“Ok, yep, good. Smile just like that. Just pretend that you’re not posing next to a metal box on the street that people are going to abandon babies in.”
Via CBS North Carolina:
The padded, climate-controlled container was dedicated Tuesday at the Woodburn Volunteer Fire Department about 15 miles east of Fort Wayne near the Ohio state line. It’s on an exterior wall of the fire station. The Knights of Columbus of Indiana will pay for the first 100 baby boxes, which cost $1,500 to $2,000 each, said Monica Kelsey, a volunteer with the fire department who has been advocating for baby boxes in Indiana for several years. The boxes are equipped with a security system that notifies emergency personnel when a baby is dropped off. Emergency responders can get to the child within minutes.
All 50 states and the District of Columbia have safe haven laws, which allow unharmed newborns to be surrendered without fear of prosecution. Indiana’s law allows mothers to drop off newborns at police stations, fire stations and hospitals. Critics of baby boxes contend the containers make it easier to surrender a child without exploring other options and can deprive mothers of needed medical care. Kelsey, however, said that some people want total anonymity. She spoke of a girl who called a hotline she volunteers for who wanted to know where a baby box was. The girl refused to go to a hospital or fire station to drop off the baby, but eventually, her boyfriend brought the baby to a hospital. “This is not criminal,” Kelsey said. “This is legal. We don’t want to push women away.” The Woodburn baby box was actually installed April 19, the anniversary of when Kelsey says her birth mother abandoned her at a hospital when she was just hours old.
I’m not sure why no one else seems to think that it’s a bit dicey to leave a baby in a box where they’re completely alone for multiple minutes. A lot can happen in a few minutes. What if there’s some dude who really wants a baby and waits around outside of the baby box to help himself to a buffet of now for sale babies to take home with himself? What if a few Indiana hoodlums get a little bored of bombing mailboxes and decide to try their luck with a baby box? These are all questions that people other than me should be asking.
While I understand the whole argument that women want to protect their anonymity, I really think there has to be a way where these women can do so while also dropping off their babies somewhere safer than a literal metal box in a random wall. But you know what, I kind of hope this one works out. Mostly because I hate when people take out their own life mistakes on the baby. Sure, babies are pretty much just skin balloons full of vomit and shit, but they also are little human beings that didn’t ask to be the consequence of your decision to have bareback drunk sex with that stranger you met during $0.50 cent wing night at Hooters. So, while I’m a little nervous about sticking babies into what essentially seems like a brick oven, I do ultimately hope it works out. For the sake of the babies.