I see no reason someone should suffer and their family should suffer if instead there is a mutually agreed upon intervention that keeps the suffering from happening. To be fair, I don’t know if Patrick and Susan meant to have children (she’s cognitively disabled). But many people share your view. Men can be put in prison for not paying court ordered child support and reduced sentences or other incentives for men to get vasectomies are not allowed because of accusations of eugenics.
To me, offering Patrick an incentive to get a vasectomy seems analogous to giving an opiate addict methadone so they don’t steal money to buy opiates, rather than putting them in prison for stealing.
Maybe I misunderstood what happened. It sounds like they had 4 children, 3 of whom were disabled, and then the German state caught on and punished them? If so, this seems like callous enough behaviour to me that a strong form of retribution makes sense as a deterrent just as it would for crimes like manslaughter, even if we didn’t have reason to think they’d be repeated by the individual.
I see no reason someone should suffer and their family should suffer if instead there is a mutually agreed upon intervention that keeps the suffering from happening. To be fair, I don’t know if Patrick and Susan meant to have children (she’s cognitively disabled). But many people share your view. Men can be put in prison for not paying court ordered child support and reduced sentences or other incentives for men to get vasectomies are not allowed because of accusations of eugenics.
To me, offering Patrick an incentive to get a vasectomy seems analogous to giving an opiate addict methadone so they don’t steal money to buy opiates, rather than putting them in prison for stealing.
Maybe I misunderstood what happened. It sounds like they had 4 children, 3 of whom were disabled, and then the German state caught on and punished them? If so, this seems like callous enough behaviour to me that a strong form of retribution makes sense as a deterrent just as it would for crimes like manslaughter, even if we didn’t have reason to think they’d be repeated by the individual.