Comment on Is it wrong to not have a disabled child solely to avoid forcing the child to suffer their whole life?

• lukewarm_ozone@lemmy.today ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

  Yet, people suffering from it can lead happy and fulfilling lives.

  Sure, it’s possible for a person with a severe disability to grow up happy. But when one is making a decision in real life (like having a child), one should consider an average case, not a exceptional one. And the average case for an example like Down’s Syndrome is pretty bad. It is a bit unclear how to quantify the suffering in this particular disease’s case because the main harm to the child is lifelong mental impairment and assorted physical disabilities - but it is at least going to inflict suffering on the child’s family, since caring for a child with a severe disability for their entire life isn’t exactly fun.

  It is a slippery slope that, if not navigated carefully, has historically leaded to atrocities.

  I don’t see the relation. You’ll notice that I’m not proposing killing off disabled people for the “improvement of society” or whatever it was that nazis called it. I am not doing this because nonconsensually killing a person is a harm to them. But deciding not to have a child isn’t the same thing as murdering a person - it’s not harming anyone who exists, and hence may well be morally better than having a child.

  (Oh, I suppose you might mean that I’m arguing that there are circumstances in which it’s morally bad for a person to have a child, which is similar to nazi eugenics in that I’m deciding whether or not people should have children? In that case, my answer is that the difference is that I’m a person, not an authoritarian government, and I don’t have power (nor, indeed, the desire) to force people to obey my personal moral judgements.)

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  • foenkyfjutschah@programming.dev ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

    And the average case for an example like Down’s Syndrome is pretty bad.

    with my experience as care-taker i cannot agree. is there scientific knowledge that you can cite that’d explain me how divergent my experiences are from the averaged realities.

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  • angrystego@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

    Do you think happy Down’s syndrome people are an exception? I have a different experience.

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