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Yeah man, I don’t disagree with any of that. But that is not what the ruling is about. The law, as it is written, only says “children”. This was a law written i

by sph87 3y ago

Yeah man, I don’t disagree with any of that. But that is not what the ruling is about. The law, as it is written, only says “children”. This was a law written in the 1800s. It does not consider any of that. The defense said, “hey you should throw this out because that thing isn’t a child, it hasn’t been born yet. Also, even if it was a child, they signed waivers and accidents happen.” The court said, “you can’t just say this doesn’t count because it hasn’t been born yet, but your right about the other stuff. Case dismissed.” They did not rule on the number of cells that constitutes a child because that was not the argument. Here is the pseudocode: Defense: If(!born) then child = false Judge: Error Media: mind blown You: ‘If(cells <= 10) then child = false’ works on my machine Me: That’s not what caused the error

quantified 3y ago
Yes, but the number of cells is somewhat relevant. Any unfertilized egg or misplaced sperm is an important fraction of a child. A single fertilized egg could be viewed as a child.
- sph87 3y ago
  The court did not rule on that. This specific law only says children. The defense said this case did not apply because these are embryos that had not been born. The court said that’s not a valid argument because the word children includes unborn children. For you to then say, ohh well these don’t meet the development criteria is a different argument entirely. That was not the test proposed by the defense. Had they said, this does not count because it doesn’t meet a cell count threshold, then that would be something the court did not rule on.
LeafItAlone 3y ago
https://www.al.com/news/mobile/2021/11/frozen-embryos-not-persons-under-the-law-alabama-fertility-clinic-argues-in-bid-to-dismiss-wrongful-death-suit.html https://www.al.com/news/mobile/2021/11/frozen-embryos-not-pe... The defense was arguing that frozen non-implanted embryos are not “children”, not just unborn.
- LeafItAlone 3y ago
  And here’s the opinion, in case you are still confused: https://publicportal-api.alappeals.gov/courts/68f021c4-6a44-4735-9a76-5360b2e8af13/cms/case/343D203A-B13D-463A-8176-C46E3AE4F695/docketentrydocuments/E3D95592-3CBE-4384-AFA6-063D4595AA1D https://publicportal-api.alappeals.gov/courts/68f021c4-6a44-...
- sph87 3y ago
  From the ruling: The parties to these cases have raised many difficult questions, including ones about the ethical status of extrauterine children, the application of the 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution to such children, and the public-policy implications of treating extrauterine children as human beings. But the Court today need not address these questions because, as explained below, the relevant statutory text is clear: the Wrongful Death of a Minor Act applies on its face to all unborn children, without limitation. Under the defendants' test, even a full-term infant conceived through IVF and gestated to term would not qualify as a "child" or "person," because such a child would be "unborn" (having never been delivered from a biological womb). Unborn children are "children" under the Act, without exception based on developmental stage, physical location, or any other ancillary characteristics. It is not the role of this Court to craft a new limitation based on our own view of what is or is not wise public policy. As I have stated above this is a very narrow ruling. About born or unborn. And what’s more it doesn’t even rule in favor of the families. It upholds the dismissal of the case on other grounds. You are all trying to apply this to cases that they explicitly side stepped! The ONLY questioned answered by the court is: Does this law apply to unborn children? Nothing more.
  - LeafItAlone 3y ago
    > The ONLY questioned answered by the court is: Does this law apply to unborn children? No. The very beginning of the opinion: > This Court has long held that unborn children are "children" for purposes of Alabama's Wrongful Death of a Minor Act, § 6-5-391, Ala. Code 1975, a statute that allows parents of a deceased child to recover punitive damages for their child's death. The central question presented in these consolidated appeals, which involve the death of embryos kept in a cryogenic nursery, is whether the Act contains an unwritten exception to that rule for extrauterine children -- that is, unborn children who are located outside of a biological uterus at the time they are killed. Under existing black-letter law, the answer to that question is no: the Wrongful Death of a Minor Act applies to all unborn children, regardless of their location.
acdha 3y ago
> Yeah man, I don’t disagree with any of that. But that is not what the ruling is about. The law, as it is written, only says “children”. This was a law written in the 1800s. It does not consider any of that. A law in the 1800s did not consider embryos children. They did not have funerals for every miscarriage, most people didn’t name children until after birth, and in the early 1800s abortion was a not uncommon practice and even advertised. I think it’s also worth noting that when that started to change it was racist and focused on babies, still having no concept of an embryo as a human, as white people got concerned that immigrants and former slaves would outbreed them: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/article/the-complex-early-history-of-abortion-in-the-united-states https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/article/the-compl... Alabama was early to criminalize but the laws reflected the understanding of the time–functional but not scientific–and banned inducing a miscarriage because they understood how pregnancy worked but didn’t treat it as murder, following biblical precedent. The total ban is a historical precedent going all the way back to 2019: https://www.montgomeryadvertiser.com/story/news/2022/06/24/abortion-law-access-alabama-roe-vs-wade-history/7702753001/ https://www.montgomeryadvertiser.com/story/news/2022/06/24/a...

by sph87 3y ago

quantified 3y ago

Yes, but the number of cells is somewhat relevant. Any unfertilized egg or misplaced sperm is an important fraction of a child. A single fertilized egg could be viewed as a child.

sph87 3y ago
The court did not rule on that. This specific law only says children. The defense said this case did not apply because these are embryos that had not been born. The court said that’s not a valid argument because the word children includes unborn children. For you to then say, ohh well these don’t meet the development criteria is a different argument entirely. That was not the test proposed by the defense. Had they said, this does not count because it doesn’t meet a cell count threshold, then that would be something the court did not rule on.

LeafItAlone 3y ago

https://www.al.com/news/mobile/2021/11/frozen-embryos-not-persons-under-the-law-alabama-fertility-clinic-argues-in-bid-to-dismiss-wrongful-death-suit.html https://www.al.com/news/mobile/2021/11/frozen-embryos-not-pe... The defense was arguing that frozen non-implanted embryos are not “children”, not just unborn.

LeafItAlone 3y ago
And here’s the opinion, in case you are still confused: https://publicportal-api.alappeals.gov/courts/68f021c4-6a44-4735-9a76-5360b2e8af13/cms/case/343D203A-B13D-463A-8176-C46E3AE4F695/docketentrydocuments/E3D95592-3CBE-4384-AFA6-063D4595AA1D https://publicportal-api.alappeals.gov/courts/68f021c4-6a44-...
sph87 3y ago
From the ruling: The parties to these cases have raised many difficult questions, including ones about the ethical status of extrauterine children, the application of the 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution to such children, and the public-policy implications of treating extrauterine children as human beings. But the Court today need not address these questions because, as explained below, the relevant statutory text is clear: the Wrongful Death of a Minor Act applies on its face to all unborn children, without limitation. Under the defendants' test, even a full-term infant conceived through IVF and gestated to term would not qualify as a "child" or "person," because such a child would be "unborn" (having never been delivered from a biological womb). Unborn children are "children" under the Act, without exception based on developmental stage, physical location, or any other ancillary characteristics. It is not the role of this Court to craft a new limitation based on our own view of what is or is not wise public policy. As I have stated above this is a very narrow ruling. About born or unborn. And what’s more it doesn’t even rule in favor of the families. It upholds the dismissal of the case on other grounds. You are all trying to apply this to cases that they explicitly side stepped! The ONLY questioned answered by the court is: Does this law apply to unborn children? Nothing more.
- LeafItAlone 3y ago
  > The ONLY questioned answered by the court is: Does this law apply to unborn children? No. The very beginning of the opinion: > This Court has long held that unborn children are "children" for purposes of Alabama's Wrongful Death of a Minor Act, § 6-5-391, Ala. Code 1975, a statute that allows parents of a deceased child to recover punitive damages for their child's death. The central question presented in these consolidated appeals, which involve the death of embryos kept in a cryogenic nursery, is whether the Act contains an unwritten exception to that rule for extrauterine children -- that is, unborn children who are located outside of a biological uterus at the time they are killed. Under existing black-letter law, the answer to that question is no: the Wrongful Death of a Minor Act applies to all unborn children, regardless of their location.

acdha 3y ago

> Yeah man, I don’t disagree with any of that. But that is not what the ruling is about. The law, as it is written, only says “children”. This was a law written in the 1800s. It does not consider any of that. A law in the 1800s did not consider embryos children. They did not have funerals for every miscarriage, most people didn’t name children until after birth, and in the early 1800s abortion was a not uncommon practice and even advertised. I think it’s also worth noting that when that started to change it was racist and focused on babies, still having no concept of an embryo as a human, as white people got concerned that immigrants and former slaves would outbreed them: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/article/the-complex-early-history-of-abortion-in-the-united-states https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/article/the-compl... Alabama was early to criminalize but the laws reflected the understanding of the time–functional but not scientific–and banned inducing a miscarriage because they understood how pregnancy worked but didn’t treat it as murder, following biblical precedent. The total ban is a historical precedent going all the way back to 2019: https://www.montgomeryadvertiser.com/story/news/2022/06/24/abortion-law-access-alabama-roe-vs-wade-history/7702753001/ https://www.montgomeryadvertiser.com/story/news/2022/06/24/a...