Speaker 1: In a striking story that highlights the tension between personal
Speaker 1: beliefs and medical advice, Alex Gooding, a self proclaimed triad
Speaker 1: wife and mother of seven, is navigating a dangerous pregnancy
Speaker 1: condition known as cesarean scar atopic pregnancy or c SEP.
Speaker 1: Despite medical consensus that continuing the pregnancy poses severe risk
Speaker 1: to her health, Gooding insists on moving forward, rejecting her
Speaker 1: doctor's advice to terminate. This decision has sparked criticism not
Speaker 1: only for the potential harm to herself, but also for
Speaker 1: the influence she wields as an influencer with conservative anti abortion.
Speaker 1: Her story racist critical questions about the impact of ideology
Speaker 1: on health decisions, the role of influencers in perpetuating harmful narratives,
Speaker 1: and the consequences for families left behind. At its heart,
Speaker 1: it's a cautionary tale about the life threatening costs of
Speaker 1: prioritizing belief over evident. The story is from the Friendly No,
Speaker 1: This story is from the Friendly Atheist, rather by him
Speaker 1: and Meta on October twenty eighth, twenty twenty four. So, Eli,
Speaker 1: I'm coming to you again because why not? So? How
Speaker 1: do we balance personal beliefs with medical advice? Especially when
Speaker 1: those beliefs put others at risks, such as dependent children
Speaker 1: or family members.
Speaker 2: The thing is, I'm not sure that we're obligated to
Speaker 2: the fact of the matter is that she's still allowed
Speaker 2: to make this choice, just as much as she should
Speaker 2: be allowed to make the choice to have the abortion.
Speaker 2: Should that be that what she wants to do. As
Speaker 2: long as she's an alert and oriented, conscious adult, she
Speaker 2: can make her own medical decisions. Now, unless she has
Speaker 2: an advanced directive on file, then they're just going to
Speaker 2: take life saving measures as soon as she goes unconscious anyway.
Speaker 2: But the fact of the matter is you your primary
Speaker 2: obligation is to make choices for your own way well being,
Speaker 2: because nobody else is going to prioritize your own well
Speaker 2: being over theirs. So you know, at least if you
Speaker 2: think it a purely like animalistic evolutionary is sort of
Speaker 2: primitive sort of context. So I mean, yeah, I don't
Speaker 2: think necessarily that the need to balance those things is there.
Speaker 2: I think someone can take their personal beliefs and make
Speaker 2: their own medical choices for themselves based on that.
Speaker 1: You know, I have an antidote if you all don't mind.
Speaker 1: I was speaking to one of my clients who is
Speaker 1: a serial smoker who also deals with COPD and also asthma. Now,
Speaker 1: one of the things that I was speaking with them
Speaker 1: about when I was doing their assessment is the you
Speaker 1: know them smoking, And of course, as a healthcare professional,
Speaker 1: I'm going to bring up, hey, you have these chronic
Speaker 1: conditions and they're exasperated by your smoking, maybe you should
Speaker 1: rethink I don't know smoking. And he implied and told
Speaker 1: me that, well, yeah, I know. My doctor brings it
Speaker 1: up a lot. And I'm like, em, you think when
Speaker 1: I listen to your doctor just saying and you know,
Speaker 1: I know that you as as a person in my position,
Speaker 1: can only warn at the end of the day. These
Speaker 1: people are adults, right, But it's one thing that my
Speaker 1: client is in his home making a adverse healthcare decision
Speaker 1: on his own that influences him and him alone. But
Speaker 1: when you're looking at Alex Gooding, who has I don't
Speaker 1: even know how many follows she has, I believe it
Speaker 1: is it over a million? I want to say it's
Speaker 1: over a million. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I
Speaker 1: mean only and I may be I may be overestimating
Speaker 1: because it.
Speaker 3: Was one hundred thousand. Yeah, like is that because of
Speaker 3: this whole thing or is that something that happened before.
Speaker 1: Well, you know, she's an influencer who is talking about
Speaker 1: her family. She's a mom of seven, she's a your
Speaker 1: traditional housewife. She makes sure that you know, her husband
Speaker 1: comes home with his pipe and slippers, just like the
Speaker 1: Donna Reed show. So and she is talking to you know,
Speaker 1: possibly thousands and thousands of people, you know, and I
Speaker 1: would suspect like a majority of them being other women
Speaker 1: who you know, jive with her story, right, But you know,
Speaker 1: but at the same time, I and I like to
Speaker 1: just preface that an et topic pregnancy is never a
Speaker 1: viable pregnancy. If that particular pregnancy is not dealt with,
Speaker 1: the person who is pregnant can and most likely will die.
Speaker 1: So there is still this other portion of responsibility, And Jimmy,
Speaker 1: I would like for you to talk about that. You know,
Speaker 1: even though like, yes, we know that she's an adult,
Speaker 1: she has the right to make her own decisions about
Speaker 1: how she's going to deal with her particular medical choices.
Speaker 1: But she says, an influencer, what is the what is
Speaker 1: the responsibility she has to the people that's actually listening
Speaker 1: to her, and what kind of things could happen if
Speaker 1: she goes through this, and another possibility that people who
Speaker 1: are able to get pregnant are listening to her and
Speaker 1: thinkingness this is a good choice too.
Speaker 3: Yeah. So I think if she's going to go through
Speaker 3: with behavior like this and she is going to kind
Speaker 3: of cast her life as an episode for these people
Speaker 3: to watch, that she needs to be honest and not
Speaker 3: cut out the parts that she doesn't want them to see. So,
Speaker 3: for example, when she goes and gets a second opinion,
Speaker 3: which I think she has a responsibility to go do,
Speaker 3: because she's not going to get advice in her Holy
Speaker 3: Book on how to handle this. That's something that we know.
Speaker 3: Unless she wants to bring her vision back by rubbing
Speaker 3: dirt in her eyes, that's a story that I don't
Speaker 3: need to get into. But we know that God has
Speaker 3: no medical expertise, So if you disagree with your first doctor,
Speaker 3: certainly go to the second doctor. But I would almost
Speaker 3: bet that the doctor that she describes in her little
Speaker 3: episode here is not the kind of person that she
Speaker 3: makes him out to be. She says that the doctor
Speaker 3: was rude and refused to acknowledge her and only turned
Speaker 3: to her husband and said, you need to make sure
Speaker 3: that she terminates this embryo. I would guarantee that what
Speaker 3: really happened is that this person, she was so dismissive
Speaker 3: of this guy who dedicated his life to not only
Speaker 3: becoming an expert in his field, but saving other people's lives,
Speaker 3: and you know, in order to just suffice her religious leanings,
Speaker 3: her dogma that she's aligned herself with, she's kind of
Speaker 3: painted him to be the adversary in this story, when
Speaker 3: in fact, she is really being the adversary for the
Speaker 3: people that look up to her when she's not being
Speaker 3: honest with them about the medical advice that she's getting. Now,
Speaker 3: this is a lot of conjecture, but I'm not saying
Speaker 3: this because I don't know of other instances where I
Speaker 3: don't know the kind of people I'm talking about. You know,
Speaker 3: these our people that are not completely honest with themselves
Speaker 3: about what is good for them and what are good
Speaker 3: for their families because they take advice from people who
Speaker 3: are not trained and not professionals in these medical fields,
Speaker 3: in these healthcare fields. You know, they're taking advice from priests,
Speaker 3: they're taking advice from old men, and these are young
Speaker 3: women having complicated pregnancies. Multiple pregnancies, so she has a responsibility,
Speaker 3: I think, to care for her viewers, her influencers by
Speaker 3: giving them all of the data.
Speaker 1: That's my take, what data the data from? Because Jesus said,
Speaker 1: I was going to say that, well, if we want
Speaker 1: to go into medical advice from the bibble, she could
Speaker 1: always drink the bitter water. But you know her husband
Speaker 1: would have to take her to the priests first for
Speaker 1: her to do it. Eli, you mentioned in your notes
Speaker 1: about her having a valid complaint about one of her interactions.
Speaker 1: You want to actually talk about that a little bit more.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, Jimmy kind of just like throw that out
Speaker 2: to window, because that was the interaction, the one that
Speaker 2: Alex Gooding describes. Uh well, I'm like, so if that's
Speaker 2: a if that is the truth about that interaction, that's
Speaker 2: a valid complaint because as she tells it, she told
Speaker 2: that she went to a second OB told that OB
Speaker 2: she didn't want to terminate that. OBI completely dismissed her,
Speaker 2: turned to her husband and was like you need to
Speaker 2: make her do this, which is like really dismissive of
Speaker 2: her like agency and autonomy. But I think it probably
Speaker 2: is pretty likely. As Jimmy said that, like that's probably
Speaker 2: not how it went. It was probably something a lot
Speaker 2: more like him telling her the cold hard truth about
Speaker 2: what will happen if she doesn't terminate the pregnancy, and
Speaker 2: her not liking the way that he or she or
Speaker 2: they said that and just kind of taking an issue
Speaker 2: with that and sort of inflating the story a little bit.
Speaker 2: But it is sort of even if if regardless of
Speaker 2: which of those two things is the case, it is
Speaker 2: still a remnant I think of like, as Het Meta
Speaker 2: points out in the article of that COVID era, like
Speaker 2: do your own research, because now people are starting to
Speaker 2: think that if they google the right words, which they
Speaker 2: almost never do, then they can learn as much about
Speaker 2: their condition as an MD or a DOO, and it's
Speaker 2: just not the case, and it leads to stupid decisions
Speaker 2: like this.
Speaker 1: You know, speaking on that, we are in an information age,
Speaker 1: where as you mentioned that just about any topic that
Speaker 1: you want to learn more about is available at your finger.
Speaker 1: We have more information coming through our little cellular phone
Speaker 1: than any person ever had in a lifetime and the
Speaker 1: lifetime's previous to us. And there are reputable sites that
Speaker 1: actually talk about different conditions that people can have managed
Speaker 1: or even talk about saliently concerning the outcomes if those
Speaker 1: conditions are not cared for properly. And I'm thinking to myself,
Speaker 1: especially if we're talking about responsibility, going back to you know,
Speaker 1: the first portion, about the responsibility that she has to
Speaker 1: her the influences, what about her children, What about the
Speaker 1: responsibility that she has to her children that she is
Speaker 1: with now, As you stated, Eli, I've had really and
Speaker 1: you know, and I mean, like I guess I can
Speaker 1: speak to this and personal experience that in the past
Speaker 1: I've had had tough conversations with doctor and and some doctors, yes,
Speaker 1: have been dismissive of some of my concerns and and
Speaker 1: and I don't and and giving some of the data
Speaker 1: that is concerned when it comes to black people and
Speaker 1: health and also women and how they're treated when it
Speaker 1: comes to you know, some doctors. It's not I don't
Speaker 1: necessarily think it's a far fetched idea to say that
Speaker 1: biases and issues when it comes to how you know,
Speaker 1: healthcare professionals relate to these groups exist, right. But at
Speaker 1: the same time, I find it very difficult to believe
Speaker 1: because like I, as I mentioned previously, EP topic, pregnancies
Speaker 1: are never viable and they can kill you if you
Speaker 1: don't take care of it right there and right there
Speaker 1: as soon as it's discovered. I'm just wondering to myself
Speaker 1: and Jimmy if you can kind of like fire off
Speaker 1: because I think that you mentioned this a little bit
Speaker 1: more about the responsibility she has to her children, her
Speaker 1: her families when it comes to the healthcare decisions that
Speaker 1: she makes that could possibly take her life, Like, what
Speaker 1: is her responsibility? Do you think that she's being irresponsible
Speaker 1: but not really taking some of these things seriously.
Speaker 3: I absolutely think she's being irresponsible, you know. Hem and
Speaker 3: Metta and I quoted in my show notes in preparation
Speaker 3: for tonight, made the point she should take her other
Speaker 3: kids into account. There is nothing brave about continuing this pregnancy.
Speaker 3: She is not a role model, and I do believe
Speaker 3: that to be the case. She's being incredibly irresponsible. First,
Speaker 3: she brags about having seven children and having had six
Speaker 3: when I think she means miscarriages by saying she has
Speaker 3: seven children and six in heaven. This is somebody who
Speaker 3: has been constantly pregnant her entire life. She's probably put
Speaker 3: an incredible strain on her body, which is why she's
Speaker 3: in the position that she's in, and I think it's
Speaker 3: now time to start focusing on the children that are
Speaker 3: alive and keeping yourself alive because you chose to bring
Speaker 3: them into this world, you know, and they didn't ask
Speaker 3: to be here, right, and they are young and they
Speaker 3: need to navigate through life, and you, as their mother,
Speaker 3: who is so proudly proclaiming that as your primary role
Speaker 3: in life to be a mother, I mean, for crying
Speaker 3: out loud. Her Facebook name is growing Goodings, right because
Speaker 3: her last name is Gooding and all she does with
Speaker 3: her life is just grow goodings. Well, you're not going
Speaker 3: to do that if you purposely reject medical professionals advice,
Speaker 3: doctor's advice and end up killing yourself. Unfortunately, you're not
Speaker 3: going to be able to be this person that you
Speaker 3: proclaimed to be. So get off of your high horse, Okay,
Speaker 3: get off of this religious pedestal that you putting yourself
Speaker 3: on and recognize that you have a responsibility to kids.
Speaker 3: And what I would love to see, and I don't
Speaker 3: expect it anytime soon, is for her and women like
Speaker 3: her to recognize the way that religion has abused them
Speaker 3: and indoctrinated them into a position where they have one
Speaker 3: role in life.
Speaker 2: They have one role, and that is to.
Speaker 3: Be an incubator for their husbands, but also their husband's caretaker,
Speaker 3: and also not have a life of their own because
Speaker 3: they have given their life to everybody else. That's not
Speaker 3: the way it should be. And so that's that's kind
Speaker 3: of how I feel about that. She's certainly, in more
Speaker 3: ways than one, neglecting the children she already has.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I definitely have to say, as as a person
Speaker 1: who has the ability to become pregnant, I was deeply
Speaker 1: disturbed by the story and in a bit offended specifically
Speaker 1: by her.
Speaker 3: Well, you know what, Cynthia, I'm sorry, there's one thing
Speaker 3: that I want to since you say that. So when
Speaker 3: she got the news that her pregnancy was not viable,
Speaker 3: she's the articles quoting her, she cried the entire ride
Speaker 3: home in the car. Matt was on a call with work,
Speaker 3: so he couldn't debrief with her. So you're getting terrible,
Speaker 3: life threatening news and then crying the entire way home
Speaker 3: and your husband is on the phone the whole time.
Speaker 3: Are you out of your mind? Have you not seen
Speaker 3: the sign that you are less significant in this structure
Speaker 3: that you're in? Something to think about.
Speaker 1: Well, the Bible definitely categorizes women as second, third, fourth,
Speaker 1: fifth classes. Just keep it, one hundred one thousand person.
Speaker 1: Women don't have agency. Women are property of their housbands.
Speaker 1: And when the husband dies, it would be up to
Speaker 1: the sun if he wants you to take care of
Speaker 1: the mother, and then the mother will have to basically
Speaker 1: do what the son tells her to do. So and
Speaker 1: this is the type of sensibilities that are taught in
Speaker 1: these particular churches that showed this particular structure, right, that
Speaker 1: the husband is the head of the household and the
Speaker 1: only one that he is actually subjugated to is God.
Speaker 1: And the woman is us subjugated to her husband, and
Speaker 1: the children are subjugated to their parents. But even if
Speaker 1: but as we've heard rhetoric not too long ago, just
Speaker 1: wait until your father gets home. Oh wait until daddy
Speaker 1: gets home, because daddy is the one who's going to
Speaker 1: have the final say on how everything goes. And you know,
Speaker 1: and I would have to you know, quote VP. Harris
Speaker 1: when she said that not every woman is trying to
Speaker 1: be humble. I have to say that. And and what
Speaker 1: do we mean by what do I mean by that?
Speaker 1: I mean that there are a good number of us
Speaker 1: who noticed that we have this thing called a brain
Speaker 1: that can learn things, that we can use to do
Speaker 1: other things other than being somebody's mama, being somebody's wife, okay,
Speaker 1: and that we can actually contribute to society with our
Speaker 1: brains and actually build outside of family structures. Okay. So
Speaker 1: that's one of the reasons why I was very offended
Speaker 1: by this particular story. And another reason is is that
Speaker 1: the indoctrination of Alex Gooding is so deep, it's so pervasive,
Speaker 1: to the point where she really feels that this is
Speaker 1: the heel that she literally is going to die on.
Speaker 1: And I think that, Eli, you talked a little bit
Speaker 1: about that in your notes about this, the stances she's
Speaker 1: going to get, it's like going to be unrewarding. Can
Speaker 1: you talk a little bit more about that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And you guys, actually listening to the two of
Speaker 2: you cracked this wide open for me. I understand that's
Speaker 2: on a whole new level now. So she is she
Speaker 2: has this idea that God has a plan and no
Speaker 2: matter what happens, it's part of God's plan. So if
Speaker 2: she dies, she dies. She doesn't think she's taking a risk.
Speaker 2: She thinks she's trusting God, right. The other thing is that,
Speaker 2: as the two of you pointed out, she's so indoctrinated
Speaker 2: to think that having children is what she's supposed to do.
Speaker 2: She looks back on how you know, she used you know,
Speaker 2: IVF in some of her previous pregnancies. She has delivered
Speaker 2: via c section. So these are some people hold the
Speaker 2: idea that, you know, giving giving birth or getting pregnant
Speaker 2: in certain ways isn't you know, real pregnancy or real birth.
Speaker 2: And she didn't express that at least in what we read.
Speaker 2: But she may hold the view that if she can't naturally,
Speaker 2: you know, conceive and state a baby on her own
Speaker 2: without medical help, then she's failing at what God put
Speaker 2: her here to do. So she may be of the
Speaker 2: mind that, like, if I can't do this naturally, then
Speaker 2: I'm just gonna die trying to because that's God's plan
Speaker 2: for me. So I don't think she sees it as
Speaker 2: if she's like shirking a responsibility that she has. She thinks, sir,
Speaker 2: most responsibility is to God.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm sure that she doesn't see it that way.
Speaker 3: And that was a really astute, very like eye opening
Speaker 3: perspective that you just gave you lie.
Speaker 1: My question is.
Speaker 3: If things are supposed to go to according to God's plan, well,
Speaker 3: then why did she take the IVF in the first place,
Speaker 3: And why did she trust the medical professionals in the
Speaker 3: first place? And what now she doesn't trust the medical professionals.
Speaker 3: What a turn of events and what an inconsistency.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, I think this also speaks to the
Speaker 1: whole notion of cherry picking when it comes to your beliefs.
Speaker 1: And let me tell you something for you guys that's
Speaker 1: out there that never been pregnant or shot a kid
Speaker 1: out your fallopian tube, whether if you have it the
Speaker 1: the you know, the wambam, thank you man way, or
Speaker 1: if you have it through the IVF way, you gon't
Speaker 1: feel it regardless of how it's gonna come out, whether
Speaker 1: you get IVF or not, it's a real pregnancy. Let
Speaker 1: me tell you, you.
Speaker 3: Know, Cynthia, Yeah, I have I have something I need
Speaker 3: to say. Okay, So I want to talk about my
Speaker 3: wife for a second, because I did something horrible today. Okay,
Speaker 3: And since we're on the topic of women, and I
Speaker 3: want everybody to know that I love my wife very much.
Speaker 3: I forgot our fourth wedding anniversary which is today, which
Speaker 3: is today.
Speaker 2: I did.
Speaker 3: It was horrible. It was horrible.
Speaker 1: I'm so.
Speaker 3: I'm such a bad man. I'm such a bad No,
Speaker 3: I'm not. I'm just.
Speaker 1: So. I told my wife.
Speaker 3: I told my wife that not only would I say
Speaker 3: happy happy anniversary, Deanna and I love you, but you
Speaker 3: guys would say happy anniversary as well.
Speaker 2: Could you help me the anniversary?
Speaker 1: You know what? Not only will I say it.
Speaker 2: Jimmy, and thank you for sharing Jimmy with us today.
Speaker 1: Thank you for sharing Jimmy Deanna. But you know I'm
Speaker 1: not only will I say it, I will sing it. Yes, yes, yeah,
Speaker 1: I haven't saying anything on this program for quite some time.
Speaker 1: So excuse me, meet me me. Okay, very good, Happy anniversary, Anna,
Speaker 1: Happy anniversary, Deanna, Happy anniversary, Dianna. I'm not gonna mention
Speaker 1: Jimmy because he forgot happy Aniverse serie too.
Speaker 3: Oh that was beautiful. That was beautiful. She's gonna love that.
Speaker 3: We're gonna go out and celebrate. It's Wednesday, so and
Speaker 3: and you know, we got a very important mission here,
Speaker 3: so uh, she of course encouraged me to continue.
Speaker 2: Uh and do what we're doing.
Speaker 3: We're gonna go celebrate this Saturday, and I came home
Speaker 3: with a dozen roses for her and UH. I really,
Speaker 3: I really felt like an idiot. But I love you
Speaker 3: Deanna and uh and I hope you feel that I
Speaker 3: deserve you.