[This will be a recurring feature at Sufficient Scruples: a weekly roundup of bioethics-related blog posts from notable sources. (Feel free to drop me a line alerting me to your blog or your posts, if I haven’t got you blogrolled yet.) Use this feature to keep abreast of issues or commentary that you may not have gotten to over the week.]

The Well-Timed Period gives us this trenchant “shorter Pope”: “If those Africans could just deal with the horrific threats posed by divorce, abortion, and a contraceptive mentality [threats on par with human trafficking], think how much more safe and serene the fabric of their life would be.”

Ophelia Payne at XX notes yet another study showing children raised by gay parents are doing just fine, thank you, and concludes: “Either we do our best to integrate families of all shades and kinds into mainstream culture, or we shame them for the audacity to do the best for their children.”

Reproductive Rights Blog notes the almost unbelievable, contemptuous (and beyond contemptible) viciousness of Louisiana’s anti-abortion waiting-period and mandatory-counseling laws designed to coerce women to carry unwanted pregnancies to term - and which are applied to victims of rape and incest as well as all other women.

And more . . .! (more…)

[Note: A consensus is growing that, because the young man mentioned below is still a minor and is in a very vulnerable position, bloggers should remove direct links to his blog or uses of his name. I have removed them below and made minor revisions to the text to avoid using his name. I can say, though, that I have seen his blog and it appears to me to be authentic.]

Lindsay at Majikthise alerts us to this appalling story:

[Name deleted] is a very courageous 16-year-old guy from Tennessee who recently come out to his parents. He’s also a damn good writer who has been blogging about their hateful anti-Christian reaction.

[His] parents have decided to ship him off to a self-professed “Safe Place” known as Refuge–a Christianist residential program that promises to turn kids straight.

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