Tea at Trianon: Infant Death by Neglect

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Monday, April 4, 2022

Infant Death by Neglect

This is for real. From The National Review:

I was interviewed on several talk-radio programs and was asked what the sponsor was thinking. My most charitable thought was that he was unaware of the definition of “perinatal.”

That “defense” is now inoperative. A bill was just filed in the California Legislature that is even worse than the Maryland legislation.

First, it would seem to create a broad claim for “people who give birth” to choose not to be a parent that is not limited to not getting pregnant, or in the context of the overall bill, abortion. Somehow, this is called “reproductive justice” and given a racial tinge. From AB 2223 (my emphasis throughout):
SECTION 1. The Legislature finds and declares all of the following:

(a) Reproductive justice is a framework created by Black women in 1994 to address the intersectional and multifactored issues that women of color and their families face in society.

(b) Reproductive justice is the human right to control our bodies, sexuality, gender, work, and reproduction. That right can only be achieved when all people, particularly women and girls, have the complete economic, social, and political power and resources to make healthy decisions about their bodies, families, and communities in all areas of their lives. At the core of reproductive justice is the belief in the right to bodily autonomy, the right to have children, the right to not have children, and the right to parent the children we have with dignity and respect in safe and sustainable communities.

(c) A critical part of realizing reproductive justice for people in California is clarifying that there shall be no civil and criminal penalties for people’s actual, potential, or alleged pregnancy outcomes.
Okay. Let’s be careful. Perhaps that wording just applies to preborn babies or the right not to get pregnant at all. (Read more.)