Celine Dion comments on her twins, born six weeks ago. Part of what makes “selective reduction” (have you ever heard of such a horrible euphemism?) so terrible is that there are so many women who want children so desperately. She was supposed to have triplets, incidentally, but one didn’t make it:
She also told how she was originally pregnant with three babies, but lost one during the pregnancy. “One little baby decided to step back to help the other two survive. The doctors said to me if there’s something wrong, natures takes it’s course. “I still think of the one who stepped back. I’m sure every woman has the feeling about -the little one that’s not there.”
I wish every woman did have a feeling about the one that’s not there…but that doesn’t appear to be the case.
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Celine Dion is really not very bright, what about all the other embryos she and her husband created, that are not “there” now?
Hard to feel compassion for this woman whose intelligence and conscience have remain unformed since childhood.
And what would Celine have done if that third child hadn’t “stepped back”? Would it then have been all right to reduce her pregnancy? As Julie points out, there is no consistency, only lots of emotion, when people who use IVF and other fertility treatments to bear children discuss feelings about miscarriage.
Whether or not a pregnant woman feels deeply about the child in her womb makes absolutely no difference to whether that child is a human being who deserves society’s protection from those who would kill her or him.
Julie,
I don’t really know that you’re being fair to Celine. Virtually any couple who is dealing with infertility will be losing embryos. Even the ones who end up getting pregnant naturally will have lost some embryos in the process. Probably most of us who have tried to get pregnant have lost an embryo or two. The embryo just flowed out along with our period, and we never knew that it existed. It’s kind of sad, really. But singling out the women who are trying to have a baby via IVF as evil because they lose embryo after embryo is unfair.
I’ll agree with you that her conscience is unformed. But then, if someone is using a pop star as a moral compass, that someone rather deserves what they get.
Melissa,
It is standard procedure in IVF to create “spare” embryos who will never be given a chance to implant. Eventually, they are “disposed of” (ie. deliberately killed). It is the deliberateness of these actions that differentiates this situation from what happens when embryos are lost through natural processes. So, I think Julie is being completely fair to Celine.