The opposite of 'designer babies'

[mik0rs]

the debate about genetic engineering is pretty weird: it seems to revolve around finding the borderline between "justified" and "frivolous" uses, i.e. screening out a fatal condition might be "justified" while screening out short-sightedness or lack of melanin are "frivolous"

but why shouldn't parents be able to do these things? not sure about the dwarf couple wanting dwarf kids, but the objection that "the kid doesn't have a choice like he does with religion" doesn't stand up, because if genetic modification were impossible, they still wouldn't have a choice, on account of the fact that unborn (and un-conceived) kids don't have choices, period

If it's frivolous then it shouldn't be in the parents' hands anyway.

I've heard about deaf parents wanting only deaf children, how fucking selfish and beyond sense is that? It's of no general benefit to the child beyond belonging to the section of society to which their parents belong, and surely they would belong (at least to an extent) anyway given that their parents do and given they would have a broad understanding of their parents' situation?

There must be more to it than that but it's only limiting the child by deliberately "giving" them a handicap.

In the situation that this type of treatment were available maybe restraint is the order of the day, with only life-threatening conditions being treated.

[ajerara]

I saw a TV show about a woman who had genetic deafness that ran in her family, her son was born deaf. There was a new operation available to her that would make him hear, and she decided to go for it. The deaf members of her family were so angry at her, they were crying, raging and begging her not to do it, up until the last minute. I was thinking, wtf? She went ahead with the operation and it was successful. Since these people have never heard anything, they have no idea what they would be denying this child by not enabling him to hear music, voices, the sounds of nature.

I've been overweight my whole life, and there's no way I would wish that on my kids.

[ek]

It's never to late to improve your fitness level.

[Scourge]

It is very fucking selfish. Why in the fuck would you want to limit your child to what you've had to suffer all your life?

Funny this came up. There was an episode of House dealing with exactly this kind of mentality today. Dwarf woman with a supposedly dward child. Turns out the child could get treated and be normal size. The mother doesn't want to go through with it because she wants the kid to be a dwarf. :icon27: Neither does the kid at first, being afraid to disappoint mommy.

[Hannibal]

...but the objection that "the kid doesn't have a choice like he does with religion" doesn't stand up, because if genetic modification were impossible, they still wouldn't have a choice, on account of the fact that unborn (and un-conceived) kids don't have choices, period

I don't follow. The relevant hypothetical here would include the idea that genetic modfication IS possible. The parents are clearly acting as choice-makers by proxy for their wittle critter.

"Sorry Dad, Jesus was a fruit and I choose Zoltarr as my savior."

vs.

"Hey Dad-cunt, why the fuck did you ensure that my max height would be 2 ft 6"?

Don't you agree that these 2 cases are pretty easy to distinguish?

[Massive Quasars]

There's a permanence (i.e. irreversibility) to dwarfism that could impose itself on developmentally mature human decision making agents who may, given the opportunity, choose not to live at eye to crotch level for the rest of their lives.

I'm big on morphological freedom, but ideally engineering children in favor of certain functional impairments or physical short-comings perhaps ought to be restricted to reversible or foreseeably feisably reversible procedures. Potentiality need not enter this discussion, we begin with the assumption that the parents choose to develop their embryo(s) into children and raise those children into adulthood.

[seremtan]

...but the objection that "the kid doesn't have a choice like he does with religion" doesn't stand up, because if genetic modification were impossible, they still wouldn't have a choice, on account of the fact that unborn (and un-conceived) kids don't have choices, period

I don't follow. The relevant hypothetical here would include the idea that genetic modfication IS possible. The parents are clearly acting as choice-makers by proxy for their wittle critter.

"Sorry Dad, Jesus was a fruit and I choose Zoltarr as my savior."

vs.

"Hey Dad-cunt, why the fuck did you ensure that my max height would be 2 ft 6"?

Don't you agree that these 2 cases are pretty easy to distinguish?

yes, and i did say i wasn't convinced by the reasoning of the dwarf couple who wanted a dwarf kid

my point about choice was: at present, no one has choice whether or not a kid is born with diabetes (unless you count abortion). if genetic manipulation were possible for any and every condition, parents would have a choice, and would therefore be responsible, and therefore to blame. i think it's this responsibility, rather than any specific choice, that people are uncomfortable with

someone in this thread was pointing out that the kid didn't have a choice, and i was pointing out that unborn children never have a choice under any conditions, so the choice argument was weak

in the case of the dwarf people, i'm inclined to make the un-PC argument that dwarfism would be considered an undesirable affliction by most people (a bug rather than a feature ), and since we would normally consider it a crime to inflict a disability on someone (i.e. by smashing their kneecaps so they couldn't walk), it should be considered as such in the case of someone wanting to do that to someone before they're born

[SplishSplash]

They want to create a Dwarf race

[Massive Quasars]

Subjects to the master race one hopes?

[Dukester]

in the case of the dwarf people, i'm inclined to make the un-PC argument that dwarfism would be considered an undesirable affliction by most people

What is really dumb is that you are required to make the distinction that that is an un-PC argument. How many dwarves, oops, LITTLE PEOPLE , if they had the choice right now, would not trade their shotened stature for the regular proportioned body of everyone else?

Parents raising kids to believe the same things they do are a parents right. Wanting their kids to have the same disabilities they have is just downright cruel. Most parent want their kids to have everyting better than they did. At least I thought so.

[seremtan]

it's because the issue of discrimination gets thrown in the mix where it has no place. people with various disabilities are afraid that treating those disabilities as undesirable will send "the wrong message"

[eepberries]

Why the hell would anyone want to do this

[Hannibal]

my point about choice was: at present, no one has choice whether or not a kid is born with diabetes (unless you count abortion). if genetic manipulation were possible for any and every condition, parents would have a choice, and would therefore be responsible, and therefore to blame. i think it's this responsibility, rather than any specific choice, that people are uncomfortable with

someone in this thread was pointing out that the kid didn't have a choice, and i was pointing out that unborn children never have a choice under any conditions, so the choice argument was weak

Sure, but I think most people are focusing (correctly) on the post-natal choice landscape of the child when they distinguish the religion case from the Sir Dwarfalot case. Doomer makes this point very clearly. And you're right....it is more clearly an issue of parental responsibility, especially in terms of how their deliberate fucking about pre-birth may or may not constrain said critter's self-determination or quality of life.

[tnf]

regardless of your position, it is good that these issues are being brought to the forefront a bit before we actually have the capacity to 'dial in' any genetic condition we really want.

I'm waiting for the days when insurance companies include genetic screening with a routine physical, and then base your insurance premiums on your genetic predisposition to have certain conditions (i.e. you have a certain allele that, statistically speaking, gives you a 75% chance of developing prostate cancer so you pay more than someone without it.)

I hope that day never comes, but I can see insurance companies arguing that this kind of testing is just a natural extension of a pre-coverage physical examination they might give to check for other risk factors like smoking, blood pressure, high cholesterol.

What do you think of that?

[seremtan]

when the techniques are available, that day will come. consider how governments are already in the pockets of business, and are already after our DNA for their gigantic turrurist-fightin' databases. they'll even be offering people 'life-expectancy' tests based on their DNA