated just as casually for equally trivial reasons at any stage?
Perhaps when one retires or maybe when a debilitating illness appears?
If you lose your eyesight and need ongoing help, would that be a reason to terminate?
The cost of keeping Mum or Dad in a nursing home, or even the inconvenience of incontinence may be reason enough for termination.
It would be unfair to cancel the ballet classes or manage without a housekeeper, and heaven forbid that the children should ever have to set foot in a state school. The island holidays are a must of course.
Why bother to harvest embryos at enormous cost to us all to save lives that may be terminated when they become an inconvenience?
I was left wondering how that smart young woman will feel in 40 years’ time when the college educated, enlightened children decide that their housekeeper and their island holidays are more important than proper care for their parents and choose to follow the example set for them and terminate Mum and Dad.
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