The New Conservatives in Bioethics: Who are they and what do they seek?
The divisive political structure that the United States has leaned into for so long that has separated groups of people has made its way into new realms of study including bioethics. Many of these issues in bioethics focus on extremely controversial topics including abortion, genetic manipulation, euthanasia, appropriate uses of medical technology, etc. Bioethicists and authors alike have until recently, not identified themselves as being either more conservative or more liberal than anyone else in their field of work.
One of Macklin’s potential explanations for this rests on the idea that “the most conservative wing of the Republican party in American politics, now dominating both the executive and legislative branches of government, is obsessed with matters related to procreation, prenatal life, and extracorporeal embryos, and has put those issues high on their political and legislative agenda” (Macklin, 2012). I believe that this could be an accurate explanation because now more than ever we consistently use the terms “conservative” or “liberal” to describe a person’s political stance. However, doing so can create a misrepresentation of groups including bioethicists and can creates a deep divide.
The mission of conservative bioethics is to “prevent our transformation into a culture without awe filled with people without souls” (Levin, 24). This quote from conservative bioethicist Yuval Levin tries to explain that conservative bioethics is trying to save our culture from turning into some terrible. According to Macklin however, conservative bioethics relies heavily on poetic and metaphoric language, lacks substantial scientific evidence, appeals to emotion, sentiment, and intuition, contains mean-spirited rhetoric, and creates a proliferation of projects. This article discusses how and why many conservative bioethicists argue their beliefs from a place of passion as opposed to using rational arguments backed by evidence.
Macklin addresses his claim that conservative bioethics relies on poetic and metaphoric language by recalling an instance where Leon Kass, a conservative bioethicist, repeatedly stated that it’s wrong for parents to be able to choose their children’s genetic traits with no other evidence or argument. Many of these metaphorical statements by conservative bioethicists refer to children as “gifts”, potentially appealing to members of religious audiences. I can understand how emotion influences decision making but I don’t agree with the idea that certain scientific technology shouldn’t be explored or implemented because “children are gifts.” I think that arguments regarding issues including human reproductive cloning and genetic manipulations of future offspring need to rest on claims backed by both evidence and morality.
In addition, Macklin discusses how biotechnology, including stem cell research, is promoted by many liberal bioethicists because it serves as one of the only promising ways to create preventative vaccines for diseases including HIV/AIDS. Conservative bioethicists are supposedly opponents to this argument and choose not to focus their efforts towards issues of global justice in medical research and in health disparities between developing and industrialized countries. Overall, I enjoyed reading this article but would be curious to explore the perspective of the conservative bioethicist more to potentially better understand their rationale.
Not Just for Experts: The Public Debate about Reprogenetics in Germany
One of the biggest takeaways for me from this reading was the idea that decisions concerning ethics are quickly being politicized. Braun describes how the rise of ethics in politics has given way to a new kind of expert who provides political counselling who are “experts for questions of ethics” (Braun 2012). In Germany there’s an ongoing bioethics debate evaluating the arguments for and against reproductive medicine and stem cell research. These German debates stand in contrast to the United States bioethical policy disputes because the U.S. is mainly divided between conservative and liberal bioethicists. Braun’s thinking here is that by evaluating bioethics from the German lens, we might be able to minimize the separation between conservative and liberal bioethicists in the U.S.
Similar to the U.S., Germany is also split into two “camps” namely a techno-optimistic and a techno-skeptical camp that “does not coincide with a liberal-conservative of left-right divide; it runs across party lines and across the left-right division” (Braun, 2012). I found this to be very interesting considering the U.S. assesses bioethical issues from a very divisive and politically charged perspective while techno-optimistic and techno-skeptical camps in Germany are able to approach issues with a more open mind. I feel that if the U.S. adopted a mindset more similar to this, our discussions on bioethics issues in general would be more effective.
In general, techno-optimists promote the idea that ethics is a matter of choice and that experts including bioethicists and geneticists are some of the best people to advise the research community and policymakers. In contrast, techno-skeptics aren’t necessarily resistant to adopting new technology but warns that it has the potential to negatively influence society is taken advantage of. Techno-skeptics generally fall into two categories with one group having predominately Christian principles and the other group is comprised of secular techno-skeptics.
What I found very noteworthy about these two groups is that both were convinced that some basic moral principles take precedence over protecting individual choice based off of how they interpret the idea of autonomy. Autonomy is described by Braun as being “not just the individual freedom of choice but to a society’s political capacity to control the development of science and technology despite structural constraints such as the imperative to increase economic competitiveness and the availability of reprogenetic practices outside Germany “(Braun, 2012). The perspectives of conservative bioethicists would align more closely with that of techno-skeptics and liberal bioethicists with techno-optimists with several exceptions on both sides. I think that there’s something very valuable to learn about these two German camps working to find balance, common ground, and solutions to pressing issues.
I also found the discussion of the German embryo protection law and abortion law to be interesting. Braun emphasizes that the strict laws Germany has around the embryo and abortion work to “secure human dignity” because they’re “important features of postwar, democratic, antitotalitarian German identity (Braun, 2012). In Germany, abortion is considered “illegal but not subject to prosecution” meaning given the right circumstances, a woman may still receive an abortion and be backed by “support instead of punishment” (Braun 2021). Despite their restrictive laws, the German Constitution is designed with a purpose and that is to avoid any potential return of Nazism by protecting human dignity.
Lastly, the republican discourse-discourse portrayed by the notion that issues of technology come mostly from social problems on biomedical issues in Germany was able to shape public policy through the evaluation of social consequences, causes, and solutions while promoting ethical concerns without putting economic agendas as the priority when making decisions. Braun describes how the German approach to introducing experts for questions of ethics has been for the better because it “gives voice to and listens to those organizations that address biomedical issues as social issues” (Braun, 2012).
References:
Braun, Kathrin. “Emory Libraries Resources Terms of Use.” Emory Libraries Resources Terms of Use – Emory University Libraries, onlinelibrary-wiley-com.proxy.library.emory.edu/doi/full/10.1353/hcr.2005.0054?sid=vendor%3Adatabase.
Macklin, Ruth. “Emory Libraries Resources Terms of Use.” Emory Libraries Resources Terms of Use – Emory University Libraries, onlinelibrary-wiley-com.proxy.library.emory.edu/doi/full/10.1353/hcr.2006.0013?sid=vendor%3Adatabase.
Molly did a great job summarizing “The New Conservatives in Bioethics: Who they are and what to they seek?” and “Not Just for Experts: The Public Debate about Reprogenetics in Germany”. In the first reading Molly discusses which evaluates the lack of rational explanation in conservative arguments, I found it particularly interesting the Leon Kass was analyzed. I enjoyed the ability to have context regarding this example as we previously read and discussed the President’s Report and Leon Kass’s role. Now provided additional context regarding his conservative stance and lack of evidence to support his argument, I believe his role as head of the council was heavily biased. It is important to explore the author’s accusation of Kass’s arguments when revisiting the reading and analyzing the influence Kass may have had on the The President’s Council on Bioethics.
The second reading regarding the bioethical views in Germany was particularly interesting to me not just because of the contrast to the United States, but because of how the history of Nazism has left a conscious impact on the bioethical views in Germany. Laws regarding PGT are far stricter than in the US, and this is because there is an intentional effort to prevent any hint of eugenics. I was impressed to hear that there is a genuine effort to acknowledge history and implement change. Overall, I enjoyed this weeks readings and that it provided so much to think about. I look forward to discussing it further in class!
Molly beautifully summed up this week’s readings in an eloquent and clear manner. I especially enjoyed how Molly interwove her own personal analysis and opinions within the summaries.
My first impression, like Molly’s, was also predicated on the bioethical conservative comment, “prevent our transformation into a culture without awe filled with people without souls.” I find this quote oddly pungent in religious conservatism for two reasons. Firstly, is the implication that scientific advancement is diametrically opposed — even subtractive — to the “awe” of human beings. Further, the idea that scientific, technological, and medical advancement moves humans away from their true “soul” is highly reminiscent of the religious sentiment that pain or suffering brings one closer to their humanity, and therefore God. To continue, the semantics around children being “gifts” is historically charged with religious perceptions of birth and sacredness. I wonder, however, if conservative bioethicists also consider people with AIDS as gifts as well.
Further, I too agree with Molly that the placement of political affiliations into bioethics is quintessentially American and indicative of our cultural inability develop ideologically independent and nuanced opinions. I also found the German culture surrounding bioethics interesting in how ostensibly amicable both sides were to one another. I am curious as to how the history of the Holocaust has informed this level of open-mindedness while also attributing to restrictive abortion laws. I also can appreciate that the German terms, techno-optimists and techno-skeptics, are not inherently political terms. Looking into the semantic construction of these terms, neither one is fully antithetical to the other, and therefore reflects that an area of common ground or shared value may exist between the two camps of thought.
Great job Molly!
Molly did a good job both summarizing the articles and expressing her own opinions and reactions to the reading.
I agree with Molly that arguments regarding offsprings produced by assisted reproductive methods need to rest on claims backed by both evidence and morality. Though I think “children are gifts” is a strong moral claim, in this case it is also cited as emotional evidence to support conservative bioethicists’ arguments against genetic manipulation of children.
I also found “Not Just for Experts: The Public Debate about Reprogenetics in Germany” interesting because it describes the political environment regarding bioethics in Germany. Unlike the U.S., the two camps are divided more based on their attitudes towards reproductive technology while the two camps in the U.S. differ because of their political affiliation. As Molly noted, these two German camps are less divided than in the U.S. and they cooperate to find balance, common ground, and solutions to pressing issues. I think this is also related to the history of political division in two countries. Historically, conservative and liberal parties in the U.S. have been largely divided and opposing to each other.
I think that Molly did a great job of summarizing the two readings for the week, which are especially pertinent to our current, polarized environment in the United States.
Like Molly and Jack, I think that the American conservative belief that embracing controversial medical technologies will strip modern people of our “souls” is a logical fallacy. I think that the notion that children are “gifts” is an incredibly strong moral argument that is worthy of consideration during bioethical debates, but, ultimately, I agree with Molly that we should not abstain from exploring some technologies because of the possibility that children are gifts from a divine entity. Stem cell research could contribute to the development of a treatment for AIDS; if there is a divine entity out there, I’d like to believe that he/ she/ it would positively regard scientists who use stem cell research to heal a serious disease.
Personally, I think that the German model of bioethics – which minimizes political polarization without completely severing bioethics from politics – is better-suited to meet the needs of a diverse public than the American model of bioethics, which is more reactionary. Although I respect Germany’s abortion laws, which make abortion illegal but not punishable, I think that they still favor a more conservative world view.
Hey Molly! I really liked your blog post, especially since it’s very relevant to ongoing debates in the United States concerning the COVID-19 vaccine. I have a family member who is a prominent conservative anti-vaxxer activist in Mississippi; her main arguments against vaccines stem from Republican pro-natalism (she thinks vaccines are unethical because they are developed from aborted embryo tissues – I don’t know how true this claim is, but it’s interesting nonetheless).
Although I think that there should be a place in bioethical debates for arguments that are grounded in religion, I think that the devaluation of science that has been in occurring in some conservative American communities is disturbing. In the United States, it seems to me that the polarization between conservative and liberal ideologies has pitted religion against science in increasingly black-and-white terms. Like Molly, I do think that the German model of “techno-optimism” and “techno-skepticism” is less polarized than the American model. However, I think that it would be very difficult for the United States to adapt to a more German model of thinking about bioethical controversies because conservative and liberal politicians rely heavily on debates about topics such as abortion to build voter bases.
I’d like to start of by saying that I really enjoyed Molly’s post! Molly summed up this week’s readings in a very clear way and her thoughts were easy to follow. I also appreciated seeing bits and pieces of Molly’s own thought and opinions throughout her summary/analysis.
In Molly’s description and summarization of “The New Conservatives in Bioethics: Who they are and what to they seek?” I found that I was following a similar train of thought; there is an apparent political divide that is affecting bioethical issue in negative ways. It is my opinion, and a naiive wish, that controversial issues should not be made political, or they should at least be kept as far away from politics as possible. Just the words “Conservative” and “Liberal” being tacked onto certain issues in the USA can cause people to form opinions and ideas about things that they do not understand completely, without thinking things through because they assume they know the goals of each party. However, as Molly points out, “Bioethicists and authors alike have until recently, not identified themselves as being either more conservative or more liberal than anyone else in their field of work.” I think that the political division is causing more harm than good discussions involving bioethics, which means that sorting out the political system in the USA may provide better footing for answering some of the greater, more controversial bioethical questions.
Furthermore, I agree with and appreciate the way Molly describes the division seen in the Germany example. I think it is a good example to look at, one where people can have difference in opinion, but as Molly quotes, “it runs across party lines and across the left-right division.” Although I do think that Germany is a rather unique case, with a unique history that may skew the current system and laws placed on the controversial topics bioethicists are trying to answer, I also think that having an example in the world of a more developed country with a similar political system to the USA (but, with variation) can create a space where people can think outside the box; the focus can lay more truly on answering those bioethical questions than whether or not your opinion fits in with one group or category or another.
Great work Molly!