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Pa. couple face prison after sons' prayer deaths

Kobie said:
I can't believe anyone is actually defending these people.

The idea that children are property like livestock is laughable to the point of absurdity. For starters, you can sell or eat your livestock.
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I don't agree with the parents in this case but, the 'courts' have made it legal to do away with the unborn at will so, it seems disingenuous for them to take action against these parents.
 
SouthernDemocrat said:
No one, no one, no one... is saying that an adult Jehovah's Witness should be forced to take a blood transfusion. No one, no one, no one... is saying that an adult Christian Scientist should be forced to accept medical care when they believe that prayer is all the care they need. In both cases if they are conscious adults, then they can consent to care or not.

However, a child of a Jehovah's Witness or Christian Scientist cannot consent. A young child cannot state "I am a Jehovah's Witness, so I refuse a blood transfusion even though it will mean my certain death, and I am fully aware of the consequences of my decision." Because a child is the not the physical property of their parents (because human beings are never property), that child's parents cannot make such a decision for a child. This is a simple legal concept, I am not sure why it is so difficult for a few people on here to comprehend.

Denying a child life saving care because of your religious beliefs would be no different than starving a child to death because of your religious beliefs.
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A child is in the care of his parents, not the state. If the law disagrees with me, then I disagree with the law. That's how it should be.
 
Peter Grimm said:
A child is in the care of his parents, not the state. If the law disagrees with me, then I disagree with the law. That's how it should be.
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So then by your argument, a parent can abuse their child or neglect them because they are in the sole care and responsibility of the parents. Its a ridiculous argument you are making.
 
Peter Grimm said:
A child is in the care of his parents, not the state. If the law disagrees with me, then I disagree with the law. That's how it should be.
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Neither religious freedom nor the simple state of being a parent is carte blanche to do anything you want with your child. Disagree with the law all you want, but if you abuse or neglect your child, expect a confrontation with your local law enforcement.
 
RiverDad said:
So, how much risk should I
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The test is: "what would a reasonable person do?" It is reasonable for children to go swimming but it is not reasonable to do so without supervision. The vast majority of people, by far, would NOT allow a child to die.
 
Cardinal said:
Neither religious freedom nor the simple state of being a parent is carte blanche to do anything you want with your child. Disagree with the law all you want, but if you abuse or neglect your child, expect a confrontation with your local law enforcement.
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They weren't doing "anything they wanted," they were complying with their religious beliefs.
 
Peter Grimm said:
They weren't doing "anything they wanted," they were complying with their religious beliefs.
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Which is not carte blanche to do as they did. "Religious beliefs" isn't a get-out-of-jail free card for breaking the law. I would classify the parents as being "slow learners" in this regard, seeing as they've already killed two kids and the pastor says they'd do it to a third.
 
Cardinal said:
Which is not carte blanche to do as they did. "Religious beliefs" isn't a get-out-of-jail free card for breaking the law. I would classify the parents as being "slow learners" in this regard, seeing as they've already killed two kids and the pastor says they'd do it to a third.
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Actually there needs to be a healthy separation between church and state, meaning that no law should be passed that interferes with someone's legitimate religious belief. That's the American idea, although it seems to have been lost in contemporary times.
 
Peter Grimm said:
Actually there needs to be a healthy separation between church and state, meaning that no law should be passed that interferes with someone's legitimate religious belief. That's the American idea, although it seems to have been lost in contemporary times.
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You're confused. What you're talking about is creating a special class based on religion. That's unconstitutional.
 
Cardinal said:
You're confused. What you're talking about is creating a special class based on religion. That's unconstitutional.
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No i'm talking about the government not being a nanny state that thinks its job is to raise children, about parent's rights to do as they see fit by their own kids without the government stepping in, and about having the freedom to practice religious beliefs in the privacy of your one's own home without interference from the social police.
 
Peter Grimm said:
No i'm talking about the government not being a nanny state that thinks its job is to raise children, about parent's rights to do as they see fit by their own kids without the government stepping in, and about having the freedom to practice religious beliefs in the privacy of your one's own home without interference from the social police.
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So which is it? Is it religious freedom or keeping government out of how to raise a child?
 
Peter Grimm said:
In what way are those two things mutually exclusive?
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Because one argument renders the other one extraneous. The "religious freedom" argument merits its own response, whereas if you're going to make the nanny government argument the religious freedom argument is no longer even necessary.
 
Cardinal said:
Because one argument renders the other one extraneous. The "religious freedom" argument merits its own response, whereas if you're going to make the nanny government argument the religious freedom argument is no longer even necessary.
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The fact that they overlap in some areas of logic doesn't make them mutually exclusive, it makes them complimentary.
 
Peter Grimm said:
The fact that they overlap in some areas of logic doesn't make them mutually exclusive, it makes them complimentary.
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I didn't say they were mutually exclusive. I said that one rendered the other extraneous.
 
RiverDad said:
Do I have a right to step forward and remove your children from your custody if I see you permitting them to go swimming? There is some risk of death during swimming. Sure, it's a minor risk, but it's still a risk. So, how much risk should I, an outsider, tolerate with respect to your parenting of your children before my ludicrous attempt to remove your children from your care is no longer ludicrous but not becomes justified? What if you and I can't agree on a risk threshold? What if you think that it's none of my business how much risk you allow your children to undertake? At what point does it become my business to the point that I can override your best judgment with respect to what you see as tolerable risk levels for your own children?

Now does anything change if you're really Mark Spitz and you've trained your children yourself and you know that they can swim through river rapids and through mountainous surf and survive. That is, your specific knowledge is superior to my general knowledge where I simply point to drowning statistics and such.

Lastly, if you are Mark Spitz and you've trained your children to Olympic standards and seen then perform, thus validating your assessment against reality and you dismiss my concerns for the welfare of your children, and they do in fact drown, how do you determine if my risk assessment was accurate or if I was just lucky (and your kids were unlucky) in making my claim?
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Simple, when it crosses the threshold to irresponsibly high risk of death or injury. There are a whole battery of activities that aren't specifically outlined under abuse and protection legislation because it's taken on a case by case basis--with separate investigations & trials for each. Send your kid swimming across the Mississippi and he dies? Yeah you might get a negligent homicide investigation. If he lives? You might get an abuse investigation, I don't know I'd imagine it depends on quite a lot.

Condemn your child to a likely death by withholding medicine? Yeah that crosses the threshold.
 
PirateMk1 said:
And I call yours a fools argument. There is a bigger picture and more at stake then just their rights to make a legitimate decision.
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I hope this passes. AZ will get precisely what it deserves out of this. And honestly the reforms due to its impact will be a positive actually. Too bad it will **** up a lot of businesses in the meantime.
 
WCH said:
I can produce many others who will testify. ;)
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I'm sure you can. It doesn't mean prayer had anything to do with anything. It's just that you made the connection in your head. Small sample, biased populations cannot be used to extract data on effectiveness of a dynamic. There's nothing in the data taking and analysis to prevent corruption.

It's why I said that I'd consider it if many large sample studies make it into proper peer-reviewed journals. If it's not scientific, there are too many possibilities for inaccurate analysis.
 
Ikari said:
I'm sure you can. It doesn't mean prayer had anything to do with anything. It's just that you made the connection in your head. Small sample, biased populations cannot be used to extract data on effectiveness of a dynamic. There's nothing in the data taking and analysis to prevent corruption.

It's why I said that I'd consider it if many large sample studies make it into proper peer-reviewed journals. If it's not scientific, there are too many possibilities for inaccurate analysis.
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Hi, Ikari. :2wave:
 
Sherman123 said:
Simple, when it crosses the threshold to irresponsibly high risk of death or injury. There are a whole battery of activities that aren't specifically outlined under abuse and protection legislation because it's taken on a case by case basis--with separate investigations & trials for each. Send your kid swimming across the Mississippi and he dies? Yeah you might get a negligent homicide investigation. If he lives? You might get an abuse investigation, I don't know I'd imagine it depends on quite a lot.

Condemn your child to a likely death by withholding medicine? Yeah that crosses the threshold.
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but our right to religious freedom tells us that people are entitled to believe in stupid things
hell, we have southern states teaching creationism in the schools
and that religious right also enables people who hold non-majority views and believe that prayer heals medical issues, causing them to then not seek trained medical intervention
so, prove to us that prayer does not ever heal
we know, as in this instance, that sometimes prayer is not enough, but i do not believe you can prove to us that prayer does not heal
and we also know that in many instances, medical assistance is also not enough, just as prayer was no adequate remedy in extant circumstance
people have a right to be stupid, in the name of G_d
what we have is religious right to choose the power of religious prayer over medicine as the cure for one's family; in no way should it be found child neglect
 
justabubba said:
but our right to religious freedom tells us that people are entitled to believe in stupid things
hell, we have southern states teaching creationism in the schools
and that religious right also enables people who hold non-majority views and believe that prayer heals medical issues, causing them to then not seek trained medical intervention
so, prove to us that prayer does not ever heal
we know, as in this instance, that sometimes prayer is not enough, but i do not believe you can prove to us that prayer does not heal
and we also know that in many instances, medical assistance is also not enough, just as prayer was no adequate remedy in extant circumstance
people have a right to be stupid, in the name of G_d
what we have is religious right to choose the power of religious prayer over medicine as the cure for one's family; in no way should it be found child neglect
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You can believe stupid things all you want. When they risk serious harm to an individual who has no real ability to comprehend the consequences or give consent you cross the line. You do not have the right to infringe upon the rights of another, in this case a child who would be risking life and death.

To the other point. Asking me to prove a negative is impossible. I cannot prove that prayer has never cured an individual. I can only prove that there are no scientifically verified cases of prayer curing an individual and that there is a mountain of evidence that empirical medicine does.

If someone has X illness and you propose Y treatment despite no evidence that it will succeed and much evidence that it will do harm, while I propose Z treatment with a verified possibility of medical success we don't choose Y just because I cant prove that Y has never worked. We choose the one that has a chance of saving the person from X illness.
 
justabubba said:
and no, neither would murder as a religious belief, be found acceptable
but refusing to subscribe to the belief that modern medicine is better for their kids than prayer to their G-d, that's covered under religious freedom
what you or i believe is not at issue. it's what the parents believe. and they acted on their religious beliefs...
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It is fine to make such a decision for yourself, but not for others, including children.
 
Ikari said:
I'm sure you can. It doesn't mean prayer had anything to do with anything. It's just that you made the connection in your head. Small sample, biased populations cannot be used to extract data on effectiveness of a dynamic. There's nothing in the data taking and analysis to prevent corruption.

It's why I said that I'd consider it if many large sample studies make it into proper peer-reviewed journals. If it's not scientific, there are too many possibilities for inaccurate analysis.
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Well I didn't need any, large sampling, journals or my peers to decide prayer works for me.

What about the power of positive thinking.... Anything scientific there. Like L. Ron Hubbard.
 
Lursa said:
It's amazing to me that religious idiots like this are (likely) against abortion. At least the fetuses dont suffer.
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They don't care about suffering. Look at Mother Teresa who thought suffering among the poor was a wonderful thing. What they care about is control, that's what it's all about.
 
PirateMk1 said:
Hence the parents have the explicit right to determine that until the children are of age to dissent.
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But they also have the explicit RESPONSIBILITY to make good decisions and care for their children as well. Nobody seems to remember that part.
 
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