Embryonic Genetic Testing

If abortion raises a many ethical questions, I believe that we should start at addressing the people who also chose to abort solely off of the fact that their child can now test positive for Down Syndrome, Huntington's Disease, Learning disorders, ect. before they are born. The families, a lot of the time, were most likely planning to have a child in a financially stable relationship, assumed by the fact that they are paying for Embryonic Genetic Testing. This is the problem here, in my opinion. It seems extra unfair that an expecting family can just abort a child based off of the fact that they are not a perfect human being through various embryonic testing. With that being said, the parents can be tested for genetic disorders as well - and chose to have the "healthy" genes passed on to a potentially unrelated person to have the child - who will that child call mom or dad? I understand that most of the time in an abortion, the parents decide that they can't financially support a child or can't place on in their life at the time - in the dramatic Lifetime Movies on TV anyway. Which for some reason, I don't feel as strongly about - the part that gets me is that parents who use genetic testing are getting greedy, in my opinion. Event hough, they may just want the healthy, beautiful life like a "normal" child, for their baby - but unless the parents have experienced Down Syndrome, for example, who's to say that they don't fulfill a just as happy of a life as any other kid? It's almost as if they just don't want to try a little extra harder to provide for a child with potentially an "un picturesque" life.

To understand these conflicts, I think that science needs to stop flashing how fancy it can make all of our lives, we are just humans at the end of the day! Our species got along great without genetic testing, and with it humans may just turn into evolutionary machines - but what is perfect? What if we become too good? Or something slips and there is a large disease outbreak? Science is fantastic, and so is evolution , and even though they go hand in hand - I believe that the genetic testing part should leave reproduction alone.

Build Your Own Baby

While major concerns lie within the fight between birth control and abstinence and pro or against abortion are going on, another epidemic is beginning to grow. It’s called build your own baby or a more medical/ professional term is Pre-Implantation Genetic Diagnosis. PGD started as a procedure that couples did to diminish the chances of having a child with a life threatening disease. In recent news it has been an arugmentive topic about a couple who have a child with a rare blood disorder. If they had another child free of this disorder thanks to PGD their older child could be cured from this baby’s tissue. Many are questioning whether this is ethical of a doctor and or parents to go through with this procedure. They could potentially be bringing a child into the world to save their first born. Now, I try not to judge without know the real facts. Did this couple actually want a second child and then figured out that they could also save their first from dying if they did go through with it? Or are they just bringing this child into the world to save their first child? Regardless of their intentions it is still a huge argumentive topic.

Now in even more recent news this procedure is in the process of being tested to find out the characteristics of a future child such as curly hair, blue eyes and 5’4 on top of already choosing the sex of your future child. While people like Andrea Jone discuss Birth Control and the repercussions it has had on society an even bigger pandemic is beginning to occur. I can’t even imagine what society says about abortion or sex-selection, nevertheless about building your own child. If we are basing it off of what the church says then this is right up there with birth control and abortion. If God wishes us to sustain from sex till marriage and only bring a child into the world through a loving relationship between to heterosexuals who are married, can you even imagine what he or the church would have to say about picking your baby as if it was a toy?

Regardless of the church’s point of view, how many of you expect this to become the new “in” thing? I can undoubtedly say that once this procedure has worked out all its kinks and flaws this will be the so called “in” thing to do. I don’t know about you guys but I know that I have though once or twice about my future as a mom and I have always worried about my future child being picked on for not being cute or never finding a boyfriend. You can laugh all you want but, I don’t think many of you could deny thinking about this type of thing. Anyone that hopes to have a child in the future hopes that it is beautiful. Well now you don’t have to hope, you can pick your child out yourself!!!

Not only in the future will this be a legal and political battle for many Americans, I also think this will be another turning point in America. Just as Birthrights were as Jill Lepore wrote about. How would our culture deal with such new technology? We would essentially be god (for those who believe in him) or at least be taking some of his place. What mysteries will be left by the time our generation passes away? Not only now do we have the choice of having a child or not, we can choose the gender and soon choose the characteristics of our babies. As for argument sake, what side do I take? The same side as everything else, I can see the good and the bad, even the very bad from both sides. But for now, we will just have to see what the future holds.

Patriotism vs. peace

The wars which our country is involved in have caused division in opinion across the nation. I was sick of hearing all of my friends argue when they had no historical or quantitative basis to their arguments. We all came to a conclusion that we didn’t support the government’s decision to wage war with Iraq, but never came to a consensus over how to deal with the issue. I tried to do some online research to look into the argument in a more in depth fashion but this made me more confused than ever because both sides had strong points and weaknesses in their argument so I looked to the Bible for some type of guidance on what may be the right way to look at the issue of being patriotic and respecting authority even when the government is involved in wars we don’t all support. I have always been a believer in the Bible and had a personal relationship with God so I thought this would be a great way to find a good way to view the issue but it wasn’t as simple as I thought.
Just as the seating arrangement in class I found myself trying to stand by my religious beliefs and my political position. The problem with this doesn’t really come from the way I interpret the Bible, but the way I feel others see me as a believer. In class I felt as though by sitting where I agree with a fair amount of science other believers would see my stance as an injustice to the religion but I don’t perceive science really interfering with my religion so for me this really shouldn’t be the case. As the only religious person involved in the argument with my friends I was expected the same; being a strong patriotic stance due to versus in the Bible such as Romans 13: 1-3. This isn’t really a fair expectation though because with further research I found other versus in the old testament that speak of epic battles of the Israelites against peoples trying to subdue them and their flee from Egypt.
The way I have come to look at this is through the context of the situations in the script. Much like any other religions and everyday forms of media single versus can be taken out of context or applied wrongly to different situations, sometimes even contradicting the original form they were in. I feel that skepticism of authority is good in many ways but respect and the manner in which one is a skeptic really dictates the Biblical correctness of ones views and actions. I feel that the stance one takes must be justified but we are all entitled to have our own stances relentless of belief, laws, or any other program that points us in a certain direction. I want to live my life accordingly and worry less about what others think like the class seating arrangement and more about what I truly believe; whether it be empowering the government through patriotism, disagreeing with certain institutions or living my everyday life.

Gender selection - Why do people want to do this?

Although gender selection during pregnancy has been banned for decades in China, people has been looking into new ways of knowing the result before the baby was born. Some simple solution would be bribing the nurse when the women went for ultrasound examinations during pregnancy. Although the nurse could not explicitly say whether the baby is a boy or a girl, she could offer candies or toys of different color to the couple -- blue for boy and pink for girl -- the traditional way of distinguishing the two genders. Another probably dangerous way is amniocentesis, which is usually only used to find out babies with genetic diseases like Down syndrome and Edwards syndrome. This procedure has been abused in some places where the discrimination against women is still high.

Apart from some parents who just want to buy respective baby clothes for the newborn, many parents just want to know the gender of the baby. If it is a boy, the whole family will celebrate the news and the mother-in-law of the wife will become especially kind to her. On the contrary, if the test show that the baby is a girl, most people in the family will show disappointment and they will go for a second test just to confirm the result. In the case that a second child is allowed, the family probably won't abort the baby, but choose to have a second baby -- a son.

One of the reason that those people do not want baby girls is that they believe a son will bring more fortune to the family and can continue the presence of the family since any children that he may have will have his last name. They also believe that sons can better take care of them when they are old and daughters will not be able to perform this task well. However, the modern situation is far different than the traditional situation 500 years ago and women nowadays stand more or less equally in most developed and developing countries. There are numerous women with talent and capabilities in the industry and business field and they sometimes even earn bigger money than their male counterparts. Most women now in China could find a decent job when they graduate from college so the chance that "daughters" won't be able to keep her family alive is slim. The modern family structure in China also changed from that of 500 years ago, when married couples will stay with the husband's family for the rest of their life and the wives were not allowed to go back to her own parents unless in some special circumstances. In the old days, "married daughters are like spilt water", as the saying goes. Women were constrained in her husband's house and weren't able to come back and take care of her own parents. This is no longer the case in the modern society as most couples buy or rent their own house and take care parents of both side together. Even if the children could not take care of the parents, the senior people still have a choice to go to nursing homes, to be taken care of by professionals.

"The Pill" Should we use is?

I have been a part of the Catholic religion my entire life, but for the past few years I have experienced views that are much different from what the Catholic church preaches, and therefore, I have grown a bit away from the church. One example of this is that I personally believe the use of birth control is okay, but for as long as the Catholic Church and the birth control pill have been around, the two have been at odds.

To strict Catholics, birth control is essentially a way of "playing God." Some even go as far as to consider it to be a form of abortion. By using birth control one alters God's creation of the fertile body and because of this his plan for us is being altered. Anytime that one alters God's plan it is considered a mortal sin. Another point that Catholics make is that nobody should be having sex until they are married and capable of having and supporting children of their own. When one follows this, there is no need for birth control because it would be a blessing to be given a child. This, however, is most often not the case. Many people have sex before being married and that is where the opposing view, on birth control comes in.

If someone chooses to have sex before being married and before being ready to support a child, they should have the right to prevent it. Birth control does not kill an unborn baby like abortion does. Birth control pills are simply hormone pills that prevent the release of a woman's eggs so that she is unable to become pregnant. This means that there is no fertilization, no child, no abortion. God blessed humans with intelligence to create new tools and technologies and birth control is just one of these inventions. I see it as a good thing because it is so sad to see children who are unwanted or are being raised by parents who are unable to support them. Some married couples are unable to financially support a child so does that mean that they should refrain from having sex until they can?

According to the Catholic church, the answer is no. Catholics are allowed to use a system called Natural Family Planning to plan when they will have their children. This plan does not use any form of birth control besides just learning and understanding the body and when it is most capable of fertilization. The only way that this differs from birth control is that there is not a supplement being used to alter "God's plan," all that is used is that human body.

Sex-selection abortion

With the development of technology, sex-selection abortion become possible around us. Sex-selection abortion is used to prevent the birth of a child of a undesired sex. Currently the victims of these abortions are overwhelmingly female. This preference is based on both traditions and economic realities.

With the help of modern technology, it seems that sex-selection abortion happens in most of countries all over the world. This sex-selection technology is based on a new blood test. It is reliable to determine whether the child is a boy. In most asian countries, Ultrasound is one of the most popular method used to decide a Sex-selection abortion. Actually, Sex-selection abortion may cause a lot of serious issues like gender imbalance and domestic violence.

Sex-selection abortion is prenatal discrimination based on gender. It is unfair to girls and boys and girls should be treated equally. Based on my personally knowledge, sex-selection abortion must violates The Fourteenth Amendment and must be unconstitutional. Many people think that Sex-selection abortion stem from Asia. As a Chinese student, I will say it is true and I experienced several Sex-selection abortion issues in my country. In China, especially in relative poor areas, male children are widely preferred over females. In United States, "In Americans of Chinese, Indian and Korean descent families, if the first child was a girl, it was more likely that a second child would be a boy. If the first two children were girls, it was even more likely that a third child would be male," reported the Times. I think it is unnecessary and stupid because boys and girls are the same and they all have some ability to integrate into society.

Most Americans object Sex-selection abortion. It is good that over 86 percent of Americans support a ban on sex-selection abortion. Sex-selection abortion is morally and culturally devastating. How can you kill a unborn child just because she is a girl? People who support Sex-selection abortion should reconsider their "trandition" reason. With the development of human society, people should have a new understanding about tranditions, abandon useless and wrong ones, improve rational ones. Sex-selection abortion is absolutely inhuman and immoral, it should be banned and treated as illegal all over the world. Our culture and society need both man and woman and any bias will break the balance and destory culture structure. I agree with Andrea Tone that technological and political change moves faster than we expect, and often the outcomes are not what we expect. But only the change that based on respect about equality of men and women can promote the social progress.

Posting Assignment #8 (due Sunday 12/4, 11:59 P.M.; comment by 11:59 Monday, 12/5) Building a theory-bridge of charity—to reach people who believe 'nonsense'

 [long post; read it carefully]

When we did our 'belief / science' spectrum in class we could all look out over our group and see—graphically—how we differed in the ways we see science, facts, rationality, spirituality, commitment to views of the world and the universe, emotion, proof—everything.  It was a moment of affirmation for many of us, because we were able to treat our many differences with complete respect.

It's not always that way.  In 'Beyond…reason,' Robin and Carl try to explain how we might understand the visceral, powerful, passionate and often ugly ways we 'construct' those whose views radically contradict ours.  They show how words (rhetoric) work to construct worlds that may never be brought into alignment.  And why it matters so much.  And why we all probably do it.

So maybe, over in the other corner from where we sat on Tuesday, are people who really don't live in the same worlds we do—though we pass on the street and sit beside each other in Al's all the time.  Maybe.

In this late blog post, we can take this further by imagining a very specific 'subject position' different from our own, identifying a very specific claim about the world on which we would probably differ, and offering that person a way to see how the differences are constructed.  And why it matters so much. 

NOT a rant.  NOT Hannity or Jon Stewart.  No sneering, eye-rolling, snarky, funny put-downs.  No preaching.  No testifying. No self-serving superiority.  No unsupported claims. No condescension—as much fun as any of that can be.

Reasoned, careful, theoretically-anchored, self-aware and charitable. 

We may never change a mind.  But we may be able to get clear how we differ.  Step one across the bridge.

1.  Identify a subject position.  The model here is 'Beyond…reason,'  but for you and your world.  Think about how Robin lays out his hard-won investment in science, ornithology, geology, mountaineering, careful driving, big words, art, representation—and how his it contrasts with the world of guys who like the grand and grandiloquent, and who read the Whitney's catalog and build trucks as art.  Detailed.  Specific.  Maybe it's your best friend or your aunt.  Maybe it's your former Pastor or Hebrew School teacher.  Maybe it's your biology teacher.

2.  Identify an issue with a specific claim in it. The MCCL billboard above has many.  One is actual science: 'embryos are just tiny babies.'  One involves gender roles and pairings; a dude with his cap on backwards, and a babe with a cute hat with a butterfly.  Science.  Sex and sexuality, of course, if you can—but really anything that falls under our big umbrella of 'Science and Culture.'   Use the claims in Andrea Tone's history of 'the pill' if you like; things like Loretta Lynn singing sexual freedom and Bad Men.  Medicalization of sexuality.  Side effects.  Birth control as a 'woman's issue' (variously). The total alteration of sex, love, marriage, families that comes about when various 'reproductive technologies' become available.  'Rights' (privacy, life).  'Hook-ups' or 'friends with benefits' (discursive technologies).  Abstinence rings, clubs or balls (discursive technologies).  Arranged marriages (discursive technologies). Celibate priesthoods  (discursive technologies).  E-Harmony  (discursive / cyber technology).  Though we're not there yet, Jill Lepore's history of Planned Parenthood politics, the Pope, and the MCCL website (next week) are full of material.  So is your life.  Get it small and specific; good issue = good blogpost.

3.  Build a bridge. Writing in any form / format that works for you, explain how and why this issue is a total stumbling block, and what needs to be done to understand the inherent conflicts.  You're explaining and showing.  You're using our work (all of it) to make the case.  Your goal is understanding—going both ways.