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Every time you don't want to have a kid for whatever reason is ethical to abort.
What's not ethical is to have a child you don't really want.
This is a decision made by the pregnant person, informed by her/their doctor. I can also see her/their family having some input in informing the pregnant person's decision, to the extent that they are not being coerced by their family.
As far as outside agents, such as ourselves, are involved, pregnancy is a medical issue. This is the only responsible way for society to handle these questions. Society is able to provide support for parents, esp those who are caretakers of children with severe disabilities, and we can improve education and access to contraceptives. But it is irresponsible and unethical to become involved in the medical decisions of others under any circumstances.
If we really care about unborn children we should care doubly about born children and the families who take on the responsibility of ensuring those disabled individuals are able to experience love and joy. Trying to collapse ethics and morals into pure individual choice is a scam.
Yes
Part 1: GOD YES!!!!!!!
Part 2: And thus my long watch has begun.
Part 1: yes, abort
Pat 2: you'd have to be blind to not see that your child has down syndrome for a week. Not much you can do at this point outside of putting the child in the system to be abused and abandoned or murdering it so this is the point where I become stuck with a mentally challenged child.
Yes.
These are always technology problems more than moral problems. The issue is our technology is too shit currently to fix the genetic disease. Same with abortion generally. If we had artificial wombs then we could even have late term abortions and birth the child to be adopted and yes there is a shortage of babies to be adopted.
and yes there is a shortage of babies to be adopted.
So adopt literally anyone besides a baby instead. The issue is that adoption is almost singularly focused on babies, while the foster system is falling apart at the seams due to being overfilled and underfunded. In the foster system, any child older than 4 is considered a “late” adoption.
The sad reality is that if a baby doesn’t already have adoptive parents waiting for them when they’re born, they likely won’t ever get adopted. Because adoptive parents are entirely focused on adopting babies. And that really says more about the adoptive parents, because it means they’re adopting for their own sake, instead of the child’s. It’s selfish to sit on an adoption list for years to get a baby, instead of simply adopting a toddler who needs a home. The sheer level of arrogance and narcissism on display is honestly astounding. Adoptive parents see a system bursting with kids who need a home, and then go “nah, make a new one just for us. We want that bun straight out of the oven.” It’s honestly disgusting.
It is, I mean unless we start forcing people to adopt kids they don't want to adopt or something else I'm not sure that will change anytime soon. As for me in my family it's more like accidental adoptions aka a more distant family member can't take care of their kid whose 10 then someone else takes them in. It worked that way with family friend's kids as well. It's not like official legal guardianship or adoption, more so an informal familial help.
There's very much an ethical problem here. Sure, it's fairly clear-cut with some debilitating genetic issues. But there's a point at which you're veering into eugenics, and that's sooner than people think.
Take children who are deaf due to a genetic defect. I'm sure most parents imagine being deaf a terrible lot in life that they'd like to spare their kids from.
Then listen to actual members of the deaf community. They're proud of their identity, they have their own language, and they're terrified of the prospect of being essentially eliminated in just a few generations by well-meaning folks that can't imagine a happy life as a deaf person.
What if we discover a few years from now that there are genetic markers for being queer? What if we can genetically engineer people to be thinner, more muscular, have a more attractive bone structure, lighter skin? Those are all things that offer an objectively more comfortable life, which I'm sure many parents would want for their kids without much thought given to what the societal implications are.
And what if this technology becomes available to a charismatic cult leader, a narcissistic tech CEO, a fascist regime?
Such technology doesn't just fix genetic diseases. In a hierarchical global society that measures people's worth by their body rather than their character, it eliminates human diversity.
Yes designer babies are totally going to be a thing. The ethical discussion we had about this in college boiled down to it being ethical if and only if an individual could choose to undo and redo the changes as they desire.
I've run into that argument from the deaf community. It's a tough one, should a community of people have more of a say over what health outcomes are chosen than the parents of said child?
Ultimately technology should make whatever one wills be (short of causing suffering to other minds). Anything less than this is insufficient or otherwise broken technology. Theoretically if we had sufficient technology one could take any form whatsoever they desire at any moment with any senses they desire and so on. Now it's a quite far fetched concept short of us gaining the ability to digitize our minds or otherwise inhabit simulated realities. To achieve this in physical reality would be quite difficult.
The issue you're really getting at is the unequal spread of technology and our current technological limitations. Minds should be maximally free to experience whatever they desire short of causing other minds suffering.
I think that this decision is taken by the mother, and no one else.
As fucked up as it sounds, if it's early enough that there isn't any chance of it being considered alive, I'd let the family decide whether or not to do it on their own because not every family is capable of that type of constant care and/or affording the bill to pay someone to help.
As for a week after birth, as fucked up as it sounds, if you truly cannot afford the constant care, then probably putting them up for adoption to a family that can afford the care is better, IMO, than not being able to afford to care for said child and having potentially seeing them die from lack of care you cannot afford.
Sometimes you need to make hard decisions to keep afloat financially.
Part 1: Yeet
Part 2: Looks like I'm down with the sickness.
I think it's ethical to abort any baby. It's parasitic on the host, if you don't consent to the idea how is it any worse than getting a flu vaccine
If you don't think you can provide a better life for your kid than state care could I see putting it up for adoption to be ethically mandatory
Doctor wouldn't know how severe.
Down syndrome is regular DNA but one extra copy that interferes randomly with the building of the body.
Every kid is different.
The doctor told us the fetus might have issues based on growth. We didn't care.
My son was born with down syndrome. The doctor we had said he may not talk much, may not move much, etc.
He will talk your ear off. He graduated highschool with a modified plan. Got the Phys Ed award in the regular grade 12 program. He reads, writes, excels at video editing and PowerPoint creation, excellent at figuring out technical stuff to a degree. Highly social and works partime.
His birth showed me that acedemics aren't as important as enjoying life for what it is.
Every human has an innate right to access Healthcare and this involves prenatal care for expectant mother's. Mother's should have access to screenings for a variety of chromosomal issues some of which are literally incompatible with life and the baby will not live more than a few days if at all. Mothers should also have access to post-natal care. Children with disabilities deserve to have access to Healthcare and education.
It is the United States, the UK, France, "israel" and their NATO nazi allies that jave worked to systematically deny most human beings on earth from having access to basic levels of healthcare and education.
Additionally these fascist colonial entities have imposed destruction that causes more children to be born with significant disabilities. Look at what happened to children born in Iraq after the US invasion. What is happening to Children born in Gaza today. I am sure there are many such examples in history.
I met a guy who had cancer twice, he was only 27, his father was exposed to agent orange.
Theres also this artist, RA Rugged Man, who talks about this kind of thing frequently with his work: https://youtu.be/YV2Guv8l2FY
Awful.
I just started reading an article about the horrible diseases caused to children by Agent orange but I had to stop because I was going to throw up.
Death to America
I remember discussing this in an undergrad biomedical ethics class. Pls don't ask us to do ur homework lmao
Jury was still out by the end of class discussion btw. This one was complicated lol
I had business ethics so it was boring questions like "should we advertise to kids" or "do cigarette manufacturers have souls". But ya this seems to be pretty divisive so far.
Yeah it really splits the crowd. There were three case studies from the course but I can't find my offering's outline and I forget the third case study. The first one was: "A woman signs a form saying that if she gets dementia she wants euthanasia in the late/developed stages of the illness. Later, she gets there, but this 'version' of her has a really high quality of life and is quite contented. Do you follow through?"
In between there were discussions of frameworks like Aristotelian/Kantian/utilitarian ethics. There were also some medical specific stuff, like the biopsychosocial model of disability. Pretty neat overall, though tbh I wish I took an ethics class more relevant to my current academic pursuits (math)
Killing your unborn baby is still killing. If the child can grow up, live a live, see parents, have friends and laugh, then it is unethical to abort.
What you're asking about is eugenics. People with downs syndrome can lead rewarding lives. Many people who work with those of us with downs say that they have the highest satisfaction with life of anyone out there. They do require a lot of costly and time consuming care in early life, but there is no reason a child born with downs can't have a life they find fulfilling.
Given that, I would say if a mother's only reason for aborting is the downs syndrome, that probably leans towards unethical. However if there are any other reasons a mother might choose to abort that fetus, it's ethical. But terminating a pregnancy because the child has an "undesirable" trait is both eugenics and ableism which rarely result in ethical decision making.
Even under the umbrella of downs syndrome being the only reason, I think there's variability. "I won't be able to take care of this child" is quite different from "This child has an undesirable trait."
Is it ethical to abort a child with any kind of disease/syndrome that requires more resources, time, and money than the parents can afford? If we had rephrased it as an adoption, it would be inarguable child abuse for a couple to adopt a special needs child they have no capability of raising.
I don't disagree with you. Unwanted children do not have happy outcomes, especially those with disabilities. However if you are applying the logic of adoption to that of eugenics you should tread carefully. If society is allowed to impose restrictions on adoptions, why not biological parents? Perhaps pregnant women should have an income test? If a mother can't afford to feed her child should she be allowed to retain custody or have the baby at all?
If a pregnant person decides they cannot afford it or aren't up for the commitment that's ethical. If a pregnant person decided to abort out of some pity for people with downs, well that's eugenics and ableist, so probably unethical. Pragmatically though the result is the same.
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It's not ethical to not abort the pregnancy in this case. There is nothing wrong with getting rid of the fetus, there is everything wrong with letting a person disabled to this stage from the start emerge.
About part 2: I think euthanasia is ethical in this case. Certainly more ethical than emotional blackmail with "unborn child".
If it's ethical to abort just because you don't want the kid (and it is), then it's ethical to abort for any reason.
Also, it's no one's business why people choose to abort.
In my country it is legal to abort just because you don't want the kid, but illegal to abort for a certain specific reason (the parents not wanting a girl). This is because people might abort daughters if they are poor and think that girls are less likely to get jobs.
I feel that the Down's Syndrome case is similar. There are people with Down's Syndrome who lead happy lives, and genetically 'normal' people who lead miserable lives. So of course a mother has the right to abort a foetus. But I fear that if we normalise aborting children on genetic grounds, that could lead to eugenics.
it’s no one’s business why people choose to abort.
This. The only answer to "why" is "fuck off", and for so many reasons. It'd suck to agonize over the decision, and once it's made to then be second-guessed by some rando.
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It's kinda besides the point. If a woman wants an abortion she should get an abortion. Downs syndrome or not, it doesn't matter.
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What else does it bring if I keep the one-week-old baby alive but suffering to not only himself but all people around him: parents, grandparents, annoyed neighbours, teachers in special schools, eventually indifferent docters?
If it's guaranteed Hitler will do what he will do, will you kill infant Hitler when you travel back in time? The example in part 2 is just a milder Hitler.
I think it's ethical to abort if your fetus is perfectly healthy.
I don't know about the ethics, but forcing people to carry to term a baby with a significant developmental disability is unconscionable to me. It is very likely to ruin their marriage, finances, sanity, life, but the people that manage to do it are saints.
There are many factors to take this decision, but mainly in how long in the term is the fetus and the resources situation of the family (work, economic, external support, their health, etc).
In an ideal world though, induced abortion should not exist since it is the society who should completely support, and adaptively to the children' special needs, but when society fails at that and, so far, #all societies are, it is the family and doctor the only ones who should only make the decision on a fetus. The only argument today should be when a fetus becomes a human.
We should treasure far more families that dedicate more than the usual percentage of resources to take care of their weakest of their members (children or parents) than basically anyone else in society like we do with youtubers, sport players, oligarchs, politicians, etc.
Your punchable.
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let me flip the question:
if you KNEW the child you were going to conceive had the same chance of the same condition, would you still have sex?
if you'd skip it, then i see no issues with an abortion.
we don't have foresight, but we do have hindsight. how we use it is important. nobody gets asked if they want to be alive. how dare anyone bring someone into a life of pain without their consent? part 2: if you don't take responsibility for your own disasters, you are the disaster.
Without doubt.
Part 2: nope. Get used to changing babies.
We part, we choice
Can't really say for part 1 but for part 2 it's definitely not abortion anymore after birth so that is unethical in my opinion.
Have you guys spent much time around people with Down's syndrome? It's typically not a uniform "life of suffering" like what many comments seem to be assuming.
It's fair enough to try to imagine how you would feel if you had a certain disability, but never assume you're right about that, you might be surprised. Especially with intellectual differences, I don't think you can really know what it would be like to be that person.
My SO brother doesn't have downs but was severe brain damaged at at young age. His whole family doesnt hate him they just wish he was better. After grandma died he lost the last person that really loved him for who he is. Everyone dreads is presence and dealing with his backpack of medication or fits of dangerous rage due to frustration understanding things from a bloke 2x their size (literally 2 meters tall).
I spoke to him enough to know he is not happy in state care but no one can handle him when things go wrong. He is a effectively 5 year old child stuck and unable to grow and alone with only his handlers. No one should have that fate if its preventable.
Yes, in my experience, aquired brain injury is one of the hardest things for people (and their families) to adapt to, but that's a whole different kettle of fish than Down's syndrome.
The post talks about the ethics of pre-emptively aborting a fetus that has a high likelihood of "severe downs syndrome ", and this is something many people face irl ask the time. my point is (mainly) that people with Down's syndrome can have a lot of joy in their lives, and bring a lot of joy to those around them, despite the fact that they will face certain struggles (as so many of us do, in our own ways). And (secondly), although it's outside the scope of the hypothetical situation in the op, foetal tests for Down's syndrome are notoriously unreliable.
I'm just saying don't be afraid. Most new parents want to avoid any chance of anything 'wrong' with their child, but nearly everyone has something...
Source: have worked with children and adults with a variety of physical and intellectual disabilities, and in my own friends and family know (and care for) a multitude of neurodiverse people and those with chronic mental illness or addictions.
Abort whenever for whatever.
Yes.
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this post was submitted on 11 Jul 2026
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