Organization Pays Addicted Women to Undergo Permanent Sterilization

[ccharles000]

A Tennessee non-profit organization is paying drug addicts and alcoholics to undergo sterilization or long-term contraception. Seriously.

Cash for birth control may sound unusual, but it’s one woman’s crusade to stop drug addicts and alcoholics from giving birth.

Barbara Harris started “Project Prevention” after watching her four adopted children struggle with drug addiction at birth. Now teens, they’re helping spread her message across the United States.

Parked under a downtown Knoxville overpass Wednesday night sat a 30-foot RV with bold pictures on the outside of it.

The same people who drove it here passed out flyers and talked to anyone who would listen.

“My heart is for the children. These women have a choice, but children don’t,” Harris explains.

The organization pays women who are drug addicts or alcoholics a one time amount of $300 to get permanent birth control.

If they choose to get long-term birth control, $300 is paid out each year they use it.

Men can also get involved and get a one time amount of $300 for having a vasectomy.

Documented proof of a drug addiction or alcohol problem is mandatory to qualify.

What we’re looking at here is the exploitation of a vulnerable population of women. (While the program is open to men, less than 1% of those who have taken the deal have actually been men.) Because I don’t know about you, but I don’t know a whole lot of people who aren’t currently interested in permanent birth control who would suddenly become interested for a rather lousy $300. I can only imagine, in fact, that someone would take such a deal only if they were incredibly desperate for money (and not only because of addiction, but also because of unbearable living expenses, etc.).

http://thecurvature.com/2009/07/02/organization-pays-addicted-women-to-undergo-permanent-sterilization/

[jwirr]

1. Not a bad idea.

[TommyO]

10. No, it's a horrible idea.

Eugenics with a pretty face decribes it perfectly.

[jwirr]

12. Okay that I agree with. I guess my view was coming from a great grandmother

who just had a new baby born into our family addicted to meth and God only know what else. Then the parents fight like mad to keep the children while they continue their habits. It is hell for everyone but the parents.

[lindisfarne]

23. Or, it's preventing kids being born with deformities, learning disabilities & mental retardation,

fetal alcohol syndrome (which really is a spectrum, the worst end of which is fetal alcohol syndrome).
It also prevents children from being abused and neglected by an addicted parent - emotionally, physically, mentally. If the addicted parent has turned to prostitution to get drugs, the children are at risk there, too.

Longterm birth control like an IUD or something like norplant are offered in the program as well - but both eventually need to be removed, so there would have to be guaranteed access to getting them removed, which could be difficult if the person moved or remained addicted and unable to care for herself.

It's a very complex & difficult issue.

Ultimately, the concern has to be for the effect of the drugs on the fetus during pregnancy and then child.

[lindisfarne]

35. The organization is also paying men to get vasectomies and women to use long-term birth control. nt

[madamesilverspurs]

16. Not a good idea...

unless you're into eugenics.

[jwirr]

20. Been there - done that! In the early 1900s my family was one of the

families with mental illness that was institutionalized so that they could not reproduce. I am luck I am here. However, we did not get any money - we were forced.

[BlooInBloo]

2. Presumably this is yet another attempt by white folks to sterilize brown folks?

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

3. It looks that way to me.

[Kolesar]

6. Are you saying that "brown folks" are the only druggies in this society?

[BlooInBloo]

13. lol!

[NickB79]

36. I'd wager that the majority of drug addicts in this country are white

Considering the widespread addiction to pain meds in the US, and the large number of white kids that drive into "urban" areas to score their fix, this would possibly sterilize more white people than anyone else.

[MercutioATC]

4. This would be a good program to offer to everybody.

[Kolesar]

9. Indeed! ... eom

[LWolf]

34. Agreed. nt

[YOY]

5. Wonder if it's primarily focused only on urban.

Looks like it.

As initially as "good" as an idea is sounds it may be some kind of racism in disguise.

[Kolesar]

7. Psssst! Rural America is not 100% white

I know. I saw some black folks outside of Columbus, Mississippi.

[YOY]

14. And urban isn't 100% black/latin

But this could be targeted on specific communities.

Just a thought.

[shadowknows69]

8. Make the same offer to the Catholics.

Maybe we'll stop breeding our way into global starvation for a while.

[Kolesar]

11. filling up the bloody world with people they can't bloody afford to feed!

[RB TexLa]

15. Being Catholic and childfree can I just have the money anyway? Or do I have to fit your stereotype?

I'm also Irish and sober at Noon, would it make you feel everything is the way it's supposed to be if I knock back a few drinks real quick?

[YOY]

17. Well educated Catholics don't. Even those who have a solid Catholic education.

I actually heard some priest decry Catholic education for doing this...what a jackass he was.

Poor and religious of all kinds pop 'em out for the sake of poppin' them out.

e.g. The Duggars...they sure as fuck ain't Catholic. Neither are Muslim or Jewish fundementalists. Yet the birth rate is high above the norm there.

[RB TexLa]

18. Be careful, next thing you know someone's going to say African-Americans can't all dance.

[YOY]

19. Catholicism is a preferred and easy target for many here.

Lapsed and agnostic as I am I have some good memories of the Church to go along with the crap that pushed me out. I can't hate it as a whole but I can see the RW elements at play and call them for what they are without damning the entire faith.

For every Torquemada there is a St. Francis of Assisi...kind of hard to hate Saint Francis...practically the father of environmentalism and stewardship of nature (and I say that lightly).

Some people think the same of all Evangelicals. Jimmy Carter is a hell of a Evangelical to kick on. He walks it like he talks it and does good.

[shadowknows69]

21. Oh chill the frig out for Saint Peter's sake.

I was referencing a Monty Python movie, but to be fair it is your basic Dogma isn't it?

[lindisfarne]

25. Actually, I don't think the Catholics are the ones with the biggest families. Low income, I believe,

is a better predictor. Education level as well.

It's an interesting phenomenon - but folks working in development around the world know that if you educate women (which increases income), you decrease family size.

[lindisfarne]

31. Many Catholics ignore the pope's edict against using birth control. Too bad more don't ignore other

edicts of the pope.

[jaksavage]

22. We should encourage everyone

to stop reproducing. It is our biggest problem.

[lindisfarne]

27. And promote adoption. Create a social atmosphere where people don't feel biological children are so

important.
A lot of people cite the complexity of adopting, but the hoops people go through with artificial means of getting pregnant are far more complex & emotionally draining.

[seabeyond]

24. gotta be sterlizing the addicted male too.... that sperm sucks up a lifetime of stuff. n/t

[lindisfarne]

26. Good point - and vasectomy is a very simple procedure these days - much simpler than sterilizing

women. The program OP mentions does in fact pay for vasectomy.

Plus, women's ability to produce offspring is severely limited. A man's is limited only by the number of partners he has.

[LisaL]

28. If you read the OP, maybe you would notice that they also pay

for vasectomy.

[seabeyond]

30. cool. i didnt read any of it cause... hey

whatever.

[seabeyond]

29. yup. n/t

[juno jones]

32. Silly and sick.

Long-term birth control for women costs far more than $300. They seem to be assuming all of their target population all have state medical benefits or something, since a tubal can run into the thousands and depo-provera, etc isn't cheap. If you aren't insured, what's the likelihood you will see a doc for any of it?

And then there's the problem of getting sterilized in the first place. If the local hospital is religiously-based you might just be SOL unless you have the means to travel to a hospital that can. Many docs won't sterilize you if you are under thirty, have less than x-number kids etc.


The best choice I ever made was getting a tubal. I was on state med insurance at the time after having my twins. I was lucky to have a teaching hospital nearby which would perform it (the local catholic one wouldn't). But it was my own decision and in no way coerced, in fact I had to fight to get one, probably because I don't fit the profile of someone who (according to predjudice)'should' get one.


This is thinly disguised racism/classism straight from the eugenics handbook.

[LWolf]

33. I know one grandmother who would fervently support this idea.

She's raising 9 grandchildren, all of them with health problems and cognitive disabilities directly related to her daughter's drug use while pregnant.

Every time the daughter gives birth, the state steps in within a short time to take the baby away, because she is unfit. And the grandparents have another child to raise.

Edited to clarify, after reading down thread:

They are white and suburban.

[Robb]

37. It's a few clicks to get to the whole article

...it's here, FWIW.

One thing stood out for me: "So far 3,000 women and 27 men have participated."

That's getting close to $1 million. Who's funding this??

[Tikki]

38. My foster daughter's OB told her he would forgive her...

medical bills if she would agree to sterilization. Thankfully she agreed.
She is a long-term alcoholic and both of her children were raised by their
grandmother.

She used to call me months afterward and tell me she thought she was pregnant..
I'd remind her that she could not be...and she would say.."I think you can still get
pregnant with the kind of procedure I had." Of course she was not pregnant.

Tikki

[NickB79]

39. Free birth control is bad how, again?

No one is forcing these men or women to get permanent sterilization. If you read the OP, you see they also offer free long-term birth control (likely an IUD or Depo shot).

And before anyone starts screaming "Eugenics!", the last time I checked, drug addict was not a recognized race of people. It appears this program is open to everyone, of whatever racial background. And need I point out again that this is a VOLUNTARY program, with an option for reversible birth control if the participant later gets his/her life in order and wants to raise a family? And that the reversible method actually pays MORE overall ($300/yr vs. a one-time payment of $300 for the permanent procedure), so that people won't be getting clipped just to get some cash?

[nekkid]

40. I would gladly contribute to ANYONE who'd voluntarily sterilize him/herself

I can't figure out why the hell governments aren't providing free birth control to anyone on the goddamn planet who wants it.
:grr:

[vadawg]

42. the thing is not everyone wants or needs birth control, for some the choice of a big family is their

choice, i would hate us to be like the china one child policy and enforce people to have only one child or face stiff penalties.

[Quantess]

43. Hear hear!

I agree completely!

[riverdeep]

44. It's just the opposite,

governments let you write off kids as a deduction. They actually encourage kids instead of penalizing for having more. I would prefer a penalty, but would happily settle for neutrality. Married people and single people on the same tax footing, that'd be nice.

[undergroundpanther]

41. I wish my

alcoholic father was sterilized.Than I would not have been forced to be born and suffer with the family he terrorized.
If addicted women are getting it done,it could be couched as exploiting them,but than again it is no joy growing up with a drunk that is vicious.What gets me is why the MEN are not getting it done? It puzzles me because when men try to shirk responsibility of kid making,they might find themselves forced to pay child support, or be locked up for not paying..So any rationale some addicted male cooks up for not getting a vasectomy is beyond me.

I sterilized myself years ago and I am not an addict, but I knew I did not EVER want kids ,as a kid.I made the decision to be child-free at a very young age.For years I had to argue and try to convince pro-child,sexist GYN's to let me get the operation done,even though the cost was paid for,they always said I would want kids someday,well they just didn't get it that I did not want to have kids.I asked to be sterilized at my first GYN appointment,and almost every appointment thereafter.It didn't happen until I was 27.If there was a clinic paying 300 bucks to get a tube tie I would have done it at age 14 or earlier.
But than again adults cannot imagine a kid being capable of such decisions, but I was capable,and no one listened.