Ashley X: defending disabled children's rights
Since the shocking story of Ashley X - the American child with learning disabilities whose parents have chosen surgery and other treatments to keep her body "childlike" because they believe it will give her a better life - broke at , there has been much from all quarters, not least on a packed thread on Ouch's messageboard, which currently atands at a massive 171 replies.
Disability charity Scope has now started an online campaign where you can sign up to defend disabled children's human rights. They are looking for a large number of people, both disabled and non-disabled, to add their names to their call for Government to provide appropriate and adequate support to disabled people and their families to prevent the Ashley X situation happening here in the UK.
You can add your name to the campaign at .
Comments
I would like to agree with Scope but until there isn't a lottery and the government has made all the necessary changes Scope has highlighted, I just can not. My wife and I are working parents and find it daunting working, managing house-hold affairs and keeping our children intellectually stimulated. We would give and arm and a leg for having a grand-parent or other family member nearby just to have someone to assist with childcare.
I believe that both parties must be look after, the child and the parent. In the current state of affairs you cannot forget the parent in the family unit. It is all well and good to say that no one should intervene in the child's development but what about the bond between the parent and child. It is human nature to begin to dislike arduous chores. Lifting a child out of bed, on your own, everyday and lifting an adult are two very different tasks. Also, in the case of an emergency such as a fire, heaven forbids, it is right to endanger both lives. It is my belief that we need to look at what is the best possible solution for the situation. If there are two or more people always available to assist with the moving of Ashley X, then she should be allowed to grow. If the British government will provide adequate assistance for any family in a similar situation then I will stand shoulder to shoulder with Scope.
When we live in a better world... until then what is best for the family, that should be the primary concern not a blanket decree which may protect the child physically but destroy a family.
I signed this, because obviously I want to make sure that what has been done to Ashley isn't done to anyone else.
But, I think it's incredibly irresponsible of Scope to try and take the blame away from Ashley's parents and blame it on society. It's almost like they're trying to come up with a "Social Model of Child Abuse" - blame the society, not the abuser.
I think Ashley's parents did a terrible thing, and I think it's appalling that Scope is trying to justify their actions by blaming someone else.
Ashley's parents say in their blog (https://ashleytreatment.spaces.live.com/blog/):
"We hope that by now it is clear that the 鈥淎shley Treatment鈥 is about improving Ashley鈥檚 quality of life and not about convenience to her caregivers."
And they go on to say:
"Furthermore, we did not pursue this treatment with the intention of prolonging Ashley鈥檚 care at home. We would never turn the care of Ashley over to strangers even if she had grown tall and heavy. In the extreme, even an Ashley at 300 pounds, would still be at home and we would figure out a way to take care of her."
This case was not about an unjst care system, the parents state that themselves. They are the ones responsible, not a discriminatory culture.
Grotesque, that is the only word that even scrapes close to describing this atrocity and complete disregard for human life. How dare these so called "parents" allow a child, their own child, to be violated and mutilated in such a horrific way, to have her reproductive organs ripped from her, her breasts chopped off and her growth stunted simply because she is disabled. Is this not the same disability discrimination we as a civilised society are fighting against? I have Asperger's Syndrome, which is a form of Autism and that is a disability, dos this also mean I should be cut to bits and pumped full of hormones? My heart goes out to Ashley and it frightens me very much to think how many more so called "parents" will also try and mutilate their own child in the name of an easy life.