Gucci, Gucci, Goo
by Blake on Apr 26, 2009 at 09:10 Political
Eugenic- Pertaining to eugenics; relating to, or tending towards, the production of fine offspring. (eugenics)- The scientific application of the findings of the study of heredity to human beings with the object of perpetuating those inherent and hereditary qualities which aid in the development of the human race.
That sounds like quite a mouthful, doesn’t it? It also sounds fairly benign, until you begin, like a sore, to pick at it. Once you begin to look at the deeper meanings and think about the history of eugenics, this doesn’t sound like such a good thing, but this is what is happening under the surface here in the good old U.S. of A., as well as the European countries.
Since 1992, in Minnesota, there has been a DNA database that they keep on all newborns, and I have found that many other states also have a variant of this database. Let me explain.
Every time a baby is born, a nurse takes blood from a pinprick on the baby’s foot- this is to check for diseases and other conditions that the baby might have- a good thing, right? But then, whereas the hospital used to destroy the blood sample, now it is taken to a lab for gene sequencing, so these doctors can find out if your baby might be prone to cancer, Parkinson’s disease, Muscular Dystrophy, and a horde of other conditions that plague mankind. The Government keeps this blood database for comparison and experimentation. This still sounds like a good thing, right?
Here’s where it goes off the rails- because these doctors can do such a fine job on DNA. they can feasibly find out if your potential baby has a temper, is prone, (in their opinion) to violence, or might develop other qualities that might (again, in their opinion) be detrimental to the human race. Their job is to determine if your potential baby will be a plus or a minus in the great numbers game that is the human race. They want to be the judge of your baby’s potential- or lack thereof.
There have been advocates of Eugenics since the 1920s- it was taught with great fervor in the Universities of the world. People who thought of themselves as “Progressives” openly advocated the study of eugenics as a practical method of moving the evolution of human development forward dramatically. There was just one problem- not enough was known about DNA at the time, so practical study of it was stymied, but there were plenty of advocates, from Charles Lindbergh to Franklin Roosevelt, to Adolph Hitler.
Oh yeah, that’s right, many of the eugenics experiments Hitler’s SS carried out on Jewish prisoners were designed to create a “Master Race”- that is Eugenics at is most basic and cruel form. Because DNA was not understood well at that time, many of the experiments involved “grafting” different anatomical parts onto a living body to see if it would take. The SS would experiment on midgets, and twins, all to find out any data that might help them in their quest. The process and logic was tortured and cruel, and we would, you would think, never condone this barbaric behavior today. You would only be partly right.
Instead, the process can begin in the womb. You have heard that soon you will be able to choose traits for your child, thus having “designer” babies. You can choose to have your baby be blue eyed, blonde haired, all the traits you desire- but there is a dark side to this also- the undesirable traits that your child might have in his genes. Progressives want to weed out these undesirable traits, and might want you to terminate, indeed might have you terminate, by law, your child, so that the Down’s syndrome, cancer, Muscular Dystrophy, whatever might be the deficiency they believe they see, will not have a chance to become part of the human race. It might just be that your child doesn’t have, IN THEIR JUDGEMENT, the potential to be as intelligent as these “Progressives” would like.
So sorry, no baby for you.
The kicker is, they might just prohibit you from having any children, just to make sure that your DNA doesn’t pollute the purity they seek. For example, Sickle- cell Anemia is a killer of proportionately many more Blacks than any other race- getting rid of this would be a good thing, right? Maybe not, if you were the ones told that you were not allowed to have children since your potential children MIGHT get the disease. Now you are banned from having children, all based on a possibility.
Add to this is the very real probability that the insurance companies would use this data to determine if you could be covered by insurance. If you were prone to cancer- say it was a possibility that genetically you MIGHT get cancer, well, they would adjust their coverage accordingly, or deny you coverage altogether. This would be the “business” side of eugenics, and we would pay the cost in not only money, but potential.
Stephen Hawking is a fine example- he would have been killed in the womb, or never been allowed to be conceived, if the judgement was based on his physical condition alone. Yet this man made great strides in our understanding of physics and the cosmos, all while being enormously crippled physically.
The study and application of Eugenics is a very real thing, people, and this brings up the question that “Progressives” hate to hear- just because you may believe you can play God, does that really mean you should? Some things should be left to God alone.
Or as “Progressives” like to worship Darwin, leave the cycle of life to Natural Selection.
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Tags: database, designer babies, dna, eugenics
This is beyond frightening on so many levels I cannot even begin to express the half of it. I have studied DNA and there is still so much that is unknown and unexplainable that this whole idea of “selecting” for the genes you want (creating a designer baby, so to speak) is really playing with fire.
Consider Downs Syndrome alone (Trisomy 21). Look at all the characteristics that are affected by just one extra chromosome piece in one set of genes. Traditional features affecting the skin, tongue, eyes, brain, neurology, speech – the list goes on. How can one expect to know for certain that “coding” for blue eyes does not somehow affect another, latent portion of the genetic sequence causing problems in another area. Genes are expressed throughout a lifetime – there is no definitive way to determine who is going to be violent, smart, passive, etc.
And no one wants to take into account the fact that many things are a product of both genetics and environment. Yes, blue eyes are genetic. But blue irises can also be caused by trauma or disease. So what’s to say that any other trait is not affected and determined by both the coding of DNA and the environment in which it is nurtured? This is another small step right into cloning, too. Once you can code a fetus that exists, what’s to stop someone from making their own from scratch (so to speak – no disrespect intended).
You see, that’s the danger- it not just becomes a question of whether you CAN doit, but whether you should- the road to hell is paved with the best of intentions.
You have heard of the butterfly effect- well, who’s to really know whether the mother eats asparagus or not means a change that would otherwise not have happened.
So many variables.
Totally my point – I could not agree more. I don’t think that people get into the kind of thinking that is required before doing something so dangerous. Like you said – just because you can does not mean that you should or even that it should be an option.
I shudder when I contemplate the ads- a mother sets her newborn in the high chair, and looks fondly at her older daughter and says, ” Here’s your new brother- isn’t he nice?”
Her daughter says, ” We made him with Shake ‘n Bake- and I helped.”
The same fears crop up over genetically modified foods but before we knew it large numbers of foods sold in American stores contain GMO’s and they don’t even have to specify that on packaging.
I don’t know what I fear worse: scientists tinkering with the genetics of children or scientists tinkering with the genetics of the food our children eat.
A chicken or the egg scenario- the GMOs alter what they touch, and modified anything is bound to be affected by the Law of Unforeseen Consequences. Why do you think our children have grown taller, larger, and faster than ever before.
In the early 1900s, our average height was 5′ 9″- its 6′ 1″ now, when, if you look at natural evolution of species, when the species gets crowded, the natural tendency is to get smaller, to save food and space. Not so here, and it might be growth hormones in the beef, and chicken, and other modifications.
I gave up eating animals and animal bi-products years ago but unfortunately if you don’t want to blow extra dough on organic and non-GMO foods then you’re going to still be picking up GMOs from virtually everything you buy containing staple ingredients such as soy beans and corn. Sucks.
I agree with you there, which is why, even though i get a lot of pain from the gardening, I still grow most of what I eat, and try to use non GMOs wherever possible. I catch fish, and eat them too.
I mean, we are all going to die at some time, but like my quitting cigarettes- I didn’t want my last breath to be my last gasp, as it were- I had been trying to quit for forty years, and finally have been able to.
I am trying to help with global warming by eating those methane producing cows. I can’t do it alone. Adam, where are you?
I know Dog- I BBQ every chance I get- heck, at my age, any pleasure is welcome, and a good steak or rack of ribs- yum. That reminds me of a CIA officer who once said that he was burning Castro’s tobacco fields one cigar at a time.
A good cigar after a fine steak dinner. Yep, that’s the ticket.
Life is a sexually transmitted terminal condition. We are all going to die no matter how many plants we eat. Enjoy what God put here for us.