Many people are rightly outraged at just how extreme Alex Greenwich’s “Reproductive Rights Bill” is, which will soon be before the NSW Upper House. It allows for abortion up until the day of birth, on the basis of sex selection, and if the child happens to still be born alive then the withdrawal of all medical assistance. It is quite simply, horrifying.

But one aspect which seems to be completely overlooked is that babies with congenital conditions—such as Spina Bifida (see from the thirteen-minute mark in the following link), Downs Syndrome (just see what they’ve done in Iceland) or even a cleft lip and palate—will also be under threat. Yes, you read that right. Even for something as treatable as a cleft lip and palate, which can be surgically corrected.

For under Greenwich’s legislation, an abortion can be performed for any reason under twenty-two weeks’ gestation. Just stop and think about that for a second. A woman in NSW can be five and a half months pregnant and terminate her pregnancy without having to give any reason what’s so ever. And while the mother doesn’t have to provide her reasoning, sex selection will also be a factor.

Now while some might want to argue that it is good that a child with any kind of deformity be terminated before they are born—or that this might also be a helpful strategy in executing toxic masculinity—there is a word that defines a position such as this. It’s eugenics.

And it’s not without significance that one of the largest abortion providers in our country, Family Planning Australia, was originally called the Racial Improvement Society. Which was then changed to the Racial Hygiene Association in 1928. A title which it kept right up until 1960 when it finally adopted its current (politically correct) iteration.

However, what a lot of people don’t know is that Family Planning Australia has historically been very supportive of the eugenics movement. For example, Ruby Rich and Lillie Goodisson—the founder of “Family Planning Australia”—was well known for her promotion of eugenics and “advocated the selective breeding of future generations for the elimination of hereditary disease and defects.” Sadly, she would have had no problem at all with this video:

But is this the sort of society we really want to become? Where we kill off the weak and only give assistance to the strong?

This is a time for the ‘quiet Australians’ to have the courage to speak; to stand up to those who are unable to protect themselves and to fight for those who are our society’s most vulnerable.

Mark Powell is the Associate Pastor of Cornerstone Presbyterian Church, Strathfield.

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