[FSTDT Darwin Award?]
A young mother has died after giving birth to twins, amid claims that she had refused a blood transfusion because of her faith. Jehovah's Witness Emma Gough, 22, from Telford, Shropshire, gave birth on 25 October.
The Royal Shrewsbury Hospital said an internal review into the case would take place.
Family friend Terry Lovejoy said: "They are going through an immense amount of turmoil and grief."
He added: "We follow the Bible and abstain from blood and I've got no reason to believe that Emma didn't share those views."
52 comments
Perfect.
"What? Oh, no, I'd much rather leave my children motherless. I'm sure that God will more readily forgive my abandonment of my children than He would forgive a blood transfusion."
You fucking selfish idiot.
What... the... fuck?
Wow, that's... selfish.
so sad.
On this forum we tend to excoriate the fundies for their thoughtless BS.
We tend to forget that they als put their BS into action - against their "enemies" if they can, but often against themselves.
So sad, so tragic.
If it had been someone accompanying a loved one to an assisted suicide, the police would be investigating...
Wait, wait. You've got no reason to believe Emma, the deceased, would have wanted the blood transfusion? Is that implying that she had no direct say in the matter? o_O
I find it hard to be sympathetic to the family, even if they are going through "immense turmoil and grief". They should think themselves extremely lucky they did not lose the twins as well.
Blood for the blood god, indeed!
@Mike:
JWs are still told that blood transfusions are wrong and 'against God', but as of 2000 you are no longer automatically excommunicated from the church if you receive one.
This change was made by church leaders because too many JWs were renouncing their faith when faced with a blood-or-die decision.
Doesn't count as a Darwin Award - she managed to reproduce.
To be honest though, the UK is a free country - a mentally-competent adult can refuse treatment for whatever reason they choose, up to and including the toss of a coin.
@Philbert:
I'm not sure deciding whether or not to receive life-saving treatment on the toss of a coin really counts as 'mentally competent'.
Come to think of it, I'm a bit doubtful that doing it based on a Victorian interpretation of a 2000 year old book of myths started by an American Evangelist who thought the second coming of Christ could be predicted by measuring various bits of the Great Pyramid at Giza (Charles Taze Russell) counts as mentally competent either.
I can't get too worked up about this.
Most of the fundies we see are busy trying to force their morals on others. This woman, misguided as she may have been, was living her life as she thought God meant her to without trying to tell the world that they should be following her rules.
"I knew a JW who always had his steaks well-done because of this blood prohibition."
Now that's a real crime against culinary taste. Everyone with any sense knows that if you don't need a vet to tell whether your steak is dead or not, it's overcooked.
It's incredibly sad for a young mother to give up her life for such a pathetic reason.
That said, I will say this much for the JW's. As far as I know, they are not trying to pass a law to prevent us unbelievers from having blood transfusions. In fact, their interaction with the secular legal system has typically led to more individual liberty, not less.
I can't get too worked up about this.
Most of the fundies we see are busy trying to force their morals on others. This woman, misguided as she may have been, was living her life as she thought God meant her to without trying to tell the world that they should be following her rules.
Unfortunately, I rather fear that leaving two newborn children to grow up without a mother rather constitutes the forcing of beliefs on others.
The Bible says you're not allowed to eat blood. How JWs twist this into "no transfusions" is something I'll never fathom. And how do they justify eating a steak with blood in it simply because it has been cooked until it's not red anymore? Why would Orthodox Jews go to so much trouble to kosher a chicken (which actually makes it taste excellent, BTW) if they could just cook the red out of it?
My cousin had a heart problem and simple surgery could have fixed it, but her grandparents were JW and so her parents decided not to offend them and not do the surgery. They did allow the surgery after the granparents died. Unfortunately, many irreversable health conditions had occured by then, let alone the fun she missed by not being able to do simple things like running across a field. (she had to be very carefull keeping her heart rate low)
Stupid!
What a shame. Twins without a mother. Husband without his wife. And all on account of unreason. In effect, it's a form of suicide.
But this is what following the Bible leads to.
Nutz wrote:Wait, wait. You've got no reason to believe Emma, the deceased, would have wanted the blood transfusion? Is that implying that she had no direct say in the matter? o_O
I was thinking the same. Deliberately or not, he's making it sound quite sinister.
I knew a girl who was a lukewarm Jaydub. I don't think she was particularly observant, but she didn't celebrate her birthday or Christmas.
Also had an unbelievable body, and she once told me upon me buying a dating book that "we can be single together"...
I can understand self sacrifice for others.
I can't understand Killing oneself for nothing. I call it suicide. (My POV is that the true victim of a murder isn't the murdered but people knowing the murdered, therefore, I classify suicide as murder. That doesn't mean I won't frown upon the other last survivor of the doomed spaceship if he tries to eat me with the last bag of Knakies. I'd rather send him "take a walk" and write it in my diary. And eat the results of the "stroll", he'll be a hero instead of a crazed madman and I'll be a survivor sad to see that his captain sacrificed himself for me instead of a bloody murderer.)
Anyone remember that "Saint" who gained saint hood because she decided to allow herself to die instead of getting an Abortion?
Sure she had the kid, but left the baby and 3 previous children to live without a mother.
What an hero.
one can hope the father will get run over by a runaway pro choice float or something equally ironic.
Actually, mudflappus, you've got that backwards. Irony is when you get run over by a pro-life float!
Lemmings wrote: I am fairly certain that there is a law saying that those who commit suicide are also damned.
Accept blood transfusion: You're screwed because you took blood in.
Deny blood transfusion: You die. You're screwed because you committed suicide.
Darwin Awards are given out even if the person reproduced, was not planning on having children, was gay, etc.. The only thing that prevents the person from getting a Darwin Award is a true accident (nobody could have expected the death to happen), the person is under a certain age (a child), or has a mental illness (compulsive hoarders burning or suffocating after being trapped). After all, the children only got half their genes from the deceased parent.
It's God's will... move along, move along, there's nothing to see here. Just another day in fundie world, another death on the alter of the Blood God.
"A young mother has died after giving birth to twins, amid claims that she had refused a blood transfusion because of her faith. Jehovah's Witness Emma Gough, 22, from Telford, Shropshire, gave birth on 25 October.
The Royal Shrewsbury Hospital said an internal review into the case would take place.
Family friend Terry Lovejoy said: "They are going through an immense amount of turmoil and grief."
He added: "We follow the Bible and abstain from blood and I've got no reason to believe that Emma didn't share those views."
There's a bicycle shop down Hessle Road here in Hull, that I go to sometimes. Next to it was a Jehovah's Witless's Kingdom Hall.
I say was . As in the past tense. I only noticed this late last year, when I visited said shop to buy a few components to complete a bike I was building. There's now an estate agent's sign outside said former Kingdom Hall, saying 'For Sale'.
It's not difficult to see [i]why[/i].
Confused?
So were we! You can find all of this, and more, on Fundies Say the Darndest Things!
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