Thanks to blog.bioethics.net for highlighting an article in today's New York Times:
The Right to Be a Father (or Not)
By PAM BELLUCK
BOSTON — Case study one: a pregnant woman wants an abortion. Her husband doesn't. Should he have a say?
Case study two: a woman wants to become pregnant with frozen embryos. Her ex-husband opposes the decision. Should he have a say?
The answer, legally, is no in the abortion case, and in the case of frozen embryos, almost always yes.
The point should not be the right of the mother or the father. Where are the rights of the child - the subject, if you will - to only be "created" for himself or herself?
No child should ever be in harms' way because his or her parents are debating elective abortion or because he or she was 'produced' and then frozen.
As far as the questions asked in the article: go back to the basics of medicine and law. Bodily integrity makes the woman the final consent to any procedure on her body (legal, moral or not). The embryos in the second question are independent of either body, and so they each have equal claim on the decision as to the future of the child. The only decision that should be contemplated is how to best protect the right not to be killed that is inalienable to these human organisms.
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