Livre d'Or

The specific thing I am arguing against is the type of pro choice argument which says it is cruel to bring a disabled child into the world, that it is for the child's sake to make it not exist at all rather than being disabled. I think it's important to be honest and say clearly that a choice to abort in that situation is for the sake of the parents, because they couldn't cope with that child.

The issue here is how one scales disabled. To a first approximation, any genetic disruption sufficiently small that a living baby can be born is on the mild end.

The case that strikes me as as the dividing line is anencephaly, where the neuroderm does not close over in fetal development and most of the brain is not formed; sometimes enough of a brainstem is there for there to be reflexes and breathing, sometimes not. No cerebrum; no possibility of consciousness, ever. And it's detectable quite early on, an open skull shows up on ultrasound.

My own position on this is that there would be something of great cruelty in requiring a woman to bring a fetus known to be anencephalic to term, when the best medicine in the world and the best will in the world cannot do anything for it but have it die in hours or days, and when it's quite likely to die during the later portion of the pregnancy anyway.