334
The Young Conservatives Trying to Make Eugenics Respectable Again
(www.theatlantic.com)
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
this post was submitted on 16 Sep 2023
334 points (96.1% liked)
politics
19159 readers
4964 users here now
Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!
Rules:
- Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.
Links must be to the original source, not an aggregator like Google Amp, MSN, or Yahoo.
Example:
- Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
- Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
- No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive. Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
- Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
- No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning
We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.
All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.
That's all the rules!
Civic Links
• Congressional Awards Program
• Library of Congress Legislative Resources
• U.S. House of Representatives
Partnered Communities:
• News
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
There already is a respectable kind of eugenics.
It's called "genetic counseling".
Here's why it doesn't sit well with pseudoconservatives (aka authoritarians):
It's consensual.
It involves giving accurate, scientifically based information to potential parents, on the risk of genetic disorders that might lead to unhealthy children, so that they can make better decisions about parenthood.
It does not involve racial pseudoscience, antisemitism, or violent compulsion of any sort. As such, it does not fit well with pseudoconservatism, fascism, etc.
They want it to eliminate phenotypes that are different...
Normal people want it to eliminate negative genotypes that lead to genetic issues and lifetimes of suffering for future generations.
Two completely different goals.
They just fundamentally don't understand genetics, like when you tell them there's more genetic diversity within Africa than between every other population outside of Africa. They can't see genes by looking at someone, but they can see phenotypes. So 9/10 a conservative will say "but they're all Black".
An astonishing amount of racism is actually about sex and reproduction. Many racists are more threatened by "race mixing" than by the mere existence of other races.
That’s not eugenics. To qualify as eugenics, you’d have to be getting genetic counseling because you wanted to improve the human race, not because you think it’d be unethical to make your kid go through the same suffering you did with a genetic disease. Making eugenics more palatable by ignoring the ideology that defines it can harm people, so please stop.
The end goal is to stop those diseases from continuing to affect the human race. Yes it starts with individual people but if we can prevent everyone from suffering, that is the goal. People need to understand that words are not bogeymen. Eugenics was used for horrible reasons by people who largely didn't understand the science, and by some who did. That doesn't mean it can't be used to accomplish something actually useful for humanity.