Notes

Another reader’s stepfather actually shot at his kids while drinking. This next reader, Josh, also had a father with a “truly frightening” approach to guns—though Josh wasn’t nearly as abused as the other two readers:

My earliest memory with guns left me feeling rather ambivalent towards them. My dad was a trophy-winning rifle marksman. He decided one day to introduce me to duck hunting, when I was 13. Without any training, he stuck me out in a swamp with a 12-gauge Winchester pump and laughed as I tried to figure out what I was supposed to do.

Near the end of his life, I had to encourage the removal of guns from my parents’ home as my dad slipped into mental illness and poor health (brain cancer). His attitudes around guns were truly frightening, as he still kept a loaded handgun in the house, and a shotty was in easy reach for anyone.

Years later, I became an avid bird and big game hunter—but not because of him or any bonding experience.

Update from another reader with a traumatic childhood:

My father physically and emotionally abused my mother, my brother, and me.  At his worst, when I was in my early teens, during an argument with my mother, he walked away, returned with a handgun and held it to her head. He told her to shut up and forced her outside into our backyard where he had her sit outside in silence, I think, until nightfall. I remember my mother trembling in silence. I remember the look on her face. I remember my father standing with the gun to her head.  I have no idea if that gun was loaded. I just remember thinking that she was going to die, that we were all going to die.

A few years later, we were on a family vacation, and I watched as my father casually used the air rifle at the carnie game to shoot out the center of the target, even adjusting for the weakness in the toy. I suppose it truly hit me at that moment that he knew exactly what he was doing anytime he touched a gun. My father had previously served in the Taiwanese military.

I can never forget that a gun’s purpose is a first and foremost is to kill. But by the grace of god, a person with a gun in hand chooses not to harm someone with it. Our gun laws should be focused on keeping weapons out out of the hands of people who are shown to be incapable of responsible use—abusers, the mentally ill, children. Our gun laws should be focused on common-sense safety and educational measures. I don’t understand the desire underlying the feeling that a background check or a waiting period somehow violates a constitutional right. What’s the true irreparable harm? A brief delay in their desire to kill something more quickly? Self-defense is such a stupid argument.

As an attorney and as an officer in the U.S. Navy, you’ll forgive me for having little faith in Joe Schmoe with his concealed carry and his ability to protect me. I know the training and education that our own military personnel receive, and the fact that in many states, any idiot with a pulse can purchase, possess, and use a weapon with none of the stringent requirements that we have in the military is insane to me.

Devastatingly, I lost that battle, and the embryos were ordered destroyed. With that, my ambitions of biological motherhood were forever silenced.

Like many educated, career-minded women, I had postponed marriage and motherhood until it was too late. My cohort of women was instructed to wait until “the time was right.” For me, that meant waiting until my career was stable and my financial independence was established. Many women I knew had chosen either motherhood or a career. Now many of the empty-nested moms are struggling to create new identities while the career women are struggling with feeling left behind, single and childless.

I lie somewhere in between. I have landed in a new career, but I was almost a mom. What feels terrible is that I missed the chance to keep my babies safe and secure.

ART is at once incredible and terrifying. It is fraught with ethical, legal, and socioeconomic minefields. Designer babies are happening now. Gender selection, physical features, and even genetic predispositions are all options. Furthermore, given the price tag, it’s only an option for those who can pay, generating huge concerns about the morality of our society. Why should parents who aspire to parenthood equally, but lack the out of pocket cash required, be left behind?

Finally, due to the lack of legal policy to reign in the practice, women and men are getting hurt. Custody battles are on the rise. Embryos hang in limbo. In my case, rhetoric borrowed from pro-choice arguments was used against me, and my ex argued that he had a right to not become a parent. This, however, failed to acknowledge the fundamental fact that accidental unwanted pregnancies differ vastly from the deliberate, invasive, expensive and time-consuming journey of ART.

Mimi is writing a memoir about her experience, and you can read more on her website, BabyEmbryos.com. The legal details of her story are here.

Another very public battle over embryos took place in 2010, when Jennifer McLaughlin, after giving birth to twins derived from embryos donated by a couple, sought custody of the two remaining embryos because they were genetic siblings to the twins—but the couple wanted to donate the embryos to another woman. McLaughlin appeared with her lawyer on The Early Show:

The case was settled that year with undisclosed details.

Perhaps the most high-profile custody battle over embryos involves the actress Sofia Vergara, whose ex-fiance, Nick Loeb, tried to gain custody of the couple’s two frozen embryos after she wanted to keep them “frozen indefinitely.” In 2015, he took to the op-ed pages of The New York Times and appeared on The Today Show to make his case:

From Loeb’s op-ed:

A woman is entitled to bring a pregnancy to term even if the man objects. Shouldn’t a man who is willing to take on all parental responsibilities be similarly entitled to bring his embryos to term even if the woman objects? These are issues that, unlike abortion, have nothing to do with the rights over one’s own body, and everything to do with a parent’s right to protect the life of his or her unborn child.

Abortion is indeed more difficult territory, as was evident in a battle over an embryo featured in Katie O’Reilly’s Atlantic piece, “When Parents and Surrogates Disagree on Abortion”:

In January, Melissa Cook, a 47-year-old California surrogate currently pregnant with triplets, sued the commissioning father, a single 50-year-old Georgia postal worker, who wanted her to abort one of the fetuses. (The egg used to create the three embryos implanted in Cook was sourced from an anonymous, 20-something donor.) Cook, who is pro-life, filed a lawsuit in Los Angeles Superior Court, claiming California’s surrogacy law violates due process, as well as equal-protection rights guaranteed in the Constitution.

Cook says she wants to take all three fetuses to term, adopt the unwanted third, and collect her full surrogacy fee. She also wants the court to rule that her surrogacy contract is unenforceable, which would protect her from the consequences of breaching her contract and possibly allow her to keep the multi-thousand-dollar fee stipulated in her gestational carrier agreement.

“She’s trying to get the state of California, essentially, to not recognize the contract she signed,” explains Elura Nanos, a fertility attorney based in New York.            

Ultimately all the triplets were born and went into the custody of the father, and the surrogate lost her legal effort to gain custody herself.

If you happen to have your own personal story of a legal battle over embryos, please send us a note.

American citizens, legal residents with green cards, people on student visas—some from the seven banned countries; some from other countries—all are terrified of what is going on. (There’s even fear from American citizens with parents in the banned countries.) Will they be able to stay? Will they be allowed in when the new group of fellows start in the summer? Will they be allowed to finish their programs. Can they visit family—often elderly family?

Her phone is ringing off the hook trying to find answers to very reasonable fears.  The idea that the rules on visas can change from one day to the next with no warning and no consultation with people who understand the chaos being created is simply terrifying to people here on visas or green cards and those awaiting them. These are accomplished people who are here to learn about the best we have to offer in medicine. In some cases these are researchers in an area where there is tremendous need for research and a reluctance on the part of American doctors to work in it because it isn’t a lucrative field. Some go home to share that knowledge in their home countries and are often the best ambassadors we have.  Some will stay here and will often work in underserved urban and rural communities or in the less lucrative specialties where American doctors often don’t want to work.

We will pay a high price for this ignorant demagogue and the white nationalist on his security team.

Another reader, Eric, grasps for a long-term solution to the immigration challenges faced by 21st century America:

Before the not-really-a-Muslim-ban Executive Order, I’d let my imagination get away from itself believing that we might finally see some sort of truce in the immigration wars. The GOP was finally going to pass their restrictionist immigration agenda, which would cause a firestorm that would likely energize the Democratic base even further. When Democrats were finally back in power, they’d find themselves either unable to move towards a less restrictionist policy—say, because they still were facing a President Trump—or would be unwilling to spend their political capital refighting the last war.

Finding themselves in a situation where they would need to do something to prevent a revolt by the base that elected them, Democrats would have to get creative. One solution would be to develop some sort of economic development program, where wealthy nations would “loan” money to developing nations—with strong oversight—for infrastructure, schools, and housing. Perhaps there could be certain benchmarks built into these “loans” that would allow for forgiveness of significant portions for hitting certain democratic benchmarks and environmental or labor standards. The benchmarks could be stretched out over the entire period of the loan—say, 30 years—so that the aspects of civil culture necessary to build and sustain a democratic society would have time to take hold and become the norm. If a country hit all the benchmarks, they could end up paying very little, if any, of the loans back.

A system like this—while more than a little utopian—could go a long way towards mollifying the concerns of those who would like the United States to expand immigration. For example, better infrastructure in developing nations could lead to higher GDP growth in those countries, which would benefit all of those living there, not just those with the intelligence, resources, or luck to be able to make their way to the United States. Stronger domestic growth in those countries would mean that fewer people would feel the need to immigrate in order to have better economic opportunities. And more democratic—and accountable—governance is a good unto itself, as is cleaner air, cleaner water, or stronger environmental standards. It would also go a long way towards repairing America’s image in a lot of the developing world, particularly in light of the GOP-passed restrictionist immigration policy.

There would be some on the left who would find it a bit too “neo-imperialist,” but I’d expect that to be the fringe. Less immigration would likely hurt U.S. growth, and this would likely fall short of the “trillion dollar bill on the sidewalk,” but it would be better than the angry and xenophobic status quo that helps no one. Alas, it does not seem like the direction we’ll be headed, but a guy can dream, right?

I want it to be clear: It is beyond dispute that the NFL and the NCAA have failed to educate their players on the dangers of repeated concussions and injuries, and both organizations need to take the dangers of injury more seriously. But in my mind, it is just as important to understand why so many young men feel they must return to the game year after year even when they do not enjoy the game and know that their bodies are breaking down.  

Maybe, instead of taking down the game of football, we need to have a conversation about race and poverty—forces the opportunities of would-be football players for advancement outside of sports.  I knew I had other options, and though I loved the game of football, I found other areas of work that brought me joy. But I could afford an excellent education, and had many opportunities for advancement. Maybe, in addition to the NFL and the NCAA, we are failing our athletes as a society. And maybe, if we as a society were to change, we could help our athletes avoid the suffering of permanent injury.

This next reader is less sympathetic when it comes to low-income football players because they often get athletic scholarships and a free college education:

My brother played professionally for a couple years. He was outstanding enough to earn a paycheck, but not fabulously talented enough to make a career. I’m 13 years younger than he is, so my childhood was spent driving to college football games. I tracked the NFL standings on my bulletin board. To be like the men in my family (my brother and dad), I dutifully watched the games every weekend from age 6 to 14.

For all the talk of college athletes being exploited as non-employees, there’s another side to it: My brother had a full ride in college. Yet after four years, he was a few credits short and never finished. Although I was an A student, I had to toil my way through school, working part-time to self-fund my education. So I refuse to join the “scholar-athletes’” pity party.

In short, I’m unlike most fallen-away fans because as I matured, I realized that jock culture has nothing to do with authentic manhood, so I generally developed an anti-jock / pro-scholar outlook.

Regardless, this news about CTE is infuriating. How can any responsible person allow the game to continue until science somehow finds an acceptable preventive strategy?

Funny thing is, my brother now regrets ever playing and grows ever more opposed to the game. He agrees that I should prohibit my son from playing, and he’s acutely aware of his risk for CTE and related brain injuries.

“How many concussions did you suffer?” I asked. Reply: “At least six that I know of.” What’s more terrifying: the known quantity of six, or the fact that he almost certainly suffered more and played through them?

More readers defending football and the NFL are here. One of them, Noah, wrote in part:

Football players know there is great risk, but they also know they have the opportunity to live like kings, if only for a few years, and if only in their own domain. That risk is central to both the pride of playing the game and the fascination we have in watching it.

Malcolm Gladwell is largely correct to point out that such a harsh payoff structure can only appeal to people from poorer upbringings. He and other football-haters seem to forget that players of all backgrounds make a conscious and (by this point in time, at least) well-informed choice to continue playing the game. To suggest players can’t think for themselves is to patronize them, which I find rather disgusting in light of Gladwell’s hypothesis.

Disagree? Drop us a note and we’ll try to include here.

Here he is, advocating for voting rights in 1867:

Man is the only government-making animal in the world. His right to a participation in the production and operation of government is in inference from his nature, as direct and self-evident as is his right to acquire property or education. It is no less a crime against the manhood of a man, to declare that he shall not share in the making and directing of the government under which he lives, than to say that he shall not acquire property and education.

Writing about the limits of federal power and the importance of protecting individual rights:

The arm of the Federal government is long, but it is far too short to protect the rights of individuals in the interior of distant States. They must have the power to protect themselves, or they will go unprotected, spite of all the laws the Federal Government can put upon the national statute-book.

Here he is, chiming in on education policy:

In an 1853 letter to Harriet Beecher Stowe that exemplified his interest in vocational education, Douglass didn’t call for the creation of new colleges to serve African Americans. Instead, he sought schools that would teach "agriculture and the mechanic arts." Douglass argued that teaching vocational skills—especially industrial ones—to African Americans would help them climb the ladder from slave to integrated freeman. A prosperous, upwardly mobile African-American working class would, he thought, offer a profound refutation of many pro-slavery arguments, which held that African Americans were incapable of economic self-sufficiency.

Douglass’s interest in practical training is in harmony with the thinking behind contemporary efforts to expand economic opportunity—especially to students from disadvantaged backgrounds—by promoting vocational programs and targeted enterprises such as Project Lead the Way. But his memoirs demonstrate that practical training is hardly enough. In his 1845 autobiography, the Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, he chronicles his efforts to fashion an identity as a free man, offering a bracing portrait not only of the physical hardships of slavery but also of its psychological torments. "You have seen how a man was made a slave; you shall see how a slave was made a man," Douglass wrote.

Here he is, stumping for the rights of women:

If intelligence is the only true and rational basis of government, it follows that that is the best government which draws its life and power from the largest sources of wisdom, energy, and goodness at its command. The force of this reasoning would be easily comprehended and readily assented to in any case involving the employment of physical strength. We should all see the folly and madness of attempting to accomplish with a part what could only be done with the united strength of the whole.Though his folly may be less apparent, it is just as real when one-half of the moral and intellectual power of the world is excluded from any voice or vote in civil government.

And here he is, as my colleague Ta-Nehisi Coates lays out, demonstrating radical empathy across a divide so enormous it seems almost impassable.

As my colleague David Graham points out:

It is a real and praiseworthy accomplishment for Douglass’s name to keep spreading. But the frequent, and often valid, critique of Black History Month is that it encourages a tokenist approach to African American culture, leading everyone from national leaders to elementary-school teachers to recite a catechism of well-known figures, producing both shallow engagement and privileging a passé Great Man (and Woman) theory of history.

There’s no use praising Frederick Douglass merely to consign him to the dustbin of history. He had plenty of things to say about the issues we’re still grappling with every day. And we’ll still be here, talking about voting rights and gender equality and cultural divides and the limits of federal power and, yes, Frederick Douglass, long after Black History Month is past.

His first full day in office he lied—blatantly and provably. And yes, I am bitterly opposed to the immigration order. And before someone tells me I’m a coastal elite who grew up in a “bubble” and that I should understand the fear of terrorism, look at a map, and point to where the September 11th attacks happened in New York. I grew up 40 miles from there.

At my community center on 9/11, it wasn’t just the white kids who were in line for the pay phones to make sure their parents were all right. The center was packed with people of all colors seeing if any kids needed a place to spend the night while their parents were trapped in Manhattan. Most of my high school was 1st or 2nd generation American. I played football with three Ahmeds and against a Basem. My first crush was on a girl whose parents were Iranian. (If she happens to be reading this: I didn’t say anything because I was 13 and awkward. Hope you’re well.) My hometown of immigrants taught me to love America.

I joined the military in large part because of terrorists. And today, for immigrants and the Statue of Liberty, I recognize it’s time to serve my country anew.

I am so proud of all the lawyers who stood up for those affected by the immigration ban. But our president doesn’t respect our most fundamental laws or the truth (and neither, apparently, do the leaders in Congress). I am not sure how, but it is time to give the Resistance some teeth.

A contrasting view from another servicemember:

Having spent a career in the U.S. Coast Guard, I was privy to plans regarding multiple terrorist actions. After 9/11, terrorists attempted to attack the U.S. in multiple cities, bridges, and many other points of interest. Many of these attempted attacks were planned by people from other countries.

As Americans, our hearts go out to other nations, and naturally we want to welcome refugees. But terrorists use our kindness against us. They also try to convert American citizens into terrorists. This has been seen all throughout the U.S.

President Trump’s temporary ban will make sure people entering into our country are vetted. This is a business decision with no emotions attached to it. As such, there will be far fewer attempts of terrorism in the USA.

So yes, my family is greatly affected by this order; because of Trump’s bold action, my entire family is much safer.

This next reader, however, worries about the future:

On Friday, the professional journal Joint Force Quarterly (sponsored by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs) published an issue with an essay considering—in the context of the Japanese Internment—the obligations of the military to comply with an order to intern Muslims. The essay, titled “The Viability of Moral Dissent by the Military (or, Chapter 6 of the U.S. Truth and Reconciliation Commission: Conclusions Regarding the Second Internment of American Citizens)”, won the top DoD writing award for 2016. Coincidentally, the release date ended up being the same day President Trump visited the Pentagon and signed the “extreme vetting” executive order.

Update from a reader who pushes back on the one in the Coast Guard, the one who said that “terrorists use our kindness against us”:

Just one objective look at the chart you embedded negates this argument. If Saudi Arabia is the top sponsor of terrorism, it makes zero sense for the administration to not include them in the ban. Either there are other national security reasons behind not including them, or business ones. If the former, then making a splash by excluding Syrians and Yemenis is of limited/no use. If the latter, then the rationale presented for the ban is mere hypocrisy.

This was not a bold action; it was an impulsive action—to show everyone how fast he can move (unlike the very deliberate Obama). It was drafted without consultation from typical government agencies, suggesting it was impulsive and not well thought out at all.

And to address this reader directly:

1. Make yourself aware of the immense amount of paperwork, time, and vetting that goes into a green-card application. The vetting is more extreme for those born in countries associated with sponsoring terrorism. The government already legally vets immigrants extremely thoroughly before granting them a green card.

2. Look at the number of people killed by domestic terrorism. I am (provocatively) including all the white Christian men and women who have killed abortion doctors in broad daylight, in the name of Christian principles. In fact, one shot a doctor in a church before a worship session [George Tiller, in Wichita]. Also include nihilist young white men who routinely shoot up kids in schools. Should I extrapolate from that to say that white and/or Christian men are most likely to kill fellow Americans? It may be statistically true, but it is a shoddy generalization, that is deeply unfair to millions of Christians who neither know these fanatics personally, nor share their violent beliefs, nor approve their violent actions. Replace the “Christian” with “Muslim” and you have something to think about.

I cried because I told my boyfriend that I was not comfortable with sex on a several occasions previously. But he reassured me. He reassured me everything was okay, and everything was going to be okay.

But in that very moment I knew everything was not okay. Only a few weeks before, I confronted him on some changes I saw in his behavior. I learned that he was doing drugs behind my back. Hard drugs.

I wanted to escape. I was very much pregnant but I could not even afford a cellphone. I traveled to many clinics before one would see me, since several had turned me away. This prolonged the pregnancy several weeks. A number of providers painfully apologized to me. They said I was “too far along.” They said they required parental consent. Parental consent was an immense burden for me.

My father had left home when I was 8 years old, leaving behind three kids. I never saw him again until my sister’s wedding recently. He struggled with substance use and lived on and off the streets my whole life. I learned he was living across the country in California, in an office space with no kitchen. He told me at my sister’s wedding that he cooked his food in the bathroom on a hotplate. This was the most stable housing he has ever had since before he left us.

I knew it at 16 and I know it now: You can’t ask a man like that to step up and be a parent when he never was.

Since I was a young child, my mother worked two jobs to help my family while my father struggled with unemployment and child support. She worked as a teaching assistant at an elementary school for children with autism spectrum disorders. She had a second job in an after-school daycare program. My mom never saw an income over $40K in her adult life, despite working 12 hours a day.

The implicit rule in our household was “no trouble”—especially at school, since my mom worked in the same district that my siblings and I attended. So when I forged the letter that day to go to the doctor, I caused “trouble.”

School was the only escape I had. It allowed me to continue to conceal some of the immense turmoil inside. I had finals, SAT prep, AP exams, papers, and research reports. These were my escapes. The classroom was the only place in my life where I felt like I was a good kid and loved. My teachers at the time had no idea, but they allowed me to forget the painful reminder that I was five months pregnant and nobody—not my family, not my friends, had a clue.

Finally, after the weeks turned into months, I found a Planned Parenthood in Manhattan and they gave me information about a clinic that recommended a two-day procedure. I went there and paid $800 out of pocket with the help of my boyfriend’s family.

After I paid the person at the window, I waited. I waited feeling hopeful that this place was right for me. After waiting 30 minutes, I was told that I needed to provide a urine test and get an ultrasound. I was expecting the ultrasound to be like the other ones. But this one was not.

The technician was confrontational, “How did you not know you were this pregnant?” The emphasis in her voice was a punch in the gut. I couldn’t respond. I didn’t know what to say. Should I tell her that I am 16 years old? That we didn’t cover the signs of pregnancy in my health class? That the only birth control method I was formally taught in school was abstinence? Should I tell her that I have no adult in my life who looks after me other than my teachers, so I’ve learned to habitually ignore my body, my emotions, my wishes—all of me. I had to do things my peers never had to: buy my groceries, work 12 hour+ days on the weekend, walk miles and miles to my job.

No. She was wrong. I knew I was this pregnant but I got turned away from other clinics due to barriers in the system. It prolonged my process tremendously and made the whole experience incredibly more difficult. Without Planned Parenthood, I would have had no option.

She asked if I wanted to see the ultrasound, and I said no. Firmly. I excused myself.

The next minute I felt a flash of heat. I didn’t even make five steps. The dead weight of my unconscious pregnant body would have hit the floor if not for a security guard. He caught me when I passed out walking out of the examination room. I remember waking up seeing a man who resembled my grandfather’s angel. I remember his name still: Jacques. He held me up, to get me in a wheelchair. His smile relieved my immeasurable fear.

The last memory I have of that day was when I was waiting just before my procedure. I was still feeling scared, waiting in the operating room. The doctor sense my fear and put his hand on my forehead. I felt safe.

My choice mattered even at 16, and the barriers set up to try and reduce my choice set me back and compromised my well-being—physically and emotionally. One of the things I most want to emphasize to you is that not every individual’s family is a source of strength and support in their life. Nobody should be persecuted or shamed for making one of the most selfless decisions in their life after looking at their harsh reality. Places like Planned Parenthood exist to provide people support and strength to make a decision when life presents tremendous obstacles.

After finding the love of my life and making a joint decision on family planning, I am firm that I do not want children. I devote myself to taking care of people in communities that need to be better served. This includes people who have no one to care for them: children in foster care who age out into adult systems, adults with severe mental illness, people with developmental disabilities. They are my family.

On the face of it, it’s not an immediately obvious comparison. They don’t look that similar and they have rather different backgrounds—one the scion of a wealthy New York businessman, the other the son of a devout, humble barber. Trump has expressed profound antipathy toward Iran, decrying the nuclear deal agreed by world powers with Tehran last year. (His view was ironically shared by hard-liners in Iran.)

Ahmadinejad was for years the bete noir of the West, a fulminating demagogue who raged against Israel and the United States and suggested the Holocaust was a myth. (On that last count, some of Trump’s supporters may sympathize.) His antics deepened Iran’s isolation and his regime’s acceleration of the Iranian nuclear program led to rounds of crippling international sanctions.

But scratch a bit deeper and the parallel has some depth. As Reza Marashi, a Washington-based Iran watcher, wrote earlier this year in the Cairo Review, Ahmadinejad’s rise in 2005 elections in Iran is something of a mirror to Trump’s campaign. Here’s Marashi:

Iranian voters were a largely disenchanted electorate in 2005. The reform movement had been stymied, and a sizeable portion of Iranian society failed to see their economic lot improve despite the country’s soaring oil revenues. Enter Ahmadinejad: His populist platform criticized Iran’s political elites for using their power to monopolize wealth, and promised to create new opportunities for the average Ali—an Iranian version of “Make America Great Again.” Ahmadinejad’s top challenger, former President Akbar Rafsanjani, said he would continue reforms, support a nuclear deal, and stimulate economic growth—all things that most Iranians view favorably, and similar to the status-quo platform of Hillary Clinton’s campaign.

Populist discontent fueled Ahmadinejad’s rise. “The Iranian electorate was divided in 2005, and voters neither followed their leaders nor were they averse to radical change,” wrote Marashi. “Fast-forward eleven years, and the American electorate may be in a similar place. Like Ahmadinejad, Trump has locked in his base of ultra-conservative voters, tapped into a large pool of economically disillusioned voters, and won over anti-establishment votes.”

We’ll see if that’s enough for the American Ahmadinejad to win the November election.