regret

[Scaperlanda, Michael A.]

Lynne, are you suggesting that the psychological harm the mother suffers in choosing to have her partially born child brutally killed is similar to the harm suffered when one chooses "Stanford over Yale, law over medicine"?  Or, did I miss understand you?
 
Michael
 
Michael Scaperlanda
Associate Dean for Research
Edwards Family Chair in Law
University of Oklahoma College of Law
300 W. Timberdell Rd.
Norman, Oklahoma 73019
Ph.    405.325.4833
FAX   405.325.0389

________________________________

From: conlawprof-bounces at lists.ucla.edu on behalf of Lynne Henderson
Sent: Sun 4/22/2007 8:23 PM
To: Andrew Koppelman
Cc: conlawprof at lists.ucla.edu
Subject: Re: Don't do anything you're going to regret later



Thanks, Andy.  Kierkegaard is one of my favorites.
that said, Kennedy goes beyond "regret" and into "syndromes"/
psychological disorders 'caused" by abortions in apparently in thinking
women or at least improperly "advised' women.  eg, "severe depression
and loss of [one presumes self] esteem.'  sure many woman are sad,
regret that was the choice they had to make, but they do not suffer
psychopathological  "depression" in the psychological sense or a "loss
of self esteem".   *That's* the point of Ginsburg's survey of the
psychological literature--nothing *pathological* here that "endangers
(mental) health" such that the government is justified in intervening. 
(else, gee, perhaps we should intervene on behalf of all sorts of
decisions--choosing Stanford over Yale, law over medicine, going to SF
State over Berzerkeley,  being professors over practice, turning down
one marriage proposal and accepting another,  going into military
service and having to kill enemies--which actually *does* lead to
PTSD--) IOW, Soren was right about regret (and probably sufered
pathological regret over his rejection of the woman he loved, I feel
*awful* for not remembering his object of desire/marraige, only wish,
as for JS Mill and Harriet Taylor, it had worked out), but wrong about
government interference with choice in light of "health".

As for anecdotal vs peer-reviewed, controlled studies--yes, the Supreme
Court selectively chooses among which types of evidence "count", muchto
  the vexation of scientists.  (Actually most evident in  death penalty,
title VII cases, *Grutter*, etc.).  As I often quip to  my students,
"what do you call hundreds of 'anecdotes?'"?  "Data".  But as in all of
the social sciences,  absolute proof is not possible--one looks for
robustness of results across domains and methods instead.  Violent
pornography and lack of attitudes of equality of women correlate with
rape, sexual abuse, etc. for example.  doesn't prove "causation" but is
serious evidence of the influence o images and "speech" on violence
against women. . . .But see the robustness of results on race of victim
and death penalty and of "death qualification" and death penalty. . . .

OTOH, your point at a universal level is extremely well-taken. 
"regret"for exercising a (strong) right cannot be the basis for
restricting, burdening, or abolishing that strong right: else this
listserv would be in deep trouble, as we all would be on First
Amendment grounds.  The problem re: abortion is that *Casey* for all
the protestations of the troika's opinion to the contrary reduce a
woman's interest in choosing not to continue a pregnancy to just
that--an interest to be "balanced' against a State's (and now the
Fed's) interest in "her health" and "potential human life."  The
promiseof equality in the detailed exposition of domestic violence has
been abandoned;   I/we females now have only a cognizable interest that
can be outweighed by all sorts of state interests including
"legitimate" interests in my/our "mental health."

Respectfully,
Lynne

Prof. Lynne Henderson



-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.ucla.edu/pipermail/conlawprof/attachments/20070423/3c2e575b/attachment.htm