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Abuse of Sonogram is a big story in India. In its first show,
called Satyamev Jayate (truth ultimately triumphs), in May this
year, it featured female feticide. The show has turned India
upside down and new laws are being passed to prevent the abuse.
A salesman sells the sonogram machine to the Doctors as an
investment that will return their capital in six months, and
unchecked income continues after that by performing abortions -
not male babies but female babies. Guardian reports
6 million girl abortions in the last decade in India,
reconfirmed by ABC news i.e., aborting 50,000 female babies a
month.
In
the sting operation, one doctor asks; if the baby does not die
thru aborticides, what should be done, the other says, throw it
in the river when it comes out. Yes, it is disgusting and heart
wrenching to watch. This, one particular evil has led to
disproportionate ratio of men and women to a point of sharing
the wife with brothers and friends or selling one’s wife to the
highest bidder.
The
good news is that the prophecy of Krishna is relevant, in
Bhagvad Gita IV-7 Krishna
narrates to Arjuna: “Whenever Dharma, or the situation of law
and order, is endangered on this world, I incarnate onto this
world to re establish Dharma, law and order, and to protect good
and destroy the evil elements of the society.”
The movie actor Aamir Khan is indeed an incarnation of Krishna
in mitigating the evil of female feticide, dowry, child abuse,
and other evils of the Indian society.
Texas Faith is a weekly column at Dallas Morning News managed by
Editors William McKenzie and Wayne Slater, and the material is
contributed by several panelists including Mike Ghouse.
For all the other responses visit:
How
much information is enough? The New York Times reported
last week that researchers
have discovered that
performing simple tests on parents can lead to an understanding
of almost the entire genome of a fetus. By taking a blood sample
from a pregnant woman and a saliva specimen from the father,
experts can let parents know virtually all the DNA of a child
before it is born.
As the Times reported,
thousands of genetic diseases could be detected. In the
not-so-distant future, parents could pay an affordable price to
get that information, too.
But this breakthrough also raises complicated ethical issues. On
the one hand, parents could be more ready for the challenges
that await them. Yet will this lead to more abortions, including
of children whose parents don't like the DNA profile?
Undoubtedly, we all like information. But you could argue the
creation story in Genesis shows the risks that come in acquiring
knowledge.
Is
this one of those instances? Is this discovery taking medical
knowledge too far?
MIKE GHOUSE, President, Foundation for Pluralism, Dallas
We
have come a long way in accepting things we would not have
accepted each previous decade or a century. Whether it is
ethics, morality, civility, religion, science or medical
knowledge, we have accepted the new information despite the
initial resistance.
There was a time, when saving a life was considered evil, it was
considered against the will of God, and we battle that even
today. In 2010, 70 children died in Zimbabwe, because of the
religious opposition to vaccination. The religious tolerance
organization reports that an average of one sick child a month
dies in the United States from denied medical attention.
Discovering medical knowledge is not going too far. It is indeed
beneficent in living a better life. The problem is not with the
knowledge; but with the abuse of it, which will always be there
as a part of the whole. We should not resist new research for
the fear of its abuse. Let the benefits to society at large
determine our research and not the abuse.
We might consider a requirement of ethical dimension and abuse
prevention in the research proposals before they are submitted
and funded.
Nuclear power in the right hands is a blessing, but a hell in
the hands of evil men. Religion in the right hearts is a mercy
to mankind, but a hell for others in the wrong hands. Evil men
are not a separate group; they are among us, within each one of
the faiths, races, and nationalities. As a society, we have to
prevent abuse, but must welcome research.
Abuse of sonograms is a big story in India. The Guardian reports
6 million girl abortions in the last decade in India,
reconfirmed by ABC news i.e., aborting 50,000 female babies a
month. The good news is there is a strong movement to stop this
and laws are being passed.
Unless we discuss the ethics of what parents can or cannot do
with the knowledge of a DNA child before it is born, we will
never be able to deal with it. With the new knowledge of a
difficult DNA child, we will also develop techniques in
re-aligning a few, if not all of the defects. We must not
withhold the good from those who benefit from the DNA research.
A Doctor friend of mine is teaching stem cell research in
Australian and European Universities, and sees the value of the
research in terms of improved quality of life for many, in the
United States we are still struggling with it. I'd rather
struggle and place things in order before we embark on it. It is
the American way; infrastructure first.
We have dealt with Dr. Kevorkian, Terry Schiavo and many other
ethical issues and we will continue to do with resistance. We
are indeed better off today, living a little better and little
longer due to the research in medicine.
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