regret

[Lynne Henderson]

Re: Don't do anything you're going to regret laterDear all:
        I did not intend to make light of the range of existential regrets in my post (hence the reference to regreting the decision to join the military and to  have  killed someone--my father was awarded one of his   Bronze stars for killing a spy in the Philippines but regretted it nevertheless--he could still see the man's face many years later).  A regret that a "brutal procedure" was used is also possible, though when we look a tthe circumstances in which many of these late 2d trimester abortions occur where the woman's health is in danger, or the unborn child/fetus is severely deformed, may or may not be devestating.  The studiesclaims  of regret/depression include   women who regretted or were depressed even though they experienced "less brutal" procedures in the first trimester. . . . and there are all kinds of variables involved. 
    Justice Kennedy's belief that women "can't handl the truth" and therefore a procedure should be banned in part on that basis is troubling, as Justice Ginsburg points out in her dissent. 
                respectfully
                               Lynne 

Prof. Lynne Henderson
        
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Scaperlanda, Michael A. 
  To: Lynne Henderson ; Andrew Koppelman 
  Cc: conlawprof at lists.ucla.edu 
  Sent: Monday, April 23, 2007 6:12 AM
  Subject: regret 


  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".


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