(Prolifer)ations 12-14-10
by Susie Allen, host of the blog, Pro-Life in TN
- ProLifeBlogs features a post from A Catholic View which reveals a partnership between the International Planned Parenthood Federation and UNAIDS in effort to “eliminate disclosure laws which require HIV+ individuals to inform their sex partners of their potentially deadly infection.” Exactly how is this supposed to help curb the spread of AIDS?
- MommyLife hosts video of another Homecoming King and Queen with Down Syndrome, elected by the student body:
- Secular ProLife responds to the oft-quoted statement, “If men could get pregnant, abortion would be a sacrament.”
- Vital Signs shows a tongue-in-cheek video of a “remarkable development” which provides protection against STDs, unwanted pregnancy, and heartbreak:
- Stand for Life features 3 excellent videos educating about the link between breast cancer and abortion.
Dec.14, 2010 3:00 pm |
Blogs |
Jill Stanek is a nurse turned speaker, columnist and blogger, a national figure in the effort to protect both preborn and postborn innocent human life.
Such a triumphant story!
I actually think gestures like this, in the long run, have a negative impact on the mentally disabled by creating, in their minds, an exaggerated view of their own abilities that will ultimately lead to disappointment. Obviously their classmates were trying to make them feel special, which is noble, but after high school they’ll be lucky if they can get jobs pushing carts at a grocery store.
And thank you, joan, for AGAIN showing your true attitude toward those with disabilities. Nice work! :)
Perhaps their classmates actually LOVE them and DO believe they are special. I know, I know… hard concept for that utilitarian brain of yours to grasp, I’m sure. And you know, I believe there are a lot of folks quite glad to have jobs pushing carts and bagging groceries at stores all across America. They are as much a valuable part of society as the rest of us.
Are you the type of person who has disdain for the Special Olympics, as well?
Guess Joan has never heard of actress Andrea Fay Friedman. She has Down Syndrome. Here is a little about her from Wikipedia:
A 48 minute documentary about her life, A Possible Dream: The Andrea Friedman Story with narration by Joanne Woodward premiered in 2009.[10][11] As of 2010, Friedman had been working at a law firm, as an accountant[6], for 20 years. She also occasionally works as an assistant teacher for the Pathway program in UCLA, where she helps teach students how to live independently.[6] She has traveled to India and Japan, and speaks some Japanese. She also enjoys bowling and skiing
You know, If I didn’t know better, I would swear joan was some kind of pro-life “plant,” designed to make pro-aborts look as bad as possible. Thing is, pro-aborts are only too good at doing that themselves. Insulting the mentally handicapped and those that love them is a great start.
Keep it up, joanie, and you could turn more readers of this blog to the pro-life side than anyone else here.
joan, just about time for your bi-yearly visit to Mass.
Don’t forget to take a good, long look at the Nativity scene, especially Baby Jesus.
Maybe ask Him for a new heart for Christmas. Yours quit working a long time ago.
My 10 year old daughter and I watched the video of homecoming together. She has a heart for those with Down Syndrome, like her mother. When it was over I told her that when mommies find out their babies have Down Syndrome 90% of them have abortions. We had a good cry.
Joanie,
Love wins.
“My 10 year old daughter and I watched the video of homecoming together. She has a heart for those with Down Syndrome, like her mother. When it was over I told her that when mommies find out their babies have Down Syndrome 90% of them have abortions. We had a good cry.”
I’d love to see the kinds of stories your daughter will be telling her therapist when she’s 40.
LOL, Joan.
She wants to be a special education teacher. Like me. Gads!!
Nice try at deflection though away from your obvious disdain for those with disabilities.
I was going to defend myself from the ridiculous accusations that I’m a heartless hater of the disabled, but why bother? There was nothing callous or mean about my post. In fact, I was expressing concern for them that this kind of thing could have adverse consequences on their self-esteem later in life. If the people here took that as “obvious disdain” for the disabled, it’s because of a bias they already have against me, totally removed from the actual content of my post.
Carla, Your daughter will make a GREAT teacher.
She has a beautiful, loving heart just like her momma’s.
That MUST be it, Joan. I mean how could anyone take this: “after high school they’ll be lucky if they can get jobs pushing carts at a grocery store” as a disparaging remark?
What’s sad is you claim not to realize it. Would you say something like that to the parent of a child with Down Syndrome in person?
“That MUST be it, Joan. I mean how could anyone take this: “after high school they’ll be lucky if they can get jobs pushing carts at a grocery store” as a disparaging remark?”
What? Am I wrong? Are there a bunch of doctors and lawyers with Down Syndrome that I haven’t heard of?
“What’s sad is you claim not to realize it. Would you say something like that to the parent of a child with Down Syndrome in person?”
I wouldn’t need to. They’d already know it.
Believe it or not, joan, people’s self-esteem (or self-respect) doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with their occupation or how much money they make. I believe that quite possibly is what you don’t realize. You think those with Down Syndrome shouldn’t get “above themselves” or think too much of themselves because they are going to have low-paying jobs all their lives. That’s it, isn’t it? Either way, your comment doesn’t reflect very well on you. It’s also an insult to grocery-baggers everywhere, Down Syndrome or not.
The worth of a person is not at all about what they do. Maybe one of my sons will be a grocery bagger. One of the kindest, most caring, honest and funny grocery baggers.
I wouldn’t love him any less.
Hey joan!
When I was a senior in high school, we elected as our prom queen a girl who was just beginning her second battle with cancer, after having gone into remission 18 months earlier. (The community service club I managed also, in a rare move, voted to use our leftover fundraising money from the year to buy her a really good quality wig – usually we donated it to one of our preferred local charities; it was a controversial decision, but one I was comfortable with.) She was a brilliant girl – had just deferred admission to Duke in order to focus on getting healthy again – so full of promise and optimism and youth, and I will always remember seeing her walk up onto that stage, new wig and prom dress and all.
Now, you could argue that it was pathetic to pull a ‘sympathy vote.’ That the glare of public attention only emphasized how different her situation was. But it wasn’t like that. She was a much-loved classmate and friend, an athlete and an honor student. She didn’t have our pity; she had our support.
She died a couple years after that, after getting progressively weaker and going through some very hard times. She could have been so many things – she quite literally could have become a doctor OR a lawyer; she was in most of my AP classes and blew everyone else out of the water, intellectually. She could have been a college student, a writer, a mother, an entrepreneur. So many possibilities, so many options. She didn’t get to be those things. But she got to be prom queen. More than just a stupid crown (really, I am the LAST person to give a rat’s butt about such accolades – even just typing the phrase kind of makes me gag a bit) it was a collective vote in her favor. It was all of us showing her that we loved her. I’m glad we took that opportunity, when we had it. I never told her I loved her in person, and I imagine that most people didn’t. But we got to say it through our actions, repeatedly and with varying degrees of intensity. And I am at least happy to remember that we never hesitated to SHOW her that we loved her, even if perhaps we were not always brave enough to tell her.
The point of these types of situations – people voting for not the prettiest or necessarily most popular kids (although that is assuming one definition of popularity), but for someone with Down Syndrome or cancer – is not to predict future success, or even to make people feel good for a day, but to have the community come together in a groundswell declaration of support and love. It will not solve the world’s problems; people will still have Down Syndrome, and people will die unfairly young. But with the care and backing of a community, the world’s problems can seem, however briefly, less difficult. Less lonely. Nobody wants to die young. And we couldn’t stop her from dying young. But we could stop her from dying alone.
Oh my, Alexandra, what a beautiful post…. Thank you…. The world is a better place because of you and other people who think the way you do… God bless you…
Okay, not to ruin the mood after Alexandra’s beautiful post, but I love that video about pants! I kinda wanna buy the shirt. >.>
“What’s sad is you claim not to realize it. Would you say something like that to the parent of a child with Down Syndrome in person?”
I wouldn’t need to. They’d already know it.
You wouldn’t say it because you wouldn’t have the guts to be so insensitive to someone’s face, I’d hope. You’d likely get punched. Your statement makes the assumption that somehow if someone cannot grow up to have what YOU feel is a “respectable” career or do things YOU believe benefit society in some way, that they aren’t inherently valuable. You are really demented, joan. It’s sad.
Alexandra,
Thank you for that. Beautiful. I’m crying and only have you to blame. :)
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0121630/
Another person with Downs that was given the chance to live and became an ACTOR. AKA Chris Burke AKA Corky on the series “Life Goes On”. He also played an angel on two episodes of “Touched by an Angel”. In fact, there was an episode I watched once that had Chris Burke in it (before Hallmark Channel lost its rights to the show or just took it off, not sure which) where this older lady in a neighborhood HATED the fact that there was a home for young adults with Downs in the neighborhood. She was trying to get it kicked out of the neighborhood. It took one of the neighbors, who was really an angel, helping to save her life after she suffered a stroke, to change her.
Joan,
Your words are hurtful and you can’t see that some of the young adults and adults with Downs CAN be productive, if given the chance.
Ahh…the pro-abortion mindset. Hitler would be proud.
Yes, xalisae and Margaret Sanger would also be so proud. Let’s see, hmm, what was her motto? Something like “more for the fit, less of the unfit, imbecile, human weeds that should have never been born”.
I have a concern of my own regarding the video, that people with disabilities are considered less to be people in their own right and more as an “inspiration” to us normal folks. It concerns me that their value is questioned so much that people have to defend them as valuable to the able-bodied/non-developmentally disabled. Human beings do not need to be defended on their worth to other human beings, but sadly, since 90% of these human beings are killed because they are deemed worthless to others, good people have reduced themselves to talking about how they ARE worth something to others- rather than rightly giving people the finger and saying that it doesn’t matter if NO ONE likes a particular person, that person still has a right to live. I don’t care if a human being does nothing but eat, sleep and breathe, that human being has every right to do so.
This reminds me of how women who choose not to kill their Down Syndrome babies are heralded as heroes (i.e. Sarah Palin) when there is nothing heroic about not killing your innocent child. We shouldn’t be praising those that don’t do evil- that should be the standard. In a way, we validate killing disabled people when we suggest that it’s heroic to not kill them rather than horrific TO kill them.
That’s my issue with videos that talk about the value of disabled people to non-disabled people. I understand the intent, I just see it as acquiescing to the evil that suggests that we should HAVE to do this.
The young teenage girls that I know that considered abortion but chose to give life to their children and also chose open adoption are heroes to me.
They did what I in my fear and desperation did not do.