RICK SANTORUM WANTS TO PROTECT YOU! FROM THE EVILS OF PRENATAL TESTING
This entire piece is a Must Read.
I am so bloody tired of being used as a pawn by both the left and the right in reproductive rights rhetoric, I could scream. And in fact, I often do. The right tells us that they oppose bodily autonomy and choice because it would lead to abortion of “precious angels,” which is apparently code for “disabled people,” while the left, well, unfortunately often claims that the worst catastrophe ever would be to have a disabled child, so it’s a good thing we can screen for that sort of thing and prevent it from happening.
I’m a disabled person, and I actually wholly support prenatal screening and full access to prenatal care, because I think it can result in healthier pregnancies and better outcomes for both pregnant people and infants. On its own, prenatal screening is value neutral — it’s a way to find out more about what is going on with a pregnancy. I fail to see how that could be a bad thing, because in my opinion, the more you know about a pregnancy, the more you can support the health of mother and fetus.
Unfortunately, prenatal testing often gets twisted for other uses.
The assumption people like Santorum are making is that when prenatal screening uncovers disability, the automatic response is to abort. That’s… not necessarily the case. In fact, prenatal screening for disability can help parents prepare, and may result in being informed about measures they can take to make pregnancy, labor and delivery safer. It can also help medical teams address and possibly prevent complications that might arise in connection with disabilities.
THIS. When I read the excerpt on my tumblr dash I immediately was reminded of s.e. smith and how good they are at having nuanced articles about disability and abortion, and then I clicked through and sure enough it was written by s.e. smith! This essay is so important. People need to understand that this is a complex and nuanced issue, a conversation we should be having, but the solution should never be to limit the choices of people or to purposely deny them all the information to make an informed decision. Abortion isn’t the problem, prenatal testing is not the problem; it’s society. It’s how we treat people with disabilities, it’s how we treat people who choose to continue pregnancies knowing their child will have disabilities, it’s how we slash funding for resources and support systems. This was so good, just go read it all.
(Source: keepyourbsoutofmyuterus)
