School helped secret abortion

[Xaccers]

Originally Posted by kronas

as i stated before support is available if needed.

i see your point, but you cannot hide the truth, not like this.

it diffarent.......when you have people who know you, and are around you, relationships are diffarent between parents and social workers/counsillors, im sure you can see my standpoint ?

Right, so when the father says "its ok dear, we're going to go and visit your grandparents to let them know" and takes her out of the country and kills her what do you do then?

How can we stop things like that happening?

And what if the girl wants to keep the baby but her parents threaten her and force her to have an abortion?
If she spoke to health workers at 5 weeks saying she wants to keep it, and they have to tell the parent, then an abortion is still possible.
If the girl thinks her parents will want an abortion, then she can be told that after a certain number of weeks she can't abort, then the girl has the chance to wait until then before telling her parents.

[kronas]

Originally Posted by Xaccers

And what if the girl wants to keep the baby but her parents threaten her and force her to have an abortion?
If she spoke to health workers at 5 weeks saying she wants to keep it, and they have to tell the parent, then an abortion is still possible.
If the girl thinks her parents will want an abortion, then she can be told that after a certain number of weeks she can't abort, then the girl has the chance to wait until then before telling her parents.

and what happens afterwards ? who looks after the child ?

OK look at the facts:-

She's 14
She was Pregnant
She turned to the school for help
She didnt inform her parents


Ok why didnt she inform her parents when she was obviously able to discuss the situation? Theres the main indicator for me.
The fact remains that this girl got help when she needed it, whether or not we personally believe an abortion was the best thing should not come into it. The decision was made, the pregnancy was terminated, ANY person in that situation would have second thoughts that is a natural reaction.

Abortion is there as a legal option for those that wish to chose it. Its also an option for those of us that dispise everything about abortion, should we/they need to use that option for ANY reason.

Abortion is an emotive subject hence why I said earlier that I did not care either way and consider it an necessary evil. I would much rather the choice be there whether the person having the abortion is 12 or 50 years old.

The fcat the girl did not tell her parents of her own free will indicates to me she did not want them to known. IF these parents had reacted badly when the school informed them and they did abuse the girl physically and mentally the school would then be directly implicated into the cause of abuse.

As I keep saying, the school helped the girl in a way the school should not have been expected. But the school did the right thing in a bad situation for that the people concerned need to know that they have helped this girl.

[Jon M]

If this thread is making you make sure you head on over to Russ's thread of lurve .

Don't forget, we all inhabit the same little virtual space.. lets try to keep it as friendly as the day we decided to stay

[imback]

Originally Posted by Ramrod

....and the people who carried out an abortion on an underage girl without her mothers knowledge or consent.

But it's not their job to tell the parents, it's the daughters. There is no such thing as an underage girl in this cercumstance.

People should stop blaming others for family problems it's that simple.

[Ramrod]

Originally Posted by timewarrior2001

The fcat the girl did not tell her parents of her own free will indicates to me she did not want them to known.

and at 14 yo her parents have a right to know (imo)
....where does it stop? How about if she was 10yo?

[orangebird]

Holy crap. Now the mother's wanting to sue the school for not telling her.... not quite sure what legal grounds she has to rely on there??? Money money money...

If she was really so cheesed of she should be campaining for a change in the law, not persuing the school in court for doing what was legally correct, and what the girl requested.

And the father of the baby was 13!!!!!!!!!

At the risk of sounding callous, I think the girl made the best decision.

me too, I think this highlights a great thing of your society that a young girl has some place to turn to other than her parents!

SHe didnt want to inform her parents, thats a problem, and she shouldnt have to be forced to tell her.

Good parents would be told anyway (although even good parents may not be easy to talk to about this)

[Xaccers]

Originally Posted by kronas

and what happens afterwards ? who looks after the child ?

Well in the example I gave, she'd tell her parents, but it would be too late for them to force her to have an abortion.
She's reponsible for her baby's welfare, social services can help with some things too.

[Xaccers]

Originally Posted by Ramrod

and at 14 yo her parents have a right to know (imo)
....where does it stop? How about if she was 10yo?

Ok, how do we change things so that the parents are informed automatically whilst still preventing parents taking their children abroad to be murdered to "spare their shame"?

Personally, if it meant that by not having the legal right to be told, a girl is saved from a slow death in a river, then I think that's a small price to pay.

[zovat]

Originally Posted by orangebird

Holy crap. Now the mother's wanting to sue the school for not telling her.... not quite sure what legal grounds she has to rely on there??? Money money money...

If she was really so cheesed of she should be campaining for a change in the law, not persuing the school in court for doing what was legally correct, and what the girl requested.

And the father of the baby was 13!!!!!!!!!

At the risk of sounding callous, I think the girl made the best decision.

It would appear (to me anyway) that the more we find out about the mother, the more I understand why the daughter may not have felt she could talk to her about this issue.

I am only reading between the lines, and basing my OPINIONS on what I can glean about the personalities involved from the comments in the press, but none the less :

[Hypothsis]

14 year old girl and 13! year old boy get a bit too involved in human biology practicals, either through bad judgement (no - we don't need a condom we're both new to this) or bad luck (bloody condoms - never 100% reliable) they girl end up pregant.

She loves her parents, and knows they love her, but feels that she has let them down, and they may well disown her if they find out.

She talks to councillors at school, who give her un-biased advice, and support her when she requests that they don't tell the parents.

She decides to have an abortion, and the local NHS trust have the usual meetings and discussions with her, and decide that she has thought this through and is aware of te consequences of her choice.

Mum finds out and goes ballistic - she is feeling hurt, because her child did not feel that she could talk to her about this. She always thought that her daughter could talk to her about anything.

Mum chats to the daughter, and the daughter realises that her mum would support her, and that she could have kept the child, without losing the loving family she had.

Mum/daughter contact the hosital, they tell her she should be ok to keep the baby, as the process is not complete.

Next day, the hospital say "sorry - we got it wrong - the child cannot be saved, you must continue with the abortion"

Mum/daughter both absolutely gutted, Mum is even angrier because she feels that her 14 year old daughter should not be able to have an abortion without her consent (legally incorrect, but this is a hurt mother we are talking about).

Mum decides to get as much publicity as she can about this case, as she feels that this should not be able to happen in todays caring society. (still all hypothetical here)

The press prints the story, and it makes national headlines.

Mum/daughter gets loads of sympathy from the public, and mum thinks - If I sue the school, maybe this will never happen again - I can't change the law, but I can make schools/health authorities too scared of litigation to do this again.

[/Hypothesis]

The thing with all this is that we still do not know whether the mother forced the girl to change her mind, or whether the girl wanted to keep the baby, but thought her parents would not support her, or even worse, throw her out.

We also have not heard anything from the father(not the 13 year old one) - so we don't know how he feels about all this.

There are too many unknowns, and too many moral issues for anyone to really debate this unemotionaly. As I stated before, the actions carried out were legally correct, but emotion never follows the law.

[Hypothesis 2]

What if they had told the parents, against the girls wishes, and the parents turned out to be violent, and beat her (possibly causing the loss of the baby and permanent damage).

would we then be debating why the parents were told - against the wishes of the girl?

[/Hypothesis 2]

To me it is a sad situation - as I and others have said before - when a girl feels she cannot talk to her parents about something as important as this.

I just hope that when I have children they will be able to talk to me about anything.

(for the record - no kids yet, working on it. have 2 nieces who are also my god-children, and whom I love dearly and would protect with my life if necessary)

[orangebird]

Originally Posted by zovat

Mum/daughter gets loads of sympathy from the public, and mum thinks - If I sue the school, maybe this will never happen again - I can't change the law, but I can make schools/health authorities too scared of litigation to do this again.

?? I don't understand that bit. What the school/counsellors did was LEGAL. So they shouldn't be scared of any ltitgation, cos the law is on their side... Which is why I doin't understand why she's suing the school, unless it's for money.

Originally Posted by orangebird

?? I don't understand that bit. What the school/counsellors did was LEGAL. So they shouldn't be scared of any ltitgation, cos the law is on their side... Which is why I doin't understand why she's suing the school, unless it's for money.

or revenge ... although the thought of £ÃÆ ’‚£Ãà¢Ã¢â€šÂ¬Ã…¡Ãƒâ€šÃ‚£ must be at the back of her mind somewhere. I wonder if the idea was put to her by some ambitious no-win-no-fee shyster?

Regardless of what I feel about the whole situation, I can't see how suing the school will help.

[orangebird]

Originally Posted by towny

or revenge ... although the thought of £ÃÆ ’‚£Ãà¢Ã¢â€šÂ¬Ã…¡Ãƒâ€šÃ‚£ must be at the back of her mind somewhere. I wonder if the idea was put to her by some ambitious no-win-no-fee shyster?

Regardless of what I feel about the whole situation, I can't see how suing the school will help.

(tried to rep but need to spread it around... ) Me neither...

[zovat]

Originally Posted by orangebird

?? I don't understand that bit. What the school/counsellors did was LEGAL. So they shouldn't be scared of any ltitgation, cos the law is on their side... Which is why I doin't understand why she's suing the school, unless it's for money.

could be - could also be that she wants other people to think twice before not consulting the parents (just to play devils advocate here) or even just lash out at someone because she is feeling so hurt.