Let me add that by no means are all parents with autistic or otherwise disabled children like this. In fact, many I know are among the most compassionate people around. Sometimes children with a disability can bring out either the best or worst of human nature – and Amy Tuteur has shown which side she falls on.

I guess I’d have to say I am an underground grandmother, as my youngest will turn 21 in December. But I was definitely a free-range mother, and do what I can to support my two stepsons & daughters-in-law in fear-free……

In the case of some women it is bound to be ’safer’ (due to feeling comfortable and ‘letting go’ that is a necessary part of the process of birthing) and some women will have conditions present that complicate their risk profile whether they birth in a hospital or at home. It is still THEIR choice to make and it costs LESS on the public purse than the obstetric equivalent in the majority of cases.

No single person’s opinion is going to affect my knowledge of my own body in the intimacy of my own environment. If we stop thinking of hospital birth as the norm, handing birth choices (and education) back to women and giving space to every woman’s unique and individual needs in the vulnerability of childbirth is the only way to reduce the caesarean rate and give babies an optimal first meeting with their families.

I was once involved in grass roots birth reform at a local level. Now it is being debated in the Australian Parliament. I cannot understand how properly regulated home birth with competent midwives is not a basic right. The fact that this is even being debated on various fora and at high levels of government bodes well for my daughter’s choices, when their time comes.

If she holds her own it is only because most rational people have just given up on engaging her and prefer instead to debate those who play by the rules of logic, factual information, and sanity.

Looking beyond single voices on the subject, and toward international maternal and infant health organizations and experts–who are not competitors of midwives–the consensus is crystal clear: midwives are the most appropriate care providers for low-risk women in all settings-home, birth center, hospital.

It is morally imperative for women to recognize that if marriage is unappealing or inconvenient, they shouldn’t be having children. It doesn’t matter how much they want them, and it doesn’t matter that they can financially provide for them. A child is owed a father, and any woman who is unable or unwilling to provide one is making a self indulgent, selfish choice to conceive a child.

Um, what? She says in that post that on every measurable parameter of child well being, kids with fathers do better. But she doesn’t cite any sources for that opinion. I must admit I really can’t stand that particular opinion. We’re a two parent family, but I fully support any woman who decides to become a single mother by choice. I was almost there myself a couple years ago.

I have to agree that for me personally, the revelation of her ideological position on those issues somehow casts doubt upon her reasoning in general. Perhaps I’m particularly biased in this regard, because I feel so strongly that gay parents and single moms do fine. If there are studies that show that kids are harmed by these arrangements, I’d first of all wonder who commissioned the studies and what agenda was behind them.

In any case, I’ve only read her posts on homebirth, and I still think on that subject, she’s pretty cogent. If women want to give birth at home, that’s their choice, but movies like The Business of Being Born really do a disservice to mothers by presenting homebirth as the safer option. It seems to me that if you want to make that choice, it’s best to be informed about the actual risks. But certainly I can see that her staunch stand on other moral issues might make her a bit of a reprehensible personality to many.