Last week, I wrote about the preventable death of a baby at freebirth.

So the surges keep coming every day, but still no baby. Just making me more and more tired and my body ache everywhere. Nothing I could do would ease the pain but I tried so hard to stay positive. My water broke the evening of the 4th and was discolored. Since I was 42 weeks I thought it was normal. But as the days went by it got more foul smelling and turned a sick poop color which was constantly leaking and the baby stopped moving on the 6th. I woke on the 7th with so much pain and pouring meconium that Chris and I agreed it was time to transfer.

Not surprisingly, baby Journey Moon was dead.

[pullquote align=”right” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]Leader of freebirth movement, vowing not to run and hide, immediately runs and hides.[/pullquote]

I also wrote about the hallmark of freebirth advocates: emotional immaturity. Freebirthers are monstrously egotistical, reflexively defiant of authority, unwilling to admit mistakes, incapable of accepting responsibility for their own actions and entirely devoid of any empathy for their suffering babies.

In the wake of the outpouring of negative publicity about freebirth and the Facebook group that cheered the mother on to Journey Moon’s death, its creator Emilee Saldaya defiantly vowed:

This is not the time to run, hide and be silenced.

Whereupon she ran away and hid by shutting down her Facebook group.

It is with a heavy heart that we officially announce the closing of our four wonderful groups here on Facebook. As of November 1st, all members will be removemed and the groups closed permanently.

Her explanation confirms the egotism of freebirthers, refusal to admit mistakes, inability to accept responsibility for their own actions and shocking lack of empathy for suffering and dead babies.

Saldaya’s attitude toward the death — shit happens! — is typical of the fatalism freebirth advocates display when a baby dies.

…[A] member of our private Free Birth Society group tragically lost her baby during her birth process earlier this month. The painful reality is that babies do sometimes die, in all settings, including the hospital, and every pregnant woman must contend with the possibility of death, which exists for each of us.

This is the equivalent of a mother defending the death of an unrestrained baby who died after being ejected through the windshield during a fender bender by declaring that babies in car seats die, too. That doesn’t make it okay to refuse to put your infant in a car seat.

Moreover, principled people look at an infant death and ask: how can we avoid this happening to another baby? In contrast, freebirth advocates ask: how can we avoid blame?

The bulk Saldaya’s post is a series of reasons why this dead baby is not her fault and how the death has impacted HER.

…I have received hundreds of death threats. Posts and private messages calling for my murder, my jailing, and for my family to be harmed, have come streaming in … [S]everal unsubstantiated blog articles have gone viral, full of lies, misinformation, slander and defamation.

There’s no justification for hateful messages but it is par for the course on the internet. I receive them often.

In light of this, we at Free Birth Society are advancing our plan to move off Facebook, to a safe and private membership platform.

I doubt that; they’ll almost certainly be back on Facebook when the publicity fades or even sooner. They are always anxious to proselytize and you can’t do that when you only communicate with each other.

I am so proud of the community that we have built together. This is not the time to run, hide or be silenced. It is a time to become more steadfast, more powerful and more protected in this radical work of healing the deepest wounds on this earth.

English to English translation: I will be continuing to charge hundreds of dollars for private freebirth “coaching” and courses.

I stand and will always stand for women’s reproductive autonomy, our bodily authority, and our freedom to make our own decisions surrounding our health, pregnancies and births.

Here’s something that’s will blow Emilee’s mind:

I too stand and will always stand for women’s reproductive autonomy. But having the legal right to refuse medical care does not mean that refusing medical care is wise or ethical. It does not justify lying about the risks of childbirth and the high death toll of freebirth.

Emilee Saldaya is as ethically responsible for Journey Moon’s death as if she had taken out a gun and shot her. By counseling her mother DURING labor that medical care was unnecessary, Saldaya provided false reassurance that led the mother to avoid the very care that might have saved her Journey Moon’s life.

That’s not promoting women’s autonomy. It’s denying them the knowledge they need to make the best decisions for themselves and their families. It may not be illegal but it is morally reprehensible.