Court Ordered Sterilization For The Incompentant

Great Debates
41

My bosses son is retarded and a poster boy for ppl of diminished mental capacity because of his fatherhood. His name has been in the papers and TV news and every outlet views his situation in his favor. Bad ugly ppl from the social services just want to take his sweet child away from him for no reason other than to be nasty and malicious.

What they fail to report, is what everyone who knows him is aware of. He cant find his way out of a paperbag, let alone raise a child. His whole family knows, his neighbours know, his wife doesnt know because she cant find her way out of a paperbag either. Because of the media uproar and subsequent pressure there is a social services person helping them raise the child 24/7, and Im paying 42% taxes :frowning: and the VAT is at 24,5% :frowning: . I would feel better just burning money. At least it wouldnt hurt children.

Im pretty pro Sterilization for ppl of diminished mental capacity. I dont know at what point ppl should be sterilised or if the sterilisation should be permanent or not. I just know that at some point you just cant trust human vegetables with children (not calling all ppl of diminished mental capacity human vegetables).

42

I think the slippery slope potential here is bigger than some people might think.

I have an aunt who is mentally handicapped (her husband is also mentally handicapped). Seeing them when they were younger, I would not have thought that they would make fit parents. They are both employed, but at very unskilled, low-paying jobs. I find the idea of eugenics and sterilization abhorrent, but in their cases I might have agreed that it would be “the best thing for them.”

But now, ten years later, they have a son. He is not mentally handicapped. He is a wonderful boy. Although they may not have been the most ideal parents (who is?), they’ve both done a good job raising him. They’re not well off economically, but they are thoughtful and caring and always provide for his basic needs. My grandmother and aunts who live nearby are very helpful - not that they “raised” my cousin, his parents were capable of that, but they were around for extra social contact, occasional help with homework, etc…

I’m from Canada, and my province (Alberta) has a less than sterling history as far as forcible sterilization for the mentally handicapped goes. In the first half of the century it happened quite often. The definition of what constitutes being “mentally handicapped” enough to require sterilization was so loose as to be (tragically) laughable. Some people who were not in any way mentally handicapped were sterilized. And the province has just dealt with the legal fall-out and court cases in the last decade.
I don’t see how anyone would want to require sterilization for the “incompetant” (as per the OP), when long-term, reversible, safe, and easy to use contraceptive options are easily available.

43

I think we have a few different issues floating around here. Sterilization of the incompetent can be used to:

a. protect the incompetent, as in the case presented by the OP, from being subjected to pregnancy.

b. protect other people from the incompetent, as in the case cowgirl mentioned about the mentally unstable and aggressive guy who might victimize others.

c. clean up the gene pool.

Taking these in reverse order, I agree with the others here who think c. is a dangerous proposition. Frankly, I don’t want my government to have the power to decide who is and is not allowed to reproduce. Even if this power was never abused, I don’t want the state to have it.

As far as issue b. goes, we already have laws to protect us from individuals who are a danger to themselves or others. If this poor guy is a threat, perhaps he should be placed in an environment where he can be more closely supervised and/or perhaps he’d benefit from medication.

On issue a., now. This woman is the victim of a horrible crime. She is a ward of the state presumably because she is in need of special protection since she is unable to fend for herself. That protection failed.

If the father of her child had been another, mentally handicapped resident, that would have been bad enough. In that case, the group home would be guilty of negligence for having failed to ensure the safety of its residents. The fact that the rapist was the man who was running the home is simply abhorrent.

The issue here isn’t “Should we sterilize mentally incompetent people so that, if they’re raped, at least they won’t get pregnant?” The issue is, “How the heck did such a heinous crime happen in the first place, and what can we do to prevent other such atrocities from being committed by those who are supposed to be protecting these people?”

And I hope the sick bastard who committed this crime gets everything he deserves.

44

I think you left out a clause in the second proposition. I believe a more accurate statement of the position is:

Sterilization would be “You are not at this time, nor will you ever be, a fit parent. Therefore, your ability to ever have children will be removed.”

If this is the proposition, I would have to agree with the OP, if only to protect any children born to such a person.

45

I think it’s a BRILLIANT idea. In fact, why stop there? If we cut off everybody’s hands, there’ll be fewer strangulation murders. If we gauge out everybody’s eyes, they wouldn’t be eligible for drivers licenses; definitely contribut to safety in the streets. If we cut off everybody’s feet, fewer people would get kicked in the shins! I’m all for it, Isabelle. I assume you’ll volunteer to be the first?

46

But in most cases, there is no way to be sure of that.

A court can look at the past and at present conditions. It cannot predict the future. A person may be too mentally unstable to care for a child, until a new treatment is discovered. New information in a person’s case may be uncovered.

The court’s judgement is not infallible.

47

Hmmm…this could work beautifully with my plan to take over the world…
Seriously, how would this have helped this woman, anyways? She still would have been raped-which is far greater the tragedy, I see.

And hey-why stop there-let’s abort all fetuses that are detected to have a problem!

48

Whether some of you like it or not I think down the road a day will come when ALL girls are prevented (by whatever method) from being fertile and will have to apply to the government for the right to have a child.

If you look at the whole march of civilization we’re headed that direction.

Personally, I think it a good thing to have to qualify for parenthood.

49

Does anyone know how people in other countries view the sterilization of people deemed unfit to have children? Do any countries have laws along those lines on their books? If so, how do they define unfit? Does the parent get a chance to raise the child before being deemed unfit?

I personally doubt that any non-one-party-state country could have such laws, but as eugenics was a very popular idea in the first half of the 20th century, it’s certainly possible it has happened in the past.

50

I think it would be cool if we could eliminate the need for pregnancy by inventing Brave New World style incubation chambers. We can perform tubal ligations on all women from an early age and extract eggs and sperm when neccesary to perpetuate the species.

51

Okay, I’ll agree with your last paragraph, but why just girls? It shouldn’t be too long before we can produce an effective contraceptive for males as well, and otherwise there seems a fairly big potential for problems.

52

Switzerland.

And eugenics were not only popular in the 1920s, in some countries the practice didn’t end until the 1980s.

53

I’d like to follow up on AHunter3’s post with regard to the guardian’s role in the decision to opt for forced sterilization, considering also the case for forced permanent castration.

When a parent or guardian undertakes the responsibility for sustaining the quality of life for a permanently mentally disabled person, then in my opinion they should have rights to govern decisions of their ward’s body that approaches those that we reserve for competant individuals in the case of themselves.

Any responsible guardian of a metally incompetant female prone to be taken advantage of sexually should not have to feel that their hands are tied while they stress over the possiblity that they may have to be a parent/guardian for an another child for another 20 years. I’m particularly considering the case of unwanted grandchildren. Yeah, I know, there is abortion available, but for many of us that is not an option, and presumably forced abortion would be contrary to the ACLU principles as well.

Of course we should require the court or a second public body to adjudicate the circumstances in each and every case.

I see the same problem for some guardians/parents of mentally incompetant men that could be a danger to others. Guardians should have the right to seek permanent castration to minimize harm to themselves, to others and to that individual himself.

54

When my daughter reaches puberty, should I consider putting her on birth control so that if she’s “taken advantage of sexually” (i.e. raped) I won’t have to worry about raising a baby? Would my outrage over the fact that my daughter was raped in the first place be justified?

Let me imagine here that I have an adult child who is mentally incompetent. As her guardian, I would expect to be able to protect her from being raped, since she’s not able to protect herself. If I was unable to do this myself, I would expect that the institution in which she lived would protect her from being raped.

Rape is not acceptable, whether the victim is competent or not. If you prevent the rape, you prevent the pregnancy.

I “could be” a danger to myself or others. Tonight, I might go on a homocidal rampage. Until it’s convincingly shown that I AM a threat, the government cannot restrict my normal freedoms. I assert that mentally incompetent people deserve the same protection as the rest of us.

55

You had me there until you said “castration”.

56

Shortie – if all girls have their ability to reproduce “turned off” by the state at the approach of puberty then there’s no need to do the same for the boys, is there?

But I do believe that the government will require males to be approved for parenthood also.

57

Thanks Kal! Am following up the reference now.

Another question : have laws ever been proposed to castrate mentally incompetent men?

58

holliehobbie, you are off to a good start. Excellent post! Welcome.

59

It depends why you’re turning them off. If you want fathers to qualify just like mothers, then you really shouldn’t leave them unaltered, but if you only care that the kids have one qualified parent then you can focus on women.

60

Shortie - good point.

Before I go on let me make clear that this isn’t My plan – just something that I see happening. I envisage a situation where only couples would be allowed to have children – that the government wouldn’t be so concerned with the genetics of the parents as they would be that there be two parents, of proper age, who WANTED children and who had passed psychological, intelligence, and knowledge tests to show that they would probably BE good parents. And that these parents had the means to raise a child. So, I guess it would be possible that a couple would be approved and the woman “unlocked” only to have another unapproved male jump in and father the child. Yeah, a loophole!