I have re read my OP to try and understand exactly how it has been taken so offensively and been so wrongly interpreted. I can see that the langauge is sensational, which was partly intentional in order to get a discussion started, perhaps too sensational for most peoples' taste though. The term 'breeding out' I think has upet people most, with its third reich echoes so yes that was a poor choice of words. But I still think it IS NOT a bigoted statement, nor narrow minded
Where exactly does it say that I want to cull people with disabilities, or abort babies?
I would do anything to prevent a future child of mine having a terminal illness or a disability if I could, the DOES NOT mean I think any less of people who have either. That is pretty much exactly what I said in the beginning.
Some people, who interpreted me wrongly, have argued that being disabled has in no way been a bad thing for them. They have then gone on to list a catalogue of horrors that they have suffered as a result of being disabled. When I read that it just strengthened my belief that I would want to avoid that for a future child of mine.
I DO NOT think that disabled people should be eradicated, nor that they do not contribute to society.
I DO NOT think people should stop having sex...
This is NOT ABOUT people who have become disabled through an accident.
This IS ABOUT genetic and inherited diseases and disabilities.
I DO think that if we can intervene in any way to make a life an easier and better one then we should.
We do all want the best for our children and for them to be the best they can be (not in a pushy mother sense before anybody leaps on that bandwagon). We start by loving them and feeding them right and educating them. Genetic intervention is, to my mind, an extreme aspect of this, with medicine (e.g. vaccinations) inbetween. Medicine may become so advanced that ensuring our future children are healthier, smarter and fitter than us is an easy thing to do, commonplace in fact.
In the future, with advances in genetic medicine, it may be possible to treat an embryo and cure a disease or disability there and then, so no embryos need be discarded on the basis of not being 'desirable.'
So many people have objected to the idea of embryos being discarded, but that is what happens all the time with IVF - not all are implanted - some have to be rejected.
By the way is nearly everyone on this thread pro life? I am pro choice, and if you are too then how can you think that rejecting an embryo on the basis of it carrying a breast cancer gene is terrible when you believe it is ok for a fetus to be aborted on the basis on being merely unwanted?
I realise that a lot of the people responding on this thread are disabled, the fact that I am not seems to mean I am not allowed to have a view on whether or not I would wish a future child of mine to be disabled. My experience with disabled children again appears to put me at a disadvantage for some people. Does this attitude mean that people who are disabled should not be allowed to have any input into things regarding able people?
Medicine and science are advancing rapidly, and one day genetic inteference will probably be commonplace. I am NOT talking about people making the decision over whether to have a blond blue eyed boy or a curly red haired little girl, I am talking about people being able to make sure their child does not carry a gene which will make them die in agony from a horrible disease, or that will prevent them from having a disability (I AM NOT going into which disabilities - that again is another subject).
I have read through this entire thread and I don't know that I can make myself much clearer. Had I been more explicit in my OP and used less controversial terminology then perhaps this tirade of anger could have been averted. I wrote, without thinking that none of you know me, and so do not understand how I speak, my use of words. I should have been more careful, but...I still stand by what I say in my OP, particularly in regards to disease.