People with serious inheritable diseases should not be allowed to reproduce.

[LongLiveLife]

So I took this political compass test last night, and this was the only assertion that genuinely mired me; I saw equal arguments for and against, and though in the end I chose 'Agree', I don't. And at the same time I do.

From a utilitarian perspective, following through with this is ideal: it minimizes the prevalence of a disease in future generations and, from this, the future burden on healthcare; on an individual level it negates the reduction in life quality the disease in question brings. However, the belief impinges on the rights of those who already bear the burden of living with disease, and that some lives are worth more than others follows from it. Though it will be for the greater good, a part of me fundamentally disagrees with the notion.

There's also the issue with defining what is and what is not a 'serious inheritable disease', and where prevention falls into the messy business of eugenics.

A friend of mine suffers from muscular dystrophy, an X-linked, recessive disease. Of his own free will he chose to abstain from having children; and that's great, but there's a difference between forcing someone and letting them come to the decision themselves.

Thought I'd open this up for discussion.

 

[Taylor]

I think this comes down to the preferences of the many versus the rights of the few.

Yes, it makes sense to limit those with inheritable diseases so that they cannot breed; however, that presents the moral issue of actually preventing someone from having children.

I don't particularly think we should force people with these diseases to not have children because that's infringing on their own personal rights. It isn't our choice to make, and honestly, I'd like to think that the lives of people are more important than a strain on healthcare. Still, that presents another question on its own: are the lives of people now more important than the lives of the people of tomorrow?

I see your conundrum.

 

[Ulti]

Morals tend to slow down progress. The human condition, forever more.

 

[Taylor]

Both Feminism and the Civil Rights movement might beg to differ.

Morally, slavery and segregation were considered wrong by a majority of the people. Politically, Jim Crow laws still kept blacks from gaining any ground. In the end, morals won and progress was made.

 

[Nyangoro]

Personally, I disagree. Fortunately, I'm not in a position where I'm required to make a decision on who can and cannot reproduce.

 

[LongLiveLife]

For any reason other than those have been mentioned already? I only ask because I'm in an uncomfortable place of neither here nor there, and I'm looking to take a stand.

 

[Nyangoro]

In my personal view, I always find this to be a very risky kind of thing to regulate. While it might make sense from a progressive, utilitarian standpoint; actually forcing the regulation indicates a lack of trust or respect between those who are regulating and those who are being regulated. It's like telling them that they would never make the connection themselves, and that the need to be controlled. People tend not to like to be regulated on things they can decide for themselves.

Regulating it also implies that being born with a disease means that you have no hope to live a good life; or at the very least, that the odds are very much against you. This kind of thinking runs the risk of sparking a system (be it official or unofficial) that includes the declaration that certain people are "pariahs"; and such a distinction just doesn't sit well with me.

 

[Johnny Stooge]

that presents the moral issue of actually preventing someone from having children.

I see absolutely no issue with this. Some people simply should not have kids. Drugged teenage kids for instance. I'd be handing out vasectomies and rods to those kids in a heartbeat.

And sadly, I agree that those with inheritable diseases should not have kids for fear of passing it on. I would, however, be perfectly fine with it should our medicine get to the point where we could correct such problems, say in like, the embryo.

 

[The Lionheart]

Taking away liberties of the few to benefit the many has seldom worked out in history, and I believe our individual rights are one of the most important things we have.

People who can pass down these diseases understand the risks they are taking when they reproduce. They should be allowed to weigh the costs and benefits themselves, not have some law do it for them.

 

[Orion]

I think until we have process such as Stooge spoke of, the ability to fix or even prevent congenital or hereditery diseases in the embryonic stages of develop, or seamless treatments such as with nanotechnology that can work as a person lives their lives as normal, it is - at least in part - worth taking away the rights of these people. As Life talked about, it reduces an avoidable strain on healthcare systems, and in future, hopefully when something like perfect nanotechnology comes around, people can reproduce as much as they want, regardless of what illnesses they have or had. Mind you, such an illness would be taken care of by the nanomachines before the person reproduces anyway.

 

[Alaude Drenxta]

I'm surprised that you all are so comfortable with worsening the quality of life of a person who is already facing great hardship, not to mention the massive, unthinkable, irrational detraction of basic NATURAL human rights. Often enough, genetic diseases are not even passed on to the children, however that aside, I can see the utilitarian argument, and I raise you one "inalienable human rights".

No human being has the right to deny another, who may be a fit parent, to bear a child and experience that dream. What are we, China?

 

[MangaCrazy101]

I thought the only reason china did that was to control its already over-populated country

*ding sound* That is correct.

My mother actually has a diseased gene inside her from my great-great grandmother, but fortunatly that gene is not the gene that was given to me or any of her other children as one of her 23 chromosomes of which she gave.

Diseases is genuinely a stroke of which chromosome you are given from your parents and even if your parents donnot technically have this disease it is still in their genes the gene that is not dominate. A person can have blue and brown eye genes but have brown eyes and still have a child with blue eyes because their partner also gave a recessive blue eye chromosome. The brown eye gene is dominate over the blue eye gene.

So over all it wouldn't really matter over-all my great grand children could still get this disease because I have the gene too (I wish not to name the disease). So I find restricting people on their rights to be able to have children a little unorthadox.
But that's just me.

 

[LongLiveLife]

I'm surprised that you all are so comfortable with worsening the quality of life of a person who is already facing great hardship, not to mention the massive, unthinkable, irrational detraction of basic NATURAL human rights.

This was my biggest problem with fully accepting the argument.

Often enough, genetic diseases are not even passed on to the children, however that aside, I can see the utilitarian argument, and I raise you one "inalienable human rights".

True, they may not exhibit the disease, but they will be carriers (actually, this is also up for debate, but for argument's sake let's assume a recessive disease with one homozygous recessive parent suffering from the disease) and as long as the gene remains circulating in the gene pool, any future descendent has the risk of inheriting the disease.

Diseases is genuinely a stroke of which chromosome you are given from your parents and even if your parents donnot technically have this disease it is still in their genes the gene that is not dominate. A person can have blue and brown eye genes but have brown eyes and still have a child with blue eyes because their partner also gave a recessive blue eye chromosome. The brown eye gene is dominate over the blue eye gene.

While this is not wrong, it provides a very, very oversimplified view. You essentially talk about the difference between genotype and phenotype, which no doubt forms a large part of the study of genetic diseases, but there are other preventable genetic diseases that are not strictly inheritable.

There are genetic diseases in which neither parent is a carrier or a sufferer. Polysomy X (people who are neither XX or XY but rather XXX or XXXX or XXXXX or XXXXXX) is not inherited, because the disease renders its victims infertile, but it has a genetic component, which results from genetic abnormalities in other genes.

A plethora of genes controls eye color, not just one.

So over all it wouldn't really matter over-all my great grand children could still get this disease because I have the gene too

Would you say the same thing if you actually had the disease?

It's also important that we clear the definition of what is and isn't a serious disease. We all have genetic quirks about our bodies. I have an extra bone on both my feet, but it's hardly a serious disease. Things like cystic fibrosis or muscular dystrophy, however, massively impact on the individual's life, and they are serious diseases.

 

[Oberon]

I said I agree. It's a bit of a paradox here; I'd rather reproduction not take place with deadly inheritable diseases, but at the same time, I would never force anything on someone.

 

[Nayru's Love]

I'm skeptical on this. I'm all for human rights, as in, having the freedom to pursue your own happiness, so long as it doesn't directly affect someone else against their will. The problem I have, though, is with the child, who's going to live with this disease for the rest of their life. It's not like abortion, where I find nothing for the child/fetus/whatever TO experience.

 

[Luap]

Just recently, I've been learning about these sort of diseases in Biology.
It's a hard thing to decide, whether or not it should or shouldn't be regulated. For each disease, the risk of it passing really depends on whether it is a dominant or recessive gene holding the disease, if it's X-linked, which partner has it, or if both have it.
So, from a statistical point of view, really, to be prudent, you'd have to regulate every disease separately, for every scenario. Furthermore, a lot of people aren't even aware if they are holding the gene for such a disease, so people would have to get tested for these things before even thinking about having unprotected sex. Correct me if I'm wrong, but you can't get tested for every disease at once, as compared to STDs, so you'd have to undergo multiple tests just to learn whether or not it'd be safe for your children to give life to them. This costs more money, and a lot of time, both of which could be spent of more harmful causes.

From a moral point of view, I'd say no every time. It just seems wrong to say "No Children for you." In my opinion, if the parents know they are a holder of the disease, they should be told the chances of the child having it, and make the decision on their own.

 

[Maxyli138]

As a human being with rights, the individual should have a choice on whether they want to risk giving their offspring a serious disease or not. But from the child's point of few, it's not fair to them to have or be a carrier for a disease they neither wanted nor asked for. And if someone with an inheritable disease does decide to have children, their offspring should also have a choice on whether they want kids or not. Having this cycle continue will lead to the human population gradually becoming filled with more people with serious diseases. But someone's desire of wanting their own children can be very strong. Not being able to reproduce while other humans of equal rights can would be seen as unfair. And passing on a harmful disease to an innocent child would be equally unfair.

It's all how you look at it.

 

[Nayru's Love]

But from the child's point of few, it's not fair to them to have or be a carrier for a disease they neither wanted nor asked for.

I feel like it's saying that families in poverty shouldn't be able to reproduce either, though. It's not fair for those children to live in poverty, either.

 

[Dogenzaka]

Hopefully nanoengineering and genetic engineering will advance to the point that, like a child getting a vaccine to prevent an illness, doctors can tell parents "Hey, your kid is going to have x disease, so let us know when you get pregnant so we can fix the DNA in the embryo to not contract what you have".

This would help stop Huntington's disease.

Morals tend to slow down progress. The human condition, forever more.

You're so right. Let's go back to the bonking jungle caves and watch society burn.

 

[metrifyx]

I disagree with this. As far as utilitarianism goes, yes, the diseases will spread. However, serious diseases do not change the fact that all people make a contribution to society. Of course this is impossible to predict, but society could actually be hindered by the lack of people, and thus, lack of contribution emotionally and mentally.

It is also impossible to predict the quality of the child's life. We should keep in mind that their parents do have experience with the disease. If the child does have the disease, then the family will know the best way to deal with it. If the potential parent finds the disease too much to handle and strongly doubts that their child would be able to have a good life (either with the disease or with a parent who has the disease), then they will most likely not have a child.

Lastly, and this depends if the disease can only be spread genetically or not, who's to say that the child wouldn't develop the disease later on in life from another cause?

Overall, I feel as if there are too many variables in order to successfully determine that the quality of life and impact of said reproduction are generally negative.