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I had a conversation this past weekend that I found very disturbing. I come from a family of leftists, but I was not prepared for this one.

My sister, against the odds, is now three months pregnant at age 43. She got married to a great guy last year, so the whole family is happy.

She said she would be doing the tests to determine if the child has Down's Syndrome. If it did, she would abort.

"You know, you're far enough along that the baby--or fetus, or whatever you want to call it--is going to feel pain from abortion." I said.

"So what? It's not a person yet."

She then lamented that there were some abnormalities that the tests couldn't catch, and there was a risk she might not get a perfect baby. "After it's born" she said "I'm stuck with it." She expressed sympathy for the eskimo belief that it's not a person until it's named, which is usuallly about the fifth day. She did admit that killing after birth might lead to some problems with a slippery slope, however.

My sister is a professor at an elite university. She went to all the finest schools. I could say a hundred wonderful things about her and think of her as a caring human being.. But she didn't express any caring at all toward that separate life inside of her. How do people learn to think this way?

My theory is that feminism has treated childbearing as an achievement of the woman done for the benefit of the woman. There's some truth to that; childbearing is an achievement and should be honored.

The mistake of feminism, however, is to treat having a child as a narcissistic activity. Children are a blessing partly because they force us to focus on someone other than ourselves.

"So what? It's not a person yet."

… that it's not a person until it's named, which is usuallly about the fifth day.

Francis Beckwith2 -- Is the Unborn Less Than Human

Those who defend criteria for full humanness make a distinction between "being a human" and "being a person." They argue that although the unborn are part of the species homo sapiens, and in that sense are human, they are not truly persons since they fail to fulfill a particular set of personhood criteria. Although the defenders of personhood criteria do not agree on everything, their underlying philosophical assumptions are similar enough that it is safe to say that if I can show that these assumptions are significantly flawed then no personhood criteria theory can succeed in supporting the abortion-rights position.

Mary Meehan -- The Ex-abortionists: Why they quit

But it was a 1974 operation that "changed my mind about abortion forever." While doing a suction abortion, Jarrett found that the suction curette was obstructed by a torn-off fetal leg. So he changed techniques and dismembered the child with a ring forceps:

And as I brought out the rib cage, I looked and I saw a tiny, beating heart. And when I found the head of the baby, I looked squarely in the face of another human being–a human being that I'd just killed. I turned to the scrub nurse and said, "I'm sorry." But I just knew that I couldn't be a part of abortion any more.

When Do Human Beings Begin? "Scientific" Myths and Scientific ...

"After it's born" she said "I'm stuck with it."

That is so sad. I don't have any links at hand, but I have heard there are adoption agencies that have parents waiting in line to adopt Down Syndrome children. Maybe a little research could turn them up, and perhaps that might ease her fears.

If a Down's baby survives your sister's homicidal intentions (God forgive her; maybe it's just talk) we will adopt him!

I ran into a similar situation a couple of years ago. I knew a woman who had suffered through years of infertility, even doing invitro only to miscarry multiple times. She and her husband had finally adopted a baby when she found herself pregnant. I called her about a play date, and she told me she couldn't come because she had to do "some tests for the baby." I asked if something was wrong, and she said "No, it's just an amino." I told her that I knew at least two people that had miscarried after amnios, but she said that she and her husband had discussed it at length and they had to have the test. She said that they "just wanted to be prepared" if something was wrong. In truth, 9 out of 10 mothers who find they have a Down's baby do abort....and why would anyone risk a child's life "just to be prepared" if they have no intention of aborting the baby??? I don't get it.

Your sister is on the cutting edge of the Neo-Nazis in America. These elites run universities and have no moral character. I am sorry.