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Furries and Eugenics


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Furries and Eugenics   

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  1. 1. Do you believe we can use eugenics to create a better world?



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I'm curious to what extent would furries like to see eugenic policies implemented in their countries (eg. sterilizing certain groups to encourage better genetics in the human population). Usually adherents claim this will lead to stronger, more intelligent, and better behaved human stock, and will eliminate or reduce some social problems like crime or poverty. Based on some of the opinions I see posted here, I think quite a few will answer "yes." If you do answer "yes," could you write a post explaining why? Thank you.

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no. you can probably reduce the probability of certain genetic disorders but I doubt you'll ever be able to totally eradicate anything.

4 minutes ago, Endless/Nameless said:

But sometimes I wonder if some people here secretly long for it...

I wouldn't be surprised

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Well first of all, there's the argument that some people should be able to have children. You can counter this with "just adopt". Now this could counter a rising issue: Overpopulation. At least slowing down the issue by limiting birth rates. Not a permanent fix but could assist. Now the idea that you can get a overall better population by selectively allowing people to reproduce doesn't seem to be worth the limits of freedom. We aren't facing any sort of crisis that demands we be smarter, faster, stronger, better looking, etc. Now perhaps selective reproduction could help with these new super viruses that are apparently a bit of a rising issue. However I don't know what factors could play into that. 

 

So to sum it up, I don't think it's a great idea. The restriction to freedom would be too much of an issue to countenance, and the possible benefits would not be worth it. Furthermore, the chances to abuse said system are far too great.

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Around the turn of the 20th century, Charles Darwin's cousin Sir Francis Galton had a grand idea: create a superior race of human by arbitrarily deciding who is allowed to breed and who isn't. He called this disturbing brainchild "eugenics," and it caught on like wildfire in America, where a bunch of educated white dudes collectively decided they had a moral obligation to embrace the practice out of responsibility to future generations. This "obligation" left them with no choice but to start sterilizing people left and right, provided said people were criminals, feebleminded, disabled, deformed, in a mental hospital, blind, deaf, or poor. Or, as eugenicists called them, "bacteria," "vermin," "mongrels," and "subhuman."

In 1927, Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes determined that, "It is better for all the world, if instead of waiting to execute degenerate offspring for crime, or to let them starve for their imbecility, society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind ... Three generations of imbeciles are enough." And damn good thing, too, because by that time most states had already passed laws permitting compulsory sterilization anyway. What followed was the government-mandated sterilization of more than 60,000 Americans, some of whom are still living today.

Meanwhile, an impressionable young Adolf Hitler read about all this and gave it two enthusiastic thumbs up, even going so far as to write a gushing fan letter to Madison Grant, the face of American eugenics, in which he described Grant's book on race-based eugenics as his bible, "[studying] with great interest the laws of several American states concerning prevention of reproduction by people whose progeny would, in all probability, be of no value or be injurious to the racial stock." Hitler went on to deliberately model German eugenics legislation on American policy, while boldly stepping up his game by adding homosexuals, the idle, the weak, and (big surprise here) Jews to the already staggering list of candidates to be treated as if they were stray motherfucking cats.

Hitler ultimately sterilized more than 400,000 people against their will and euthanized 300,000 more in the name of eugenics, a move that is widely viewed as his warm-up for the Holocaust. Again, we're not saying America created Hitler. But it's easy to look back and portray WWII as Uncle Sam versus the man who is the polar opposite of everything America stands for. That's taking a revisionist approach, though; in many cases Hitler was just taking some American ideas to their awful, logical conclusion.

It's, uh, kind if important that we not forget that.

http://www.cracked.com/article_23252_5-awful-ways-america-influenced-hitler-without-knowing-it_p2.html

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Eugenics has only ever been used for nonscientific discrimination against people, including in mid-to-late 20th Century United States (most infamously in the Tuskegee syphilis experiment), and it's been recognized since the founding of the International Criminal Court as a crime against humanity.  I am firmly opposed to the application of eugenics because, even if scientific research concludes eugenics can fantastically benefit or even save humanity, it can never be implemented toward achieving that goal in deed even if it's sold convincingly with that goal in word.

17 minutes ago, Strongbob said:

I believe that furries shouldn't breed.  Does that count?

But furries are all gay already and so can't breed! :V

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Well, we know from evolution that natural selection leads towards more intelligent beings.

 

So, I guess if you emulated evolution with eugenics, I suppose it's entirely possible to eventually end up with a generation of humans who are more intelligent than that which came many generations before it.

 

However, the time scales in question probably mean it really isn't worthwhile.

 

Though, we are on the cusp of a population crisis. And I that, given a choice in how we should reduce our population, ensuring only the strongest and healthiest reproduce would just be good sense.

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10 minutes ago, Cingal said:

Well, we know from evolution that natural selection leads towards more intelligent beings.

 

So, I guess if you emulated evolution with eugenics, I suppose it's entirely possible to eventually end up with a generation of humans who are more intelligent than that which came many generations before it.

 

However, the time scales in question probably mean it really isn't worthwhile.

 

Though, we are on the cusp of a population crisis. And I that, given a choice in how we should reduce our population, ensuring only the strongest and healthiest reproduce would just be good sense.

Intelligent organisms were obliged to evolve from less intelligent ancestors. This does not mean evolution progresses towards more and more intelligent creatures; it's possible to evolve in the other direction too. 

There are other problems with the post, and I may address them later- I'm short on time atm. 

 

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Eugenics could work, if society has a reliable way to judge the wanted traits.

It is also a quiet severe intrusion into the freedom of individuals and raises the question of who should decide.

So "could it work"? Yes.

Should we do it? NO! Absolutely no.

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10 minutes ago, Saxon said:

What if the desired traits aren't always hereditary, or if the genes responsible have other unknown functions? 

 

For non-hereditary traits it obviously can't work. (Besides the influence that the threat of being barred from reproduction might have) And other functions is an interesting question.

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5 minutes ago, Cingal said:

Well, we know from evolution that natural selection leads towards more intelligent beings.

Except if you live in an environment where having a thicker skull (for example) than having more brain matter is more beneficial. Higher intelligence is not always more beneficial, especially if you need more protection or strength to do things you'd need to survive whether you're dumb or smart

Also, I don't think having high intelligence is that much needed in our current society. The society already provides all the necessary tools and help to do the supposedly complex tasks. Most of our work is application of already existing knowledge. Thus I believe having a good self discipline, ability to set and achieve goals are more important so you'll land that job in the first place while keeping yourself healthy and finishing projects on time. 

Don't take this as me dissing intelligence. We still need it, especially the ability to think critically to sort the bullshit from the big ocean of readily available data.

And if we were to evolve to being more intelligent beings, then we'd evolve emotionally to be more emotionally dull or we'd evolve to have a better emotional intelligence because our need to collaborate is now greater than ever in the society we live in. If eugenics were not involved, then the lesser intelligent people wouldn't go anywhere because people are still providing stuff for them in exchange for services that don't necessarily require high levels of intelligence to do properly.

Or we could alternatively end up to a reality present in the movie Idiocracy where successful intelligent people become so independent and wealthy that they don't need any kids whereas less successful, usually unintelligent people breed like rabbits because they need kids to provide for themselves. However, I find this scenario unlikely because I believe it is the lack of self discipline and diligence that prevent people from becoming successful (thus having a lesser need for kids). I find lack of diligence to be a cultural issue than an issue of having lazy people reproducing, though it is unknown if diligence is hereditary. 

You also have plentiful of intelligent people living on social care because they are too lazy. Not to mention all the potential some random kid in Bangladesh might have if (s)he were only to have information available

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I don't agree with forced sterilization on the general public, but I do believe that people with lots of health problems are better off adopting than potentially passing on their problems. It's their choice though. I just know a family in which every member is crawling with medical issues (more issues keep popping up) and it is sad. 

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Eugenics is one of those things that's extremely practical in theory, but there isn't really a reasonable and ethical way to put it into practice. You would have to have people want to opt into it, and the reality is that most people don't give a shit about the future state of the world and they believe it's their life mission to litter the earth with little tiny versions of themselves who will all eventually cripple the ecocnomy with their combined mass. It'll be a long long time before we evolve beyond the intense need to procreate, and I have a feeling that the human race won't last quite that long. I guess I'm kind of a pessimist that way though.

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In regard to evolution, bacteria and viruses are proof that intelligence is not required for increasing success and is probably overrated.

3 hours ago, Endless/Nameless said:

If the powers that be were to start dictating how people can breed, soon they'll be dictating everything else.

They would probably have to be well on their way toward the latter before they could propose the former.

3 hours ago, Endless/Nameless said:

Anyone ever hear 2112?

The Temples of Syrinx won't let me.

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Just now, ArielMT said:

They would probably have to be well on their way toward the latter before they could propose the former.

Good point...

1 minute ago, ArielMT said:

The Temples of Syrinx won't let me.

If we ever get a bad mod team in here, I'm just dying to call them the Priests of the Temple of Phoenix

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Well who gets to decide who's sterilized and who's not? Will the system be flexible to handle common sense, and changing conditions? Can it be cheated or abused? This could also very much damage culture. All it takes is one religion, one practice, to be deemed abberant and you've just sterilized and killed a culture or religion.

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Eugenics doesn't apply to humans, as we have the ability to make up for shortcomings in biology using the progress we've made in both science and technology. Furthermore, there's far too many factors for why someone may think or act or be a certain way, from economic background to education. Its unfair to assume someone is worse off because of biology and should thus not be allowed to breed or similar phenomena. 

Its also dangerous, because then one must decide what can and cannot be allowed to continue through the human race, which no one would agree on, and oftentimes even if there isn't a solution for a problem with someone now, one may arise later. It would open up the gates for the possibility of hurting and taking away rights from people without the knowledge that would make such unnecessary that might pop up later on. Not to mention people could say "Well, we did this so I guess we could do this as well".

Not to mention the idea of pushing for eugenics seems very...err...Hitler-y.

Edited by Battlechili
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Gattaca, anyone?

1 hour ago, Xaende said:

*is disappointed that this thread isn't about creating anthropomorphic animals through selective breeding*

Genetic engineering is more promising in that respect.

5 minutes ago, DevilBear said:

I think, perhaps, just perhaps, a group of people who like to pretend to be cartoon animals may not be the best choice for a discussion on eugenics.

But thats just me.

Clearly the funny-animal people need to invade academia.

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6 hours ago, Battlechili said:

Eugenics doesn't apply to humans, as we have the ability to make up for shortcomings in biology using the progress we've made in both science and technology. Furthermore, there's far too many factors for why someone may think or act or be a certain way, from economic background to education. Its unfair to assume someone is worse off because of biology and should thus not be allowed to breed or similar phenomena. 

Its also dangerous, because then one must decide what can and cannot be allowed to continue through the human race, which no one would agree on, and oftentimes even if there isn't a solution for a problem with someone now, one may arise later. It would open up the gates for the possibility of hurting and taking away rights from people without the knowledge that would make such unnecessary that might pop up later on. Not to mention people could say "Well, we did this so I guess we could do this as well".

Not to mention the idea of pushing for eugenics seems very...err...Hitler-y.

There definitely are a lot of people who are worse off because of hereditary genetic diseases. Some cultures make this problem even worse by arranging cousin marriages. 

If we just put a stop to cousin marriages the world over, that would be a considerable improvement without having to contemplate punitive eugenics. 

Edited by Saxon
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