Frances Simonson S00150675 Tutor: Richard Wade
UNCC300 Assessment Task 2
Human dignity is a complex notion that encompasses inherent and acquired types of dignity. It becomes especially complex when the topic houses a number of opinions, emotions and ethical standpoints on a given topic. This is especially true for the chosen case study: human dignity and gender selection.
There are a number of consequences to selecting a child?s gender- both positive and negative. These consequences are influenced by social and cultural factors. Some positive viewpoints include: gender selection is simply a person?s right to reproductive autonomy, gender selection will result in ?family balancing? whereby parents have equal numbers of both genders in their family, and through gender selection the likelihood of abuse or disadvantage will be lessened (Blyth, Frith & Crawshaw, 2008). …show more content…
(Blyth et al., 2008 & Dahl, 2007). This is essentially the assumption that parents will also want to choose other physical aspects of their child (e.g. hair/eye colour); further negating the unconditional love a parent is expected to have for their child (Blyth et al., 2008). The negative debate surrounding ?designer babies? reflects quadrant 2B: ?Dignity that humans acquire (or lose) through moral or immoral behaviour? (Australian Catholic University, 2016, section 2.1.3). A study conducted by Scully, Shakespeare & Banks (2006) in the UK discovered that the average British citizen viewed parents who selected the gender of their unborn child were violating the child?s inherent value (representing quadrant 1A), were compromising the dignity or worth of the not-chosen gender (reflecting quadrant 2A) and that parents who select the gender are not good parents (representing quadrant
UNCC300 Assessment Task 2
Human dignity is a complex notion that encompasses inherent and acquired types of dignity. It becomes especially complex when the topic houses a number of opinions, emotions and ethical standpoints on a given topic. This is especially true for the chosen case study: human dignity and gender selection.
There are a number of consequences to selecting a child?s gender- both positive and negative. These consequences are influenced by social and cultural factors. Some positive viewpoints include: gender selection is simply a person?s right to reproductive autonomy, gender selection will result in ?family balancing? whereby parents have equal numbers of both genders in their family, and through gender selection the likelihood of abuse or disadvantage will be lessened (Blyth, Frith & Crawshaw, 2008). …show more content…
(Blyth et al., 2008 & Dahl, 2007). This is essentially the assumption that parents will also want to choose other physical aspects of their child (e.g. hair/eye colour); further negating the unconditional love a parent is expected to have for their child (Blyth et al., 2008). The negative debate surrounding ?designer babies? reflects quadrant 2B: ?Dignity that humans acquire (or lose) through moral or immoral behaviour? (Australian Catholic University, 2016, section 2.1.3). A study conducted by Scully, Shakespeare & Banks (2006) in the UK discovered that the average British citizen viewed parents who selected the gender of their unborn child were violating the child?s inherent value (representing quadrant 1A), were compromising the dignity or worth of the not-chosen gender (reflecting quadrant 2A) and that parents who select the gender are not good parents (representing quadrant