Neil McKenty has a terrific blog going, and his formula is pretty straighforward: pose a question and get outa the way. He gets some very lively discussions going on current events, and for the most part, his commenters are exquisitely well-behaved.The most recent topic is Dr. Henry Morgentaler, and whether or not he should be awarded the Order of Canada. Opinions are divided, and the arguements on both sides are pretty eloquent. If you want to join that discussion, go here.And, as happens more often than not, the discussion tends to branch out and get OT. On a personal level, I like to stick to one topic at a time, so I tend to chide others when they do that. Otherwise, my own stream-of-consciousness tendencies can take over, and the train goes right off the track, with nothing accomplished.During the current discussion, I got sidetracked a bit by one of the others (who is anti-choice, and wants to know if we pro-choicers want to kill Bill Gates in a flurry of retroactive selective abortions -- presumably because he is genetically flawed and not because of his company's shenanigans with computer technology), and I ended up saying:"Existing persons aside (because no, we are not going to rewrite history or make other peoples’ choices for them), I fail to see the advantage in deliberately propagating flawed genetics. Stock breeders cull weaknesses. Why don’t humans? Why do we deliberately weaken our own chances for survival as a species?"
I was going to delete that part of the comment, but I realized that it might make a really good topic for discussion. Why do we not breed ourselves the same way farmers breed crops and ranchers breed animals? We have the capability to do it that way. So why don't we?We breed plants and animals to be stronger and more disease resistant, so why do we insist that genetically flawed and fragile humans should not only live beyond their natural abilities, but also that they be allowed to pollute the already flawed gene pool by breeding their weaknesses right back into it?"Selective breeding" is a boon to agriculture, but a bogeyman to anti-choicers. We insist on better food crops because we are brain-dead when it comes to controlling our own stock. Anti-choice activists decry the deliberate destruction of failed human genes that produce non-viable monsters. They will spit and claw at the sight of the words, "failed human genes" and probably faint at the word, "monsters." But failed and monsters is what they are. And those same people would insist that food crops around the world should be managed and bred to provide more and better nourishment to feed their own failed crops.Most species start at the beginning and work their way up the evolutionary ladder. As a species, humans started in the middle and worked our way to opposite ends simultaneously. Technologically, we're progressing faster and faster. Biologically, we are regressing at the same speed. At the end of time, I think we'll find that H. G. Wells was right. We are the architects of our own destruction. And, under the pretext of proponing human rights for fetuses, the anti-choice crowd are determined to wipe humans off the face of the earth entirely. And they accuse the pro-choice people of crimes against humanity! How much more criminal can you get than to order the destruction of an entire species -- and your own species at that?
