rant...
As you may or may not know, Sue Axon, 51, is currently demanding a judicial review of Government guidelines which allow under 16s to seek advice on contraception or abortion without the knowledge of their parents. She feels that a doctor should be legally obliged to inform a parent if an girl under 16 seeks an abortion. Currently a doctor has a duty of confidentiality, unless sexual abuse is suspected when the doctor is required to inform the relevant authority, but not the parent.
Now, I speak as someone with zero teenage daughters, so I may be wrong but here goes…
1. If your daughter is facing probably the toughest choice of her life and feels that she cannot come to you for advice, help, guidance and support then you have pretty much failed as a parent. She probably has excellent reasons for not wanting you to know and as a failed parent you don’t deserve to know.
2. Doctors have a duty of patient confidentiality. Whilst I would expect any GP to recommend that a girl discusses this with her parent(s) he has a moral obligation to respect her wishes if she doesn’t want them informed.
3. If a girl does not want her parent to know that she is enquiring about or having an abortion, and that girl knows that by law a doctor must inform them, then she will not go to a doctor. She will end up with some grotty illegal back street abortionist. To put young girls in this position is evil and wrong.
4. Its up to our elected representatives to decide if a judicial review is required, not some demented middle aged mum. Judicial reviews cost hundreds of thousands of pounds. If ms Axton wants one then she should have to pay for it, not waste my tax money on something that any judge with half a brain will throw straight out.
Now, I speak as someone with zero teenage daughters, so I may be wrong but here goes…
1. If your daughter is facing probably the toughest choice of her life and feels that she cannot come to you for advice, help, guidance and support then you have pretty much failed as a parent. She probably has excellent reasons for not wanting you to know and as a failed parent you don’t deserve to know.
2. Doctors have a duty of patient confidentiality. Whilst I would expect any GP to recommend that a girl discusses this with her parent(s) he has a moral obligation to respect her wishes if she doesn’t want them informed.
3. If a girl does not want her parent to know that she is enquiring about or having an abortion, and that girl knows that by law a doctor must inform them, then she will not go to a doctor. She will end up with some grotty illegal back street abortionist. To put young girls in this position is evil and wrong.
4. Its up to our elected representatives to decide if a judicial review is required, not some demented middle aged mum. Judicial reviews cost hundreds of thousands of pounds. If ms Axton wants one then she should have to pay for it, not waste my tax money on something that any judge with half a brain will throw straight out.
posted by Old Man Rich at 12:26 PM
6 Comments:
I agree with you, except for saying the parent has failed. The measure of succeeding as a parent isn't having kids who always make the right choices or even kids who always include you in their lives. I just hope to keep my daughter safe, to teach her to treat herself and others with respect, and to support her in doing what she can to make the world a better place.
Sorry dude, having worked with young people a lot, esp young mum's, the parent has rarely failed and the YP has simply dis-connected from the aprents to establish self-identity.
We need parental consultation, not perhaps consent but knowledge of the act to be carried out.
If your daughter has been raped by you, her uncles, a brother, etc... why should you have any say in the matter? This is a law to protect the girls who do go through these things, and it's a lot more than you think.
I take it back. I had a fabulous weekend playing with the little one, and I've decided if she ever ends up in any spot of trouble, I'll have definitely failed.
If she is under 16 she is still under the gaze of her parents and they have be involved in any consultation on abortion.
This is a sticky wicket. A topic of much debate here in Virginia these past few weeks as our gubernatorial elections drew closer
Failure cannot be solely on one person or one group. Raising children - healthy, ethical, honest children is an accomplishment tantamount to the alchemic change of lead to gold. Single parent, same gender parents, grandparents raising their grand children: There is no universal, nuclear family, not anymore.
There is no one answer to fit this issue.
As a woman - I won’t stand for anyone to tell me what I can and cannot do to my body. As the possibility of motherhood lingers in my head - I hope and pray I can raise my daughter to believe in herself and her parents and trust us to come to us when she is in need. I hope, pray and trust a doctor will do their sworn duty to do no harm and offer my child the best options available to her. I would want to know, I would want to make sure she had all the information she needed and I am there to support her b/c something like this… I can’t imagine or put into words.
To that, Ms. Axon, my family priest, my best friend from college, the barista at Starbucks – they can all have their opinions. BUT I will not stand for someone, not related to my daughter or me, not invested in her life, not responsible for our history and its outcome, I WILL NOT stand for a complete stranger with no knowledge of our life to dictate my child’s.
Failure is a very strong word, babe – shit happens, stupidity happens – on everyone’s parts. When it does, you work the problem, find the solution, learn to recover and move forward with life.
Post a Comment
<< Home