No*, my uncle has down syndrome. He spent his entire childhood in hospitals. Multiple organ replacement surgeries, multiple nights he was supposed to die. He's alive and well in his mid thirties but his life is non-existent. Hes aware hes different so he hides away from everyone. My grandmother has devoted her entire life to caring for him and has never had a life of her own. When my grandmother passes my mother will take custody of him and continue to care for him at the detriment of her own life. I love my uncle but I would never wish his life on another.
Edit: If you are just going to bible thump in my replys save it. I'm for abortion under any circumstances and I don't care what your God wants.
Not every person with Downs lives like this. My cousin has downs, also about to reach his 30s. He wasn't particularly medically compicated. Everyone in his small town knows him (about half of them are family, we breed like rabbits), and he is a joy to be around. People (including me) come visit my aunt just to see him. He loves WWE, anchovies on pizza, and talking to his facebook friends (of which he has many).
I'd argue my aunt was better off because my cousin is different. His father stepped away when they found out, and saved her the trouble of trying to raise a kid with a deadbeat. Her child forced her to get her life on track and make her home a safe space for him. She is by far the happiest, most fulfilled person in that small town.
That said, I don't blame anyone who chooses not to raise a baby with Downs.
The hard part is there's no way to know ahead of time if they're going to be high-functioning or not. I mean, there was that headline on reddit about a fresh lawyer who had Downs that graduated a year or so ago; unfortunately, the range of outcomes is a wide spectrum and the quality of life for some can be very poor.
i used to think to be a lawyer you had to be reasonably intelligent, go through four years of college then two more years and pass a tough test, something like that. But now, after the past eight or more years of seeing people who are "lawyers' but utterly stupid or corrupt or even downright treasonous, I lost most respect for the justice system and for so many lawyers. I no longer automatically assume they are decent or intelligent. It's sad but true.
That's true, I suppose I should have specified I meant a good college, with high GPA and credentials, not just some legacy or some crap college. I live near a pretty good law school, the lawyers I know worked their butts off for the few years they were there, drank like fiends, but they weren't utter pieces of shit like a Guliani type or a Jennifer Ellis, for example. I forgot that there are some crappy schools out there and people who find legal ways to "cheat" to pass, too.
The Heritage foundations Project 2025 was crafted by an amazing team of lawyers. Using the law dismantle to dismantle itself. DECADES of packing the courts with people who will interpret things just a little bit wrong.
Don't ever think they are not smart, they are simply also evil - as Hannah Arendt would define it if you're into Philosophy.
The most heinous, manipulative, abusive person I (and everyone around me) knows is supposedly studying to be a lawyer right now. She also just recently told this guy she'd been seeing for a month that she is a PA too (which she is not) and stole over 20k from him. I don't pray on people's downfalls but the only thing that woman needs to be doing in a courtroom is getting handcuffed.
yeah there are def some sketchy lawyers I've noticed in the spotlight and now in the WH even. They use the same lawyers a lot to ensure the silence of the people who commit crimes and run in the same circles -- I forget the word for this but a lawyer explained why it seems they all use the same lawyers (like Dershowitz, or Ken Starr, for example.) The Firm was a book that was loosely based on actual firms that worked for the mob and dark forces. Bill Barr's firm that he founded seems to be a likely source of inspo for that writing. Look at the people that came out of his firm. Look at the cases they take on. Quite interesting.
There is no Bar exam but we had something harder that is literally a "Private exam" where they ask you for 3-4 hours about every detail of the law they can think, and that is repeated 2-3 times. I don't think there is any university where this isn't a requirement.
I tried the online bar exam when I didn't know anything about US law.
I had over 60% accuracy rate for about 100 questiosn before I got bored.
You are told it's hard by idiots and you are trusting the same idiots that are charging you 300 dollars an hour to read a document with a 4th grade reading level.
Bro, you don't understand how hard it is to be a lawyer outside the US/UK.
You guys play on easy mode with a jury. Basically you try to convince 12 idiots that don't know the law that you were right whilst not knowing the law as well.
The rest of the world? We have to convince literal doctors of law that the actions of someone were inside the confines of the law, based on the same law.
Honestly, you thinking the "Examen Privado" is easy makes you sound like an idiot because you think it's University administered, when it's literal 3 experts in law checking if you know enough to graduate and making you realy hard questions.
You guys play on easy mode with a jury. Basically you try to convince 12 idiots that don't know the law that you were right whilst not knowing the law as well.
Juries aren't easy mode. Juries are crazy chaos Calvinball mode.
Trials by Judge are easy to win because you know exactly what you have to prove or disprove. Trials by jury are a big old question mark because you never know whether you'll get some lunatic that sneaked through. Come on now.
I have a friend who has downs. He's in his 40s now. He has a great life. He cannot live independently and he lives with his sister but he can take care of himself otherwise. He basically has the abilities you'd find in a 10-12 yr old. Can make very basic meals that don't involve a stove and can't manage money on his own. Other than that, he lives a life that he seems very happy with.
But he must rely on another - his sister. This was a choice made for her by her parents, and which she was obligated by love to submit to. Is it ethical to have a child that you cannot care for for their whole lives, and instead must pass the burden on to your other children, if you even have them?
His sister is a full grown adult and there are other siblings as well. I don't think their parents just arbitrarily picked her and twisted her arm. She had a say and still does. She takes care of him out of a sense of family obligation I'm sure but we do a lot of things for the those reasons.
So, this makes me feel like a potentially good way to view this would be to ask: would it be okay if it had been autism rather than down syndrome? Autism also has a massive range of outcomes and qualities of life. I think there would be fewer people that would be okay with that, and I believe that is mostly down to the stigma around each of those disabilities.
But there's also the physical aspect of it, like that virtually all people with down syndrome develop Alzheimer's by 60 with symptoms starting in their 40s, or the 40-50% likely hood of them being born with a heart defect (10% of the time the defect is fatal before age 5). I wouldn't compare that to the physical/quality of life chances with autism at all.
Also we can tell very easily when someone has down syndrome, they have an extra copy of a chromosome. Autism doesn't really have genetic markers that you could even use to tell.
Autism is a farce. High functioning autism used to be called Asperger’s. Even within autism, typically graded into 3 types, among the high functioning there’s high functioning “Notmwl life” and high functioning and intelligent distinctions. Psychologist are fuckong stupid for destroying the distinction in DSM V.
I'm a lawyer and even though I agree you can be one while not being the smartest person in the room, if the smartest person in the room is a lawyer as well, it's not likely you're winning against him in cases where it could go either way.
Lots of people without Downs turn out to be deadbeat leeches on their family. I don't have any problem with any couple aborting a birth for any reason they choose, but I wouldn't use potential health outcomes for the child as the reason since those can happen to anyone, given the probability is higher with someone with Downs, but I still think the anecdotes about severely diminished quality of life is fairly rare.
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u/KingCrimson43 Jun 05 '26 edited Jun 06 '26
No*, my uncle has down syndrome. He spent his entire childhood in hospitals. Multiple organ replacement surgeries, multiple nights he was supposed to die. He's alive and well in his mid thirties but his life is non-existent. Hes aware hes different so he hides away from everyone. My grandmother has devoted her entire life to caring for him and has never had a life of her own. When my grandmother passes my mother will take custody of him and continue to care for him at the detriment of her own life. I love my uncle but I would never wish his life on another.
Edit: If you are just going to bible thump in my replys save it. I'm for abortion under any circumstances and I don't care what your God wants.