Nadya Suleman and the absolute right of pregnancy

Nadya Suleman, a single, unemployed mother of six, recently gave birth to eight children (the pregnancy was by in-vitro fertilization). The total, of course, is now fourteen children. Her (only) home, a three bedroom house, is owned by her mother, who is about six months behind on mortgage payments. The births of the eight children and subsequent aftercare, supposedly, is likely to cost a total of one million dollars -- and which the state of California is going to have to pay.

Nadya -- who I think is still unemployed -- has given many, many television interviews. The media attention, also, has been frantic. Yesterday, Cher -- for whatever reason -- said that she finds Nadya repulsive and her new children should be seized by the state. Dr. Phil devoted yesterday's show to her. The result is a storm of media outrage -- and which Nadya seems to willingly feed with continuing to give interviews.

The purpose of this review is to analyze the outrage of the media (and which, admittedly, I also feel at Nadya) and the assumption that the right to children is absolute.

If the media -- and by "media" I mean those that I follow -- were interested in something other than sensationalism, I think it should be easy to recognize that, although Nadya did make the tragic decision to impregnante herself, the decision was made in the context of a system that, at the least, implictely supported her choice.

Consider, the doctor who did the procedure could have been prevented from doing so. If this weren't possible -- let's assume that there's an unregulated market for these procedures -- than a clear outline of action could have been provided of what was to happen afterwards. She would have been told that the state was going to seize the babies. In any case, Nadya's extreme case highlights a broken system of determining how one gets pregnant, who does, and the role of the state in these decisions.

Specifically -- for the sake of brevity -- I'd like to focus on the relationship between the state, technology, and the apparently clearly stated assumption that the state can't interfere in any pregnancy. For reasons that I assume are historical, the right to pregnancy I assume is absolute. That is, the state, for instance, can't force an abortion. The state, also, can't determine who has the right to have children and who doesn't. Because of technology, however, I think, at the least, there should be a discussion of the validity of this absolute position.

Because, now, a woman can, theoretically, have as many children as her body can bear, I think it's now fair to ask what the limit should be? That is, should a doctor (must a doctor) refuse in-vitro treatments for single mothers? Should employment be mandatory? If a single mother of six becomes pregnant, should the state force an abotion?

I don't have answers to these questions. I am sure, however, that an unemployed mother of 14 is as morally unacceptable as an extreme option, say, such as a forced abortion.