Sunday, February 22, 2009

The Implications of Redefining Life

North Dakota, as you've probably heard, has passed a bill that states “any organism with the genome of homo sapiens” is a person deserving of full civil rights. Can you name three disturbing implications of this new definition of ''human"? Kris-Stella of Coffee Shop Philosophy can, and if you haven't read her post you should do so here.

1 comment:

Jake Aryeh Marcus said...

Good post by Kris-Stella. The implications of the new ND bill are both disturbing and disturbed. Twenty years ago when I was working on litigation challenging an abortion law defining life as beginning at 19 weeks gestation, I used to joke that someday there would be legislation defining life as beginning when a guy bought you a drink. Not so funny now.

Also in NC last week, a bill concerning breastfeeding was gutted in committee to exclude inclusion of breastfeeding as a civil right and remove all right to use a breast pump at work. Now there is a legislature that really cares about the state's children.

As Letty Cottin Pogrebin once said about Jesse Helms: for some, life begins at conception and ends at birth. So too with civil rights in North Dakota.