WASHINGTON, D.C., January 25, 2018 (LifeSiteNews) – Aborting a child because of a Down syndrome diagnosis is okay, some 2018 Women’s March participants said, arguing that abortion is better than a child not being cared for and that a woman’s purported right to “choose” comes before the child with Downs.
In one case, a special education teacher insisted she would refuse to support any law that would get in the way of a woman’s “right” to choose abortion.
“I’m a special ed teacher,” she said, “so that isn’t something I personally support, but again, it’s not my choice (to tell someone else what to do).”
“As long as it’s not my choice,” she said. “I refuse to support any legislation that’s going to hinder a woman’s right to choose.”
The marchers expressed their support for aborting unborn children with Down syndrome during interviews on abortion limits with The Daily Signal.
The 2018 event was a repeat of last year’s pro-abortion, anti-Trump event with far fewer participants.
The Daily Signal cited a January 2018 Marist poll that found 76 percent of Americans support stricter laws on abortion but noted, “Women’s March attendees clearly aren't on the same page.”
The correspondent prefaced the question on aborting children with Down syndrome with a reference to reports over the last year that Iceland is “on the verge of eliminating Down syndrome.” In Iceland, almost 100 percent of babies prenatally diagnosed with Down syndrome are aborted.
“I think that that’s a decision for a family and a medical professional to make, not a legislator,” one woman stated in response – the same reply she gave to other questions about limiting abortion.
Still another offered the pro-abortion reasoning that a child would be better off dead than alive but “not cared for.” She also argued that the nation’s foster system was inundated and that adoption doesn’t mean a child will have a “great life.”
“I mean, ultimately, I support you doing what you choose for your body and your family,” she stated. “Um, I think what’s worse than an abortion is a child that’s not cared for, and I think our foster system is really overwhelmed, and adoption is not always going to give that child a great life. And in fact a lot of kids in the foster system are abused and neglected.”
A man present at the revived pro-abortion protest saw no problem with eliminating Down syndrome by eliminating unborn children with it, provided the “individual people’s rights” making the choice to abort were maintained.
“Well, so, I think that that’s the result of a lot of individual choices that were made,” he said. “So to the extent that that’s true, right? If that’s why there’s no Down syndrome anymore, I support each of the individual people’s rights who made that choice.”
“And so, whether that’s OK in the big picture, I think is less important that the question of the individual right, right?” the man continued. “And so I support each of the women that made that decision, so whatever the consequence of that was.”
The Daily Signal asked the pro-abortion special ed teacher – in particular as someone who works with children with Down syndrome – whether the abortion culture worries her, citing the direction Iceland has gone.
The special ed teacher replied that education on treatment options was the “proper response,” so that “maybe Down syndrome won’t be seen as such a desperately bad thing.”
People with Down syndrome and their families have consistently testified to the joy and meaning in their lives. Still, aborting children because they have Down syndrome has its supporters, and estimates say as many as two-thirds or more of U.S. children diagnosed in utero with Down syndrome are aborted.