Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Are there 'unwanted babies'?

Francis Beckwith writes:

What is an unwanted baby? Is it like an unwanted black person? Or an unwanted immigrant? Or an unwanted woman? Or an unwanted handicapped person?

There are no "unwanted" babies, as if the adjective "unwanted" can be a natural property of that which is intrinsically valuable. There are just adults who have a disordered understanding of their obligations to the vulnerable and defenseless in our community. Reinforcing and nurturing that immaturity by describing the intrinsically valuable as "unwanted" is deeply immoral.

Bad adults blame the baby first, just as bigoted adults blame the immigrant, the minority, and the handicapped first for their own inadequacies.