Another example of the twisted morals of christianity. May as well grant rights to a tumor. But the articles title is misleading. It's not Criminalising Motherhood, it's exalting Motherhood above the individual. They make criminals out of women who choose NOT to be mothers. And biologically speaking, it's a leach until it's born. Nobody should be forced to supply a leach with food.

link to article at The Nation:

http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20031215&s=talvi

See, things like that make me glad I don't live in America. Any woman who has to give birth to a dead baby needs help and compassion, not condemnation.

Not that this country's perfect; several women have been jailed for murdering their babies on the evidence of a single 'expert' whose knowledge of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome has since been proved to be seriously flawed. I can't imagine anything worse than to have a child die and then be falsely accused of killing it. And he hasn't even said 'sorry'.

SIDS is horrible. Thankfully, neither of my children experienced it. If they had, I know that I would have wondered "Did I do Something Wrong?" How could anyone fight a false charge, they WOULD feel guilty. Hell, I feel bad when my kids have a bad day, or frown. I always wonder what I could do to make their smiles bigger, their laughs louder. To be blamed in a tragedy? I can see that some people wouldn't even bother to fight back. Feeling guilty, they would think they really did do something wrong. SIDS is a tragedy, and blaming someone for it is just inhumane.

A pregnant woman who uses drugs does not win my sympathy.

Probably my shortest response ever.

If they have no proof that the cocaine abuse of the woman caused the death than she should not be held accountable for the death of the infant. This is just another injustice to due to the morality of today's society blinding their critical views. It also is a shame that the Supreme Court did not give time to review the case. Another innocent woman is put behind bars because of the judicial system in America.

I don't think any drug users win sympathy from many people but surely giving birth to a stillborn fetus is punishment enough?

I'm with Karl on this one - rights to a tumor, indeed. Doing drugs while you're pregnant may make you a bad parent, but it doesn't make you a murderer. More.

This really ticks me off. It wasn't "right" to use drugs while she was living for two, but the implications of this case frighten me. It seems like this could be one of those things that could just snowball.

With little to go on in terms of proof, she's being painted as horrible and evil. To think that a woman who changes the CAT LITTER is flirting with murder is insane. Sometimes you don't know that you're pregnant, or that you're doing something dangerous, or that there's even the presence of an element that could endanger an unborn child.

This just feels really WRONG to me. I agree that there are dire consequences to drug use during pregnancy and those choices can decide the fate and health of the child, but this issue seems to veer a little too much into witch hunt territory.

For those of you with access to magazine archives, check out Ms. sept/oct 1998 article "Mothers Charged with Murder when their Infants Fail to Thrive" by Annette Fuentes.