There is nothing more annoying to me than a flagrant conservative writing op-eds criticizing the left. OK, there is something that’s more annoying -- when they make good points and get me all confused.

Damn you, Michael Gerson. Damn you and your intelligent op-ed in today’s Washington Post called “The Eugenics Temptation.”

It’s not that Gerson, a senior policy advisor for Bush from 2000 to 2006, says anything startling or new in his op-ed. It’s pretty standard. The gist is that Nobel-prize-winning and genome-mapping scientist James Watson can't keep himself from coming across as a sexist, racist, homophobic, ableist bigot.

Well, here, let Gerson tell you:

In 2003, Watson spoke in favor of genetic selection to eliminate ugly women: "People say it would be terrible if we made all girls pretty. I think it would be great." In 2000, he suggested that people with darker skin have stronger libidos. In 1997, Watson contended that parents should be allowed to abort fetuses they found to be gay: "If you could find the gene which determines sexuality and a woman decides she doesn't want a homosexual child, well, let her." In the same interview, he said, "We already accept that most couples don't want a Down child. You would have to be crazy to say you wanted one, because that child has no future."

By now most of us have heard about Watson’s strange views on which types humanity are more desirable than others. So nothing new there. But Gerson then takes the recent censure of Watson and twists it into a commentary on the left. Gerson’s analysis is so right on that I thought HE was writing from the left. It wasn’t until I did some fact-checking on Gerson that I found out he actually is considered quite ensconced on the right.

So how’d he come across as being "leftish"? Well, first, by saying parents shouldn’t use genetic testing to “weed out” gay fetuses … that seems pretty liberal. Although, in retrospect, this pro-gay stand may just be a ploy to further erode abortion rights. And Gerson appears a lefty by writing that Watson is wrong for wanting to eliminate the births of women who aren’t drop-dead gorgeous – whew! Lucky for me! By extension, Gerson would probably also argue against cultures that prefer male births to female births, and that’s a standard feminist issue.

True, true, Gerson writes about “sin.” But first, plenty of the liberal faithful write about the sins of social injustice all the time and second, it seems like a rhetorical argument based on the concept of sin. I didn’t take it to literally mean “sin”:

British scientist Robert Edwards has argued, "Soon it will be a sin of parents to have a child that carries the heavy burden of genetic disease." A sin. Which leaves disabled children who escape the net of screening -- the result of parental sin -- to be born into a new form of bastardy and prejudice.

Right on, Gerson! People choosing to keep their disabled kids shouldn’t be demonized, even if some scientists think they should. Geez. …

Gerson then explores what all of this means for those of us who are left of moderate. Gerson says we can’t both blanketly defend egalitarianism and unrestricted science. In other words if we – as we always should do, and as we do best of all – continue to strive for all humans to be treated equal, then at times we may have to support some restrictions on science. Otherwise, we’d find ourselves in the untenable position of choosing to support the lives of only white, straight, beautiful, nondisabled people.

But if he’s right, then … then … that means … well … what if people don’t want little girl disabled babies who may or may not be either black or gay … isn’t that their right? …

Arrgghh!

I think I need an aspirin.

Damn you, Michael Gerson!

This is an interesting and well-thought-out reaction, Josie. "Science" serves the objectivist utilitarian values permeating our corporate culture, I think. PWDs are regard either as less productive than the norm or an outright drain. The Randian aspect of capitalist culture (or even the social state culture of modern Europe) is served by science rather than driven by it. It is no surprise to me that individual scientists adhere to the cultural values in which they live -- and prosper. It's interesting that Gerson called for progressives to recapture liberalism. I prefer to be a Progressive, by which I mean I distrust a concentration of wealth, influence, and an overweaning utilitarian regard for the individual. ~ Gary

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