The Grand Inquisitor
Posted on 06/23/2011 7:17:26 AM PDT by surroundedbyblue
There is nothing the state of North Carolina can do, Elaine Riddick says, to make up for forcing her to be sterilized when she was 14 years old.
"They cut me open like I was a hog," the woman who now lives in Atlanta said at a Wednesday hearing in Raleigh held by a panel working to determine compensation for thousands of victims of the state's defunct eugenics program. "My heart bleeds every single day. I'm crushed. What can they do for me?"
Riddick, 57, was one of 13 people who spoke at the meeting, and one of nearly 3,000 living victims of the program, which was shuttered in 1977, three years after the last sterilization was performed. The public hearing is part of a process unprecedented not just in North Carolina, but nationally. About a half dozen other states have joined North Carolina in apologizing for past eugenics programs, but none of the others have put together a plan to compensate victims of involuntary sterilization.
"It's hard for me to accept or understand or even try to figure out why these kinds of atrocious acts could be carried out in this country," said Gov. Beverly Perdue, who appointed the Eugenics Task Force that convened Wednesday's hearing.
Any plan that involves financial compensation will be a hard sell, though, in a year when the state budget includes deep cuts to numerous programs. The General Assembly passed the $19.7 billion spending plan over Perdue's veto. Bills in the legislature aimed at providing specific financial and medical compensation for victims have stalled.
"We've made some baby steps, but as we get closer to the big one, there's some pushback," said state Rep. Larry Womble, D-Forsyth, the lawmaker who's been most active on the issue.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
If the government took YOU and did this would you think you deserved to be compensated, or what YOU just say "Crap happens"?
“You never heard of the Mississippi appendectomy or the Carrie Buck case? People who were considered feeble minded were regularly sterilized with the approval of their families and most of the folks in the community up to the late 60s”
No, but maybe I led a sheltered life.
test
Is this an accurate assessment of the situation in NC when this happened? I am old enough to have learned that everything you read in the press is not "totally" accurate.
Neither is appropriate, moral, right, or acceptable. What’s your point?
_______________________________________
My point was obvious. So obvious that you reached it.
BINGO
Oh, I'm sure your damn lawyer(s) will think of something...
Ahh, the classic approach of someone who has lost an argument... you must agree with something terrible so you're an awful person!
No. If you read my posts, I simply stated that someone who expects the state to pay for the costs of his or her children by being on welfare should be spayed or neutered. As someone who pays over half of his income in federal, state and local taxes, I am sick of being expected to cover the costs of children that I did not have the fun of making myself, which requires me to put feeding my own family DEAD LAST in my list of priorities. Why is it humane to allow clearly irresponsible people to have litters and litters of children and not expect those people to pay some of the costs of raising them?
You do realize that Free Republic is a PRO-LIFE forum don't you?
Please explain to me where someone choosing to be sterilized as a condition of accepting help from the government is morally equivalent to murdering a person. If anything, having these people be spayed or neutered (and yes, I use these terms on purpose) will reduce the number of children being murdered prior to birth because there will be no children to murder.
And if you're going to accuse me of being some sort of left-wing baby murderer, then I am going to accuse you of being a freedom-hating socialist, because you believe that it is perfectly OK for the state to hold a gun to a worker's head and take all of his paycheck to cover the costs of someone else's lack of responsibility.
Those are the same people.
They switched from sterilization to abortion when sterilization was ruled to be unconstitutional and abortion ruled to be a constitutional right.
My advice to North Carolina is pay the 3,000 people the $20,000 dollars each, but be careful this doesn’t turn into another Pigford where 50,000 show up to get $100,000 each.
Must have, it was common practice for years. Parents still have children with severe disabilities sterilized. Remember for years and years and years a lot of the street people you see today were houses by the state in insane institutes. Are they better are worse off now.
I would say you are correct.
My sister fell under that law in NC. She had epilepsy. That was all. I remember my mother going to testify before the legislature at the time.
I'm not having an argument. YOU are advocating forced sterilization and, yes, that DOES make you an awful person.
Please explain to me where someone choosing to be sterilized as a condition of accepting help from the government is morally equivalent to murdering a person. If anything, having these people be spayed or neutered (and yes, I use these terms on purpose) will reduce the number of children being murdered prior to birth because there will be no children to murder.
NONE of the victims CHOSE this, it is amazing how pro-death leftists love to use variations of the word "choice" to mask their true agenda.
You sound exactly like Margaret Sanger saying that if certain people are just sterilized they won't need abortions. What you surely think is a "noble" desire is disgusting.
And if you're going to accuse me of being some sort of left-wing baby murderer, then I am going to accuse you of being a freedom-hating socialist, because you believe that it is perfectly OK for the state to hold a gun to a worker's head and take all of his paycheck to cover the costs of someone else's lack of responsibility.
Project much?
We are talking about FORCED STERILIZATION of children.
Does the government have the authority to tax? Yes, but that doesn't mean I like it, nor does it make me a socialist.
But the government DOES NOT have the authority to sterilize someone.
Excellent, excellent, post!!!!
So how big of a check have you written the victims??? I imagine since you feel so strongly about it, you've poneyed up at least a couple grand. Or are you even a resident or taxpayer or North Carolina? You do realize that if this was the law of North Carolina for decades, a majority of state voters must have supported it or at least not felt strongly enough about it to appeal to their elected representatives to repeal it. Since we are are a Representative Republic, we "the people" are just as culpable as the government. Therefore, I will leave it up to the taxpayers of North Carolina to decide if it weighs heavy enough on their conscience to decide if what, if any compensation is necessary.
Hey, come to think of it, my fathers side of the family were Jews who left Poland in the early 1800's due to persecution, maybe I deserve a juicy payout. Paging a "Social Justice" lawyer.
Where? I merely advocate that someone who chooses to have the state be their benefactor be spayed or neutered. You have a funny definition of "force."
NONE of the victims CHOSE this, it is amazing how pro-death leftists love to use variations of the word "choice" to mask their true agenda.
Ahh, so I am a leftist now. Clearly, you support slavery too, as you believe that people who work and pay taxes should be slaves to those who do not, and should work even harder to subsidize increasingly lavish social welfare programs to benefit people who are on the dole.
Does the government have the authority to tax? Yes, but that doesn't mean I like it, nor does it make me a socialist.
Sure it does, because you're extending that authority to tax into a government obligation to pay for social welfare programs with no expectation of responsible behavior on the part of the recipients. I simply believe that in our society, we have rights and responsibilities. Someone who goes and sires or births countless children has a responsibility to take care of those children. It is not morally right for that person to use the state as a thief-by-proxy to force someone else who is trying to behave responsibly to pay for something that he had nothing to do with.
Instead of addressing my objections to this infringement of personal freedom on the part of the taxpayer, you've gone and called me all sorts of nasty names. Meanwhile, you advocate for the continuation of a failed welfare state, slavery against people who pay the bills. Are you sure YOU are on the correct site?
Let's go back to my original question, if something like this happened to YOU would YOU think you deserved to be compensated? YES or NO.
Hey, come to think of it, my fathers side of the family were Jews who left Poland in the early 1800's due to persecution, maybe I deserve a juicy payout.
Two TOTALLY DIFFERENT subjects. We ARE NOT talking about reparations to descendants of victims, we are talking about compensation to the victims themselves.
The Grand Inquisitor
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.