Sense, for once

It seems the European Court has made a sensible judgement. Why I feel this is sufficiently unusual to write on it is unclear, but I think a few things need to be said. A young woman thought it would infringe her human rights were she not permitted, against the wishes of her former partner, who fertilised them, to use frozen embryos to have a baby. Against her human rights? Her rights, surely, are such things as not being tortured, being able to speak freely in criticism of those in power, having enough food and a roof over her head, and so on. Having a family is a lifestyle choice, much like owning a Ferrari, or spending your summer travelling around Europe. Some people, whether for financial or biological reasons, don't have that choice, and it's possibly sad, but not a case for the European Court.
The other thing that must be stressed here, and that seems to be overlooked in most commentary, is the right to not have a family. It takes two people to create a child, and if one of those people doesn't want to, then their wishes must be taken into account. After all, they are the ones who are arguing for the status quo, as opposed to some radical, probably unpleasant, disruption to their life. And the voices of those of us who don't want to have families are often ignored. After all, we pay our taxes to support the education and care of other people's children, we're often left at work carrying on when the parents have had to leave because little Jonny's got a cold, we're the ones who get mugged by hoody-wearing teenage thugs and have to pay for their time in borstal, and so on. And we leech nothing out of the economy. Who's going to stand up for us?