To the Editor:
Regarding the Alabama Supreme Court’s ruling that frozen embryos should be considered children (news articles, Feb. 20-23):
I considered this dilemma more than 40 years ago when I was trying to get pregnant. In vitro fertilization was new, expensive and not often successful. I was desperate to have a child. I was also Catholic and believed that life began at conception.
What about all those embryos that would be thrown away or frozen forever? In my mind, they became angels, every one of them helping the one embryo that would become life.
I did not become pregnant with I.V.F., but my stance toward abortion changed radically and permanently. If I could sacrifice those little “angel” embryos in my hope for a new life, who was I to tell a 14-year-old girl (or anyone) that she could not sacrifice her embryos in the hopes for her own life?
To this day I support the mother’s right to choose. I believe that God gives this choice to the mother. I am still Catholic.
Beth Cioffoletti
Palm Beach Gardens, Fla.
To the Editor:
The ruling in Alabama that found that embryos are children should be a wake-up call for all Americans. This is not just about I.V.F.
If embryos are considered children, then from the moment of conception any and all women who have an embryo inside them could be subject to child abuse, manslaughter or even murder charges for virtually anything that they do that might be construed as being harmful to that “child,” including many forms of birth control.
The reality is that a large percentage of all embryos never make it through to the birth of a child. Miscarriage is not uncommon. And many embryos naturally never even implant, and they leave a woman during normal menstruation, unknown to her. Are all of these to be considered the death of a child — to be investigated and possibly prosecuted?
Are we going to institute draconian laws to prevent sexually active women of childbearing age (who might have an embryo, now “child,” within them) from engaging in any activities that might cause harm or death to such a so-called child?
This is no longer a future dystopian fantasy. We are facing it today.
Eric Johnson
Baltimore
To the Editor:
Since frozen embryos are now considered children, will Alabama parents be able to claim them as dependents when filing their state income tax returns this spring?
Lois Platt
Oak Park, Ill.
The writer is a psychotherapist who occasionally treats patients with infertility issues.
To the Editor:
The Alabama ruling that embryos are children, if ultimately upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court, would give an opportunity for states to increase their population without doing much to increase the burdens on the state’s infrastructure system. This could have an impact on the number of congressional seats allocated to a state and on the federal tax dollars allocated based on population counts.
Welcome to Fertiletown, U.S.A. — population 3,560 people (including 1,412 living in a freezer.)
Can sperm counts as “persons” be far behind?
Harvey Marshak
Accord, N.Y.
Sharing a Life, Listening to Differences
To the Editor:
Re “Talking About Israel’s War in an Interfaith Marriage” (news article, Feb. 12):
In late September, about one week before the Oct. 7 attack in Israel, my husband and I celebrated our interfaith Jewish and Muslim wedding, officiated by my childhood rabbi.
My husband’s family, from Syria and southern Lebanon, and mine, from Eastern Europe, joyously danced the dabke and the hora through the night to the beats of our eight-piece Arab band, reveling in the fusion of our cultures.
Expressing perspectives about such a divisive topic across complex cultural divides is always challenging. In my case, both our families, emotionally tied to the conflict from different “sides,” are navigating a new world.
We read diverse news sources about the same event and listen to each other with open hearts and minds, striving to understand each other’s perspectives and pain. Navigating this complexity becomes even more intricate as we build a Jewish and Muslim mixed-faith home.
We are constantly grappling with our varied views on the conflict while we also navigate the rise of global antisemitism and Islamophobia. As our communities, even in the United States, fear retaliation, we find strength in learning how the conflict uniquely affects us, often necessitating holding two distinct realities in our minds.
For our family, openness and communication are the ways we draw tightly together, when world events threaten to force us apart.
Zoe Salamey
Ann Arbor, Mich.
To the Editor:
“We needed to really hear each other and share our perspectives, and make sure we were creating an environment that didn’t lead to conflict between the two of us,” Ava Friedmann, a Jewish woman married to a Coptic Christian, said in your article.
Her statement is the key for any of us who are in a relationship, whether we have conflicting views about war or less significant experiences.
We all need to feel that the other person is listening with an open heart, or we create our own fireworks at home.
Beth Rosen
Bronx
The writer is a psychotherapist.
Rename It Navalny Street
To the Editor:
Many governments are considering how to punish Vladimir Putin for Aleksei Navalny’s death.
If they would all rename the street their Russian Embassy is on Navalny Street, making that the embassy’s official address, this would commemorate Mr. Navalny and irritate Mr. Putin, without adversely affecting the Russian people.
Patricia Walmsley
Weehawken, N.J.
Replace Merrick Garland
To the Editor:
If and when President Biden is re-elected, his first appointment should be a new attorney general. For obvious political reasons, he can’t do it immediately.
Merrick Garland has proved himself, again, to be far too timid and unable to recognize his responsibility to act in the best interests of the country. He quickly named a Trump political appointee and apparent Trump loyalist (and there were legions of established Republicans he could have chosen) as special counsel to investigate obviously inadvertent and unharmful conduct on the part of Mr. Biden when he left the vice presidency, after irresponsibly hesitating for an inordinate amount of time before appointing a special counsel to investigate Donald Trump’s criminal conduct in attempting to subvert our democracy.
Like James Comey and Robert Mueller before him, Mr. Garland has been more concerned with convincing the country of his own ostensible integrity and impartiality than he has been about recognizing the aid and support his actions, or lack thereof, have given to the most destructive, unqualified and dangerous presidential candidate in our history.
He knows the references in the special counsel’s report to President Biden’s age and memory were unnecessary, inappropriate, obviously politically motivated and harmful. The head of the Justice Department seems to have a problem recognizing injustice when he sees it.
Jay Adolf
New York
The writer is a lawyer.
