Guadalupe Benitez (right), with partner Joanne Clark and son Gabriel in August, sued her two doctors, saying they would not perform artificial insemination because she is gay.
Posted on 04/26/2006 6:12:17 AM PDT by NYer
A woman whose doctors refused her infertility treatment because she is a lesbian has sued before California's Supreme Court, her attorney said.
"Our client's doctors' behavior goes against established medical ethics and violates California civil rights law," said Lambda Legal attorney Jennifer Pizer in a statement announcing the suit was filed on Monday.
"The doctors claim a right not to comply with California's civil rights law because they are fundamentalist Christians and they object to treating a lesbian patient the same way they treat other patients," the group said in a statement.
An appeals court overturned a trial court decision that Guadalupe Benitez was denied infertility treatment in violation of California law.
"Doctors are supposed to treat their patients, not make religious judgments about them," Benitez said in a statement.
"I trusted my doctors and then they humiliated my family and me by refusing to perform the insemination procedure after they'd been treating me and promising it to me for nearly a year," she said.
Try the end quote from the plaintiff.
..oops, stand corrected. My screen did not display the last paragraph.
If this hypothetical lesbian doctor truly believed that heterosexual men and women should not produce children with one another, it would be immoral to force her to help a straight couple to conceive, or to punish her for refusing.
As somebody said earlier, a doctor is not a slave.
Please forgive the oversight...the screen did not display the final paragraph in the article. Typical AP reporter bias, however, as the lead and headline SHOULD have pointed out that it was an insemination issue rather than a fertility one.
The problem I have with this whole thing is if she had undergone procedures in the office to help her become fertile, the doctor knew her intent. He should have denied her up front. There are clinics that state up front they do not cater to homosexual couples or single women. But to introduce a 'policy' or belief after someone has already received infertility treatment seems highly unethical, not morally upright.
can you not distinguish between a LIFESTYLE choice with which someone disagrees and a fundamental RELIGIOUS belief that the artificial creation of human life is prohibited ?
do you similarly have a problem with Catholic hospitals, staffed by Catholic physicians, refusing to perform abortions because it is proscribed by their religious beliefs?
Oh brother. So if the doctor had a straight couple, one of whom was employeed in a way that offended the doctor's religious beliefs, is he within his right to deny them?
Guadalupe Benitez (right), with partner Joanne Clark and son Gabriel in August, sued her two doctors, saying they would not perform artificial insemination because she is gay.
The woman in this story was treated with the expectation that an insemination procedure would occur. If the doctor had a problem with the woman's homosexuality, he should have denied her treatment up front. It would be a different story altogether had she portrayed herself as straight, and then told the doctor she was gay. *BOTH* would be guilty of misrepresentation.
The problem is, if the doctor doesn't have a written policy on treatment procedures, he's going to lose this case. If he does have a written policy in place, and the woman lied, then she will lose.
again, you are missing the point entirely. disapproval of lifestyle or profession is IRRELEVANT. the PROCEDURE that this physician is being requested to perform, the CREATION Of life by artificial means, is an act that is proscribed by his religious beliefs. i cannot make this any clearer to you.
Perhaps the doctors figured out she wanted to get knocked up, just so she could later abort her 'fetus' just like her more fertile feminist buds?
And you are missing *my* point entirely. Based on what you just posted, he should also be denying the same procedure to straight, married people. You've just basically condemned thousands of straight families who conceived children in his manner. Your argument is better based on the homosexual aspect.
She did. In the same office, as a matter of fact.
my argument is based on the same religious beliefs as the docto. i am not attempting to have you adopt them, but clearly you appear unwilling or unable to comprehend them. i see no point to continue this. as i said previously, Catholics do NOT condone artificial insemination period. so, if you don't LIKE that argument and prefer the homosexual one, then so be it. i am telling you what the Catholic Church believes, and attempting to explain the religious beliefs upon which this physician refused to perform the procedure.
She is infertile in so far as she hasn't had sex with a man.
That seems to be the extent of her infertility.
So if Catholics do NOT condone artificial insemination, why is this Catholic Doctor performing them? Oh I get it. He's not practicing what he preaches. Seems its the doctor who has the moral problem.
listen, there are plenty of doctors that will perform any number of procedures without regard to morality/religious beliefs. let those desirous of those services seek THEM out. i am merely arguing that a physician who has moral/religious principles be permitted to abide by them and not be FORCED to compromise them.
It is when you are being taxed to care for the medical tragedies that result from such behavior.
This is all getting ridiculous.
What is making it ridiculous is the ranting of people here who think a doctor should be compelled to perform an artificial insemination procedure contrary to his religious beliefs, and then have the unbelievable chutzpah to claim the doctor is "playing God".
Perhaps you fail to see the difference between treating infertility so that someone can naturally conceive a child and performing an aritificial insemination to "unnaturally" conceive a child. Or perhaps you are being deliberately obtuse for the sake of prolonging an argument. I don't know.
As for your slippery slope strawman of "where does it end" consider the slippery slope in the other direction: If the courts rule that these doctors must violate their religious beliefs by performing an artificial insemination simply because they were initially treating an infertility condition, are you perfectly fine with the courts also ruling that Catholic OB/GYN's must perform abortions or face losing their medical licenses?
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