Speechless

[eirias]

Indiana proposes bill requiring would-be assisted-fertility recipients to have parental qualifications approved by the state

Surprise, surprise! The criteria by which applicants are evaluated are to include marriage to a member of the opposite sex and participation in religious services.

Comments

[ksledgemoore.livejournal.com]

wow, that is completely sick. ALL of the criteria are awful, in my opinion.

[darlox.livejournal.com]

I, too, am surprised that any legislator had the nuts to put this before the legislature.

However, the spotlight in the article on religion is a bit disingenuous, and certainly designed to garner the reaction that it seems to have. Every adoption agency also does a "family lifestyle" evaluation prior to adoptions, and there are plenty of athiests, mixed-religion and non-churchgoing families with adopted children... I can name you one, personally. By that bar, this is not unusual. The article makes it sound like "if you don't participate in faith-based activities, you don't get fertility treatment," and that is clearly not the case. Google News for other articles on this.

I definitely agree that this is really bad news, and a harbinger of horrid things to come. On the other hand, I do harbor a personal belief that ALL parents should have some basic qualifications before being allowed to become pregnant by ANY means. Of course, trusting the State to arbitrate that would be worse than not doing it at all, so it's probably DOA. But, we'd certainly have many fewer social problems in America, and the world, if it wasn't quite so easy for people to crank out offspring by the dozens, largely consequence-free...

[ukelele.livejournal.com]

It's not even a matter of trusting the state to do it (clearly a bad idea). It's a matter of technology. We simply don't have the technology to prevent people from becoming pregnant with 100% efficacy (and, if you do, why are you not making a billion gazillion dollars yet?!?)/

[rms10.livejournal.com]

On the other hand, I do harbor a personal belief that ALL parents should have some basic qualifications before being allowed to become pregnant by ANY means.

Abortions for all who don't meet your parenting standards? Awesome!

[thekat03.livejournal.com]

*grin*

i don't see that happening, though... damned ethics ;)

[eirias.livejournal.com]

However, the spotlight in the article on religion is a bit disingenuous, and certainly designed to garner the reaction that it seems to have. Every adoption agency also does a "family lifestyle" evaluation prior to adoptions, and there are plenty of athiests, mixed-religion and non-churchgoing families with adopted children... I can name you one, personally.

The fact that religion is not a diagnostic criterion is not important. The fact that it is comparable to a criterion already in place in a "similar" situation is also not important. My point is that religion should not be relevant to either of these decisions and should not be on the list of criteria at all. Your stating otherwise is rather like if I screened prospective parents for political orientation, claiming that it's a bellwether of ethics and we want to make sure our children go to ethical homes, and then came back with two token cases of Republicans who miraculously got through to prove that I was unbiased. There's no reason to have the question at all if you aren't biased.

[marphod.livejournal.com]

It is a bill that would make an unenforcable law.

Ignoring first amendment rights issues (of which the bill certainly would be in violation), and equal protection (marrige to 'opposite sex', as opposed to 'same sex'), it falls into violation of privacy rights, the state mandating right of access to health care and impinges on parental rights.

If it were to make it out of committee (I wager it won't) and through a floor vote (I'd be suprised if it were ever added to the agenda), and got signed, and the state court system didn't overturn it, it would fail in the Supreme Court, even in the Roberts court.

Dozens of equally stupid bills are proposed every year. its just a media circus that caused this one to get any notice.

(See similar circuses for the girl who got kidnapped in Aruba 150-odd days ago, vis a vis the otehr dozens of kidnappings that occured since then with missing victims. )

[nonnihil.livejournal.com]

What Marphod said.

I'm not sure you can say "Indiana proposes X" when in fact a grand total of one legislator has put the idea forward and it is all but certain to die in committee. 99% of Indiana is blameless in this. Legislators are always introducing stupid things like this to make headlines and keep up the name recognition.

[eirias.livejournal.com]

Sometimes I find your cynicism refreshing :).

[nonnihil.livejournal.com]

Call me cynical, but don't call me wrong: The bill has been dropped (http://www.indianabarrister.com/archives/2005/10/legislator_drops_assisted_repr.html) by its sponsor after its first hearing in committee.

[eirias.livejournal.com]

I heard! I found that refreshing as well. :)