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• Sunday, February 11, 2007 02:32 AM

  Agreeing to Disagree

  >I guess agreeing to disagree is just not a viable option

  We aren't talking about agreeing to disagree here, we're talking about your apparent inability to comprehend what it is you're reading. You spoke of Ashley as if she had aspirations, or would have aspirations. She has none, and will never have any. She's incapable of even reacting to her environment coherently, let alone aspiring to anything.

  >I have a 3-month old disabled child and I hate to tell

  >you, but he is much more of a human being than your

  >cat.

  I hate to tell you, but my cat's a hell of a lot more intelligent than any 3-month old child, disabled or not.

  And isn't it convenient you just happen to have a 3-month-old child. What are the odds of that, anyhow? Forgive me if I'm somewhat dubious regarding this claim.

  Anyhow, the point still stands – we routinely surgically modify, and even kill and eat animals a hell of a lot more intelligent than Ashley. Which sort of blows the whole argument of yours that the procedures performed on Ashley were wrong because she's an "individual" with "aspirations". If what was done to an individual in Ashley's severely limited mental condition was morally questionable, what we do every day to pigs – individuals far more intelligent than any infant – is morally abhorrent.

  But I'm guessing most of the finger-wagging scolds on here aren't about to give up their bacon.

  I'm still puzzled at why you're freaking about the surgery Ashley's parents elected to have performed on their child, while you're apparently completely oblivious to the millions of American boys who undergo painful, potentially dangerous circumcisions every year in hospitals across America. I mean, if you're so concerned about children being mutilated by their parents against their will, I should think that stopping hundreds of thousands of elective, mutilating procedures a year would take precedence over any concerns regarding a few hundred, potentially life-enhancing or even lifesaving surgeries (at most) conducted annually on individuals as severely disabled as poor Ashley. After all, individuals in Ashley dreadful condition are never gonna know what's missing, anyhow.

  —sunspot Read sunspot's other letters
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