Parental Notification: Are judges the new doctors?

[Modem Butterfly]

http://www.slate.com/id/2124299/nav/tap2/

Parental notification statutes are widely popular, I know, but let's put to rest the myth that they exist solely to promote robust and healthy communication about family choices. For one thing, as abortion rights groups argue, you cannot legislate healthy communication; all you can legislate is snitching. Good data show that the majority of pregnant teens actually do tell their parents when they are considering an abortion, so parental notification and consent laws single out many of those teens with a really compelling reason not to disclose their condition—like incest or abuse. A teen who knows she will be thrown out when her parents learn of her condition is precisely the kid who should not be forced to communicate that fact.

But the best evidence that these laws are not really about promoting open family discussion is that most of the time in most states, parents have no legal entitlement to know when their child gets pregnant. Physicians are not mandated to report when a minor chooses to become sexually active, to use contraceptives, or even to carry a baby to term and keep it. If all big childbearing decisions need a parental OK, why are these decisions deemed private? Parental consent rules assume that teens need a parent's medical, emotional, and financial support to terminate a pregnancy but apparently not to bear a child.

The difference, of course, is that abortion is seen as killing a baby—a far more consequential decision than raising one. And, once you accept this premise, it's easy to see why the parental notification and partial-birth abortion statutes have become a war on any doctors and judges who choose to enable young women to terminate a pregnancy. Doctors or judges charged with using their professional judgment to help a teen make a tough decision are really acceptable to the political right only if the ultimate decision is to keep the child. These laws "work" only when these experts say no.

[Modem Butterfly]

1. Kick

:kick:

I'm completely, 100% opposed to parental notificaiton laws.