Friday, July 18, 2008

But isn't that the whole point? That they're just medical waste?

California Woman Settles Lawsuit Over Disposal of Baby After Abortion

A woman has settled her lawsuit with Los Angeles County after officials said the body of her baby after an abortion had been disposed of along with medical waste. Yolanda Garnett filed the suit saying she was prevented from receiving her baby's body afterwards for a more proper burial.

Garnett, who is 36, had an abortion in February 2006 at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center at 19 weeks into the pregnancy.

Because the baby was killed in an abortion and not by other causes, Los Angeles County could not issue a death certificate nor could it give Garnett a burial or cremation permit.

Upset that she couldn't bury her baby, Garnett filed a negligence lawsuit in Los Angeles Superior Court last September. Officials said her baby girl's body was deemed bio-medical waste and thrown out.

"Under those circumstances the remains could not be released to the next of kin, so the fetal remains were disposed of as a specimen per Department of Coroner policy," the county's court papers say, according to KTLA.


Let me get this straight:

It's okay to kill the fetus, because after all it's not a baby; it's just a blob of disposable non-viable tissue. But it's not okay to send the disposable non-viable tissue to the incinerator, because it's a baby that deserves a decent burial.

Look Yolanda -- If you dehumanize your baby so you can kill her, you have no business turning around and re-humanizing her so you can have a nice funeral. Either she really is a baby -- in which case you have no right to kill her -- or she really is just medical waste -- in which case you would have to be certifiably insane to want to have a funeral.

The idea that you have a right to kill somebody then hold their funeral is absurd, akin to a guy who shoots a convenience store clerk dead bitching that the family of his victim didn't consult with him about funeral arrangements.

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