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neadodsIs anyone else getting the wiggins from the Melissa Rowland case? She's the woman in Utah who has been cited with first degree murder for refusing to have a c-section and consequently losing one of the babies she was carrying when she delivered 11 days later.
Now, this woman is not mother of the year - she's mentally ill and the surviving child was born with drugs in her system. And most of the articles are making her out to be phenominally shallow and vain, saying that she didn't want the operation because the scar would "ruin her life." Very few of these articles go on to mention, however, that she told a nurse that she thought that the doctors planned on practically gutting her, "slicing [her] from breast bone to pubic bone."
But if you stop and think about this for a moment and the Catch-22 for all women will become frighteningly clear.
Scenario 1: Rowland was not competent due to mental defect at the time of the original recommendation for surgery. Therefore, she's being punished for a decision that she was not capable of making.
Scenario 2: Rowland was competent at the time of the original recommendation, at least competent enough to understand that she did not want invasive surgery. Therefore, she's being punished for protecting her own health above all.
Her defense, unfortunately, is "The doctors didn't tell me of the risks to the children if I didn't have the surgery" rather than protecting her own rights, either to treatment or to legitimately refuse treatment.
It's going to be a damn scary thing if Utah actually gets a court precedent saying that the rights of a fetus override the rights of the woman carrying it.
Now, this woman is not mother of the year - she's mentally ill and the surviving child was born with drugs in her system. And most of the articles are making her out to be phenominally shallow and vain, saying that she didn't want the operation because the scar would "ruin her life." Very few of these articles go on to mention, however, that she told a nurse that she thought that the doctors planned on practically gutting her, "slicing [her] from breast bone to pubic bone."
But if you stop and think about this for a moment and the Catch-22 for all women will become frighteningly clear.
Scenario 1: Rowland was not competent due to mental defect at the time of the original recommendation for surgery. Therefore, she's being punished for a decision that she was not capable of making.
Scenario 2: Rowland was competent at the time of the original recommendation, at least competent enough to understand that she did not want invasive surgery. Therefore, she's being punished for protecting her own health above all.
Her defense, unfortunately, is "The doctors didn't tell me of the risks to the children if I didn't have the surgery" rather than protecting her own rights, either to treatment or to legitimately refuse treatment.
It's going to be a damn scary thing if Utah actually gets a court precedent saying that the rights of a fetus override the rights of the woman carrying it.
