What to do with an infant with breathing difficulties

Oops.

Prosecutors claimed Shannon Hickman never sought prenatal care when she was pregnant with David, who was born two months early at his grandmother’s home and died less than nine hours later when he had trouble breathing. He was born with a bacterial infection and underdeveloped lungs.

Medical experts for the prosecution testified that the baby had a 99 percent chance of survival if his parents had sought medical care. But prosecutors claimed the couple never considered taking the baby to the hospital. [Read more…]

The direction of benefits

Chapter 6 of Janet Heimlich’s terrific book Breaking Their Will: shedding light on religious child mistreatment is titled “An Obsession with Child Obedience.” The final paragraph of the chapter says:

While there is nothing wrong with encouraging children to honor their parents, scriptures and religious concepts that promote child obedience offer an unbalanced and unhealthy parent-child relationship model. That is, while theology says plenty about what children must do for parents, it is largely silent on what parents owe children. Expecting children to honor and obey “in all things” promotes the use of corporal punishment, fear, and, sometimes, physical abuse. [pp 97-8]

It’s exactly the same with “God,” you know. Humans are told to obey and worship god, but God is never told to take responsibility for its creation. Praying is begging, not telling.

It’s always the duty of the lower to suck up to the higher, never the responsibility of the higher to take care of the beings they created in the first place. That’s no doubt because god conspicuously doesn’t take care of humans (let alone other animals), but it’s crappy morality. Obviously god owes us more than we owe god.