The Daily Show’s temporary host, comedian Desi Lydic, reacted vulgarly to the Alabama Supreme Court’s ruling that human embryos are human beings, whether created via IVF or naturally.
According to Newsbusters, Lydic said, “That’s right, the bar has been moved again. From now on in Alabama, life begins when a man notices his first cousin is hot.”
She continued, “Just to clarify what’s happening here: tens of thousands of women have children using IVF every year and since it’s not possible to do that without creating some excess embryos, the state of Alabama has now ruled that starting a family is basically murder. You know, pro-life!”
But then, she added, “And the way this ruling happened is so crazy. This wasn’t even intentional. They just dropped a test tube! You know, back in my day, we had something called the five-second rule, and it was sacred.” (This one is likely a jab at how pro-lifers argue that every human life is sacred.)
Human life isn’t sacred to Lydic, apparently, and she also appears to lack sympathy for families when innocent lives are tragically lost.
The court case, LePage v. Mobile Infirmary Clinic, Inc. came about after the frozen embryos of several couples stored at The Center for Reproductive Medicine at the Mobile Infirmary Medical Center were destroyed after a client was somehow able to access the facility and handle the embryos. The embryos were dropped and killed. In their lawsuit, the couples argued that the embryos should be considered people under the state’s wrongful death statute. A lower court ruled that the embryos were not human beings but the state Supreme Court’s 8-1 decision overturned that ruling.
The court ruled that destroying embryos constitutes a wrongful death, but Lydic called it “weird” to consider human embryos children.
“Last time I checked, you’re not allowed to store kids in the freezer,” she joked. “And yeah, yeah, I have checked, and now I’m on some kind of CPS watch list. Don’t get me wrong, embryos are extremely precious to potential parents, but technically, they’re just jizz and eggs. That’s not a child, that’s an appetizer at a very avant-garde Brooklyn restaurant.”
The Media Research Center replied to this in a tweet, saying, “The Daily Show has no respect for human life.” Labeling a human being in her first stages of development as “not a child” but an appetizer is dehumanizing to the child and cruel to the parents at the heart of the lawsuit.
Embryos are not “just jizz and eggs.” They are unique individuals with their own DNA, but about 58% of women under the age of 35 who take part in IVF will have “excess” frozen embryos, according to the Advanced Fertility Center of Chicago.
There are about one million embryos currently frozen in the U.S. alone. Those embryos can be frozen up to and including the blastocyst stage (5-7 days after fertilization). Twenty-four to 30 hours after fertilization, the zygote divides into two blastomeres, according to the Endowment for Human Development. If in the womb, the embryo would be beginning implantation at about day six and the placenta would begin to form. While she may not look like a human yet, her unique human DNA exists and has determined her hair color, eye color, and sex. A doctor can even look at the blastocyst and determine where her back, belly, and chest will be.
Her body may not look like an adult’s body, but her life isn’t meaningless. She is at the exact stage of human existence right for her, and would continue to grow, if only she were allowed to.
