Infanticide is justifiable in some cases, says ethics professor
The Daily Telegraph, London, UK, By Elizabeth Day, January 25, 2004
One of British medicine's most senior advisers on medical ethics has provoked outrage by claiming that infanticide is "justifiable".
Professor John Harris, a member of the British Medical Association's ethics committee, said that it was not "plausible to think that there is any moral change that occurs during the journey down the birth canal" - suggesting that there was no moral difference between aborting a foetus and killing a baby.
The professor's comments were made during an unreported debate last week on sex selection, which was held as part of the Commons Science and Technology Committee's consultation on human reproductive technologies.
Prof Harris, who is also a professor of bioethics at the University of Manchester, was asked what moral status he accorded an embryo and he endorsed infanticide in cases of a child carrying a genetic disorder that remained undetected during pregnancy.
He replied: "I don't think infanticide is always unjustifiable. I don't think it is plausible to think that there is any moral change that occurs during the journey down the birth canal."
He declined to say up to what age he believed infanticide should be permissable.
Prof Harris, who is one of the founders of the International Association of Bioethics and the author of 15 books on the ethics of genetics, was condemned for his remarks.
Julia Millington, the political director of the ProLife Party, who posed the original question to Prof Harris, called the admission "absolutely horrifying".
"Infanticide is murder and is against the law. It is frightening to think that university students are being educated by somebody who endorses the killing of newborn babies and equally worrying to discover that such a person is also a member of the ethics committee of the British Medical Association."
She continued: "Prof Harris is the Establishment's preferred bioethicist, a member of the Human Genetics Commission, and has acted as ethical consultant to the Department of Health and to numerous international bodies. In such a climate is it any wonder that a baby has been aborted in the UK at seven months for a cleft palate?"
Prof Harris said that he stood by his remarks, which he claimed had been elicited "in response to goading" from pro-life campaigners.
"People who think there is a difference between infanticide and late abortion have to ask the question: what has happened to the foetus in the time it takes to pass down the birth canal and into the world which changes its moral status? I don't think anything has happened in that time.
"It is well-known that where a serious abnormality is not picked up - when you get a very seriously handicapped or indeed a very premature newborn which suffers brain damage - that what effectively happens is that steps are taken not to sustain it on life-support.
"There is a very widespread and accepted practice of infanticide in most countries. We ought to be much Read More .. upfront about the ethics of all of this and ask ourselves the serious question: what do we really think is different between newborns and late foetuses?
"There is no obvious reason why one should think differently, from an ethical point of view, about a foetus when it's outside the womb rather than when it's inside the womb."
Prof Harris added that it was up to individual families to make a decision on the future of their child and that he was not concerned that such a course of action could lead to infanticide for cosmetic reasons.
"I don't believe there is any such thing as a slippery slope," he said. "I think that we are always on one. It is our responsibility not to avoid the moral choice.
"We shouldn't make a bad decision now because we fear it will lead us to make another bad decision in the future. We should make a good decision now and have the courage to believe we will make a good decision in the future too."
The Rev Joanna Jepson, the Church of England curate who is going to the High Court to try to block late abortions for "trivial reasons" such as a cleft palate, said: "It is frightening to hear anyone endorsing infanticide but it is shocking when the person is responsible for teaching others."
"This affirms the need for an investigation into the practice of abortion. We have already seen, in the cleft palate case, how the law needs to provide Read More ..gorous protection for such babies but, with medical practitioners such as John Harris at work, there is no question of our fundamental need to reaffirm the human value of every baby's life, no matter what its sex or disability."
A spokeswoman for the British Medical Association said: "These views of Prof Harris are personal views and do not reflect the views of the committee or the BMA, which is utterly opposed to the idea of infanticide."
Copyright of Telegraph Group Limited 2004
The biased words highlighted below should be "sexual assault", "raped" or similar type words NOT "sexual relationship" or "had sex"
Female sex offenders reveal cultural double standard
The Seattle Times
September 10, 2007
It all seems so terribly familiar.
A trusted, even respected or beloved teacher is accused of having a sexual relationship with a student.
What used to shock us, but is now much too commonplace, is that the teacher is a woman.
Their names become tabloid headlines: Mary K. Letourneau, Debra Lafave, Pamela Diehl-Moore and others.
And now two more cases, both local.
Jennifer Leigh Rice, a 31-year-old former Tacoma teacher, was charged with having sex with a 10-year-old boy who had been in her fourth-grade class. The boy's father says she lavished the boy with attention until she was told not to come to their house anymore.
So she abducted the boy, police say, drove him to a highway rest stop outside Ellensburg and had sex with him. After her arrest in early August, Rice said she'd had sex with the boy four or five times, including once when she sneaked into his house as his parents slept.
Earlier this year, former Tenino math teacher Dawn Welter, 38, was charged with second-degree sexual misconduct after spending the night at a motel with a 16-year-old female student. Her lawyer explained her relationship with the student as "horseplay that became sexual."
Our Most Popular Web Page
Sex Offenders
Female Sexual Predators
Hundreds of them.... female teachers who sexually assaulted 12 year old boys. Read about a lesbian tennis coach who sexually assaulted her 13 year old female student.
Read how a 40 year old female sexual predator blamed a 7 year old boy whom she claimed was "coming on to me" and whom she "hoped to marry someday." Read More ..
3 in 4 B.C. boys on street sexually exploited by women
VANCOUVER - Canada's largest study into the sexual exploitation of street kids and runaways has shattered some myths about who the abusers might be - with the most surprising finding being that many are women seeking sex with young males.
"Some youth in each gender were exploited by women with more than three out of four (79 per cent) sexually exploited males reporting exchanging sex for money or goods with a female," said Elizabeth Saewyc, associate professor of nursing at the University of British Columbia and principal investigator for the study conducted by Vancouver's McCreary Centre Society.
"I must admit it wasn't something we were expecting."
Mom drugged daughter to get her pregnant: police
Associate Press, U.S.A.
April 3, 2009
PITTSBURGH (AP) - A western Pennsylvania mother has been charged with giving her 13-year-old daughter drugs and alcohol so the woman's boyfriend could impregnate the girl without her knowing, police said Thursday.
Shana Brown, 32, is no longer able to have children but wanted to have a baby with her current boyfriend, Duane Calloway, said Uniontown Police Detective Donald Gmitter. The pair decided to drug the girl so Calloway, 40, could have sex with her, he added.
"There's some sick people on this case," Gmitter said.
Brown has been charged with endangering the welfare of a child, turned herself in Thursday and was being held in the Fayette County jail, police said. Brown's attorney did not return a call for comment.
Calloway faces several counts of attempted rape. He was arrested Wednesday and remains in jail. It was not immediately clear whether he had an attorney.
The three attacks occurred in Brown's home in Uniontown, about 50 miles south of Pittsburgh, according to the criminal complaint.
The Oprah Winfrey Show
Lisa Ling Video Interview of Female Sexual Predator / Offender
This woman raped or sexually assaulted over 100 children by her own account.
Our blind rage at women who abuse
Because we assume women never commit child sexual abuse, we treat one who is accused with disproportionate disgust
The Guardian, UK
June 11, 2009
About 20 years ago, I gave a talk about sexual abuse to the RAF. At the end, a young airman came up to me and said, "It's not just men, you know," before hurriedly walking away. That pulled me up sharp. Up till then, like most people working in the area of sexual abuse, I'd always assumed the abusers were men.
This just isn't so. We can't be sure of the precise prevalence of sexual abuse by women, as there hasn't been enough research into the subject. Academics have just assumed it doesn't happened. But conservative estimates suggest that 5% of girls and 20% of boys who have reported being abused have been abused by women. From my own research - I have had 800 cases reported to me - I believe the more likely figure is that it is 20% of all sexual abuse that is done by women.
It is women themselves who have done most to propagate this conspiracy of silence. It has almost become a feminist axiom that it is men who are to blame for abuse and that if women are in some way implicated, it is only because they have somehow been forced or controlled into doing so against their will. Again, this turns out to be completely incorrect: 75% of the cases reported to me involved women acting on their own. Read More ..
Why you shouldn't see VAGINA MONOLOGUES
Lesbian Pedophilia and the rape of girls
Don't attend performances.
Mother confesses to sex with sons
Had intercourse with 2 teenagers
Pleads guilty to incest charges
A Kitchener woman has pleaded guilty to having sexual intercourse with her two teenage sons on separate occasions.
Woman who cut off her newborn son's private parts handed 5-year prison term
Mainichi Daily News, Sakai, Osaka, Japan, November 26, 2006
SAKAI, Osaka -- A woman accused of cutting off her newborn son's private parts in 2004 was ordered Monday to spend five years behind bars.
The Sakai branch of the Osaka District Court convicted Shizue Tamura, 27, a resident of Izumi, Osaka Prefecture, of inflicting bodily injury.
"The way she committed the crime was unprecedented, inhumane and cruel," Presiding Judge Masahiro Hosoi said as he handed down the ruling. Prosecutors had demanded an eight-year prison term. Read More ..
Up to 64,000 women in UK 'are child-sex offenders'
After Plymouth case shocked the nation, police say number of women abusing children
The Guardian UK and The Observer
4 October 2009
Researchers from the Lucy Faithfull Foundation (LFF), a child protection charity that deals with British female sex offenders, said its studies confirmed that a "fair proportion" of child abusers were women. Donald Findlater, director of research and development, said results indicated that up to 20% of a conservative estimate of 320,000 suspected UK paedophiles were women.
Female Teacher Charged With Sex Assault on Seventh-Grade Boy
Associated Press / Fox News
MORRISTOWN, N.J. — A 35-year-old seventh-grade teacher was charged with having sex with one of her students at least 20 times at the teacher's home.
Jodi Thorp, 35, surrendered to authorities Monday on charges of aggravated sexual assault, aggravated sexual contact and endangering the welfare of a child. Prosecutors claim she had sex with the boy at her Mendham home between June 2001 and September 2002. The boy is now 15.
Female Teacher jailed for sex with boy
The Guardian, UK
August 16, 2005
A married primary schoolteacher was jailed for 15 months yesterday after admitting having sex with an underage teenage boy.
Hannah Grice, 32, pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing to two counts of indecent assault on the boy, who was aged 14 and 15 at the time of the offences.
Sentencing her at Stafford crown court, Judge John Shand told Grice, from Cannock, Staffordshire, she had abused her position of trust.
"Cases such as this are, of course, made worse by the fact that you were a member of the teaching profession," he told her. "You should have been very sensitive indeed to child welfare issues." Grice was also ordered to register as a sex offender for 10 years. Read More ..
The Manchester News UK
Pervert Woman Carer who Preyed on Boys is Jailed
The mother of one victim said after Bromiley was jailed: "If I could get hold of her I'd kill her. She stole my son's childhood and he's now in a terrible state and has threatened suicide. She got away lightly and should have got at least 10 years."
Judge David Hale explained that he was constrained by the law which only allows for specific charges to be brought when the offender is a woman. Had she been male, he said, the sentence would have been in double figures.
He said: "As a house mother you were in charge of children who were mentally and educationally disadvantaged and you took your own advantage of them for your own needs and sexual pleasure. This is the worst case of a woman abusing children in her care any court in the land has had to face." Read More ..
The Men's Project
"Men
of Courage"
1st Ontario Provincial Conference on Male Sexual Victimizations.
It was held March 17-18, 2008
Sheraton Centre Hotel
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
The Men's Project, an Ottawa / Cornwall registered charitable service provider with the assistance of a grant from the Ministry of the Attorney General, hosted this conference.
About The Men's Project
From what was initially a volunteer run initiative, The Men's Project has
grown to become one of Canada's leading counselling and educational agencies
for men and their families, and in particular for all male survivors of
sexual abuse committed by males and females.
The Men's Project has witnessed incredible expansion of their funded services, their fee-for-service programs, and their training and consultation services.
Their mandate is "helping men and their families build better lives". Read More ..
Angry scenes as nursery worker appears in court on sexual assault charges
Vanessa George remanded in custody after crowds jeer from public gallery and throw missiles outside court
The Guardian, UK
June 11, 2009
A nursery school worker was jeered and spat at when she appeared in court today, charged with sexual assault and making and distributing child abuse images.
Vanessa George, 39, who worked at the Little Ted's nursery in Plymouth, was remanded in custody amid angry scenes in and outside the city's magistrates court.
George, of Plymouth, faces three counts of sexual assault on girls and one on a boy. She is also accused of making, possessing and distributing indecent images of children. Read More ..
BBC, UK TV
Programme - 1997
The sexual abuse by women of children and teenager
A surprising 86% of survivors of sexual abuse were not believed when they said the abuser was a woman.
Many myths were exposed, such as the one that women only sexually abused when coerced by men - they in fact played the lead part. Also the myth that women are incapable of cruelty - what was shown was beyond belief.
Women commit 25% of all child sexual abuse
250,000 children in UK have been sexually abused by women
Women in our society have been portrayed as victims, but somewhere within their victimisation they have learned that to abuse children gave them a sense of power, control, agency, and therefore they use the abuse of children to gain those things.
Jacqui Saradjiam: (clinical psychologist)
I think people find it so difficult to see that women sexually abuse children
because the whole view of women is of nurturers, carers, protectors - people
who do anything to look after children - and they see the women as victims
rather than enemies or perpetrators of any abuse.
Michelle Elliott: (Director - children's charity Kidscape)
I think the issue strikes at the core of what we perceive ourselves as women
to be. I think that it's easier to think that it's men - men the enemy,
somehow - but it can't be women - it's one thing women can't do. Women can
be equal, we can be free, we can be in charge of companies, but we can't
sexually abuse children - That's a load of rubbish.
Female Teacher jailed for sex with boy
The Guardian, UK
August 16, 2005
A married primary schoolteacher was jailed for 15 months yesterday after admitting having sex with an underage teenage boy.
Hannah Grice, 32, pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing to two counts of indecent assault on the boy, who was aged 14 and 15 at the time of the offences.
Sentencing her at Stafford crown court, Judge John Shand told Grice, from Cannock, Staffordshire, she had abused her position of trust.
"Cases such as this are, of course, made worse by the fact that you were a member of the teaching profession," he told her. "You should have been very sensitive indeed to child welfare issues." Grice was also ordered to register as a sex offender for 10 years. Read More ..