Sunday, August 26, 2012

My body my rules?

One of the main planks of the abortion debate has always been that it's the woman's decision, her body, her rules so to speak. There have even been court cases where a father has attempted to stop a wife having an abortion and failing to do so as the courts have always gone along with the woman's body point of view.
Yet now we have a case where a husband became a sperm donor without his wife's knowledge and she's demanding that any such activity should be only with her permission as well...
Mail.
The wife of a man who donated his sperm without her knowledge is campaigning for married men to require their spouse's consent for the process.
The woman, who is in her 30s and lives in Surrey with her husband and son, says the possibility any children - of whom there could be as many as 20 - may want to trace their biological father in 18 years' time, would 'almost feel like introducing the offspring of an adulterous relationship'.She argues that in married relationships, sperm donation should be a decision both parties are involved in; she says in marriage, sperm should be considered some kind of 'marital asset'.
Yet if she were to fall pregnant and have an abortion, if her husband objected as discussed above, he would have no say whatsoever. I don't know whether she's thought this through properly, but if sperm were to be classed as a 'marital asset' then her eggs and the fruit of any union between said sperm and eggs becomes a marital asset as well and somehow or other I cannot see the pro choice people being very happy about this at all. Indeed I can see militant feminists out in force with flaming torches and pitchforks if ovaries were suddenly classed as a marital asset. There's also the human rights aspect to take into consideration as well (sadly) what would happen if a rape victim suddenly found herself pregnant but prevented from an abortion because the rapist classes the foetus as partly his asset? We've all seen the consequences of bad law getting onto the statute books and whilst rape may be seen as an extreme case, there's so far nothing to tell how such a law might be interpreted by the human rights industry.
Whilst I don't believe the husband should have gone down this path, it is his body and his decision, not his partners.
At least so far...

5 annotations:

Richard Carey said...

What happens in the event of divorce? Does she get one testicle, or will he have to send a vial every month?

Anonymous said...

Mr Quiet Man, are you recruiting misogynists ? sign me up please cos you've convinced me.
Ms Noisy Woman

Quiet_Man said...

How odd, equality being mistaken for misogyny.

pa_broon74 said...

This is daft. let me find a comparison.

What else can a woman claim control off that comes out of a man's body which can have ramifications down the line? Words.

So by similar logic, a female spouse could claim the very words spoken by the man are marital assets and should be subject to some form of joint control...

Oh hold on...

JuliaM said...

So....can he claim the products of her ovaries?