By MIKE
ARGENTO
You have to give President Dubya credit for having the courage to take on one of the most pressing issues facing humankind.
Terrorism, right?
No, any fool can fight terrorism — quick show of hands, who’s in favor of terrorism? — and they often do, as evidenced by the stellar performances of the CIA, NSA and other initialed agencies charged with eavesdropping on us when we call out for pizza. On the plus side, they have repeatedly killed al-Qaida’s No. 2 guy. (Is it me, or have we killed Osama’s right-hand man about 18 times now?)
OK, then, his stand on our oil dependence, right?
Sorry, wrong again. He said we’re “addicted� to oil and have to kick the habit. Hey, his family was responsible for giving us our first taste, so it’s only fair that they pay for our rehab.
He said some other things.
But the one stand that took the kind of courage we expect from Dubya was his call on Congress to ban human-animal hybrids.
“Tonight I ask you to pass legislation to prohibit the most egregious abuses of medical research: human cloning in all its forms, creating or implanting embryos for experiments, creating human-animal hybrids and buying, selling or patenting human embryos,� he told a rapt nation which, until that moment, had been quaking in fear of an attack by flying monkey-men.
Not flying monkey-men!
It was one of those special moments. One moment, he’s complaining about how having to follow nitpicking stupid rules — otherwise known as the law — is inhibiting the government from learning when Arabic citizens call a customer service rep in India, and the next, he’s calling for a ban on the development of man-squirrels.
At first, that’s what I thought — man-squirrels. Half-man, half-squirrel. Imagine the horror of waking one day to see a flock — or whatever you’d call it — of man-squirrels descending upon you.
Of course, given the state of scientific research in the area of developing such critters, the chances of waking one day to see a flock — gaggle, whatever — of man-squirrels descending upon you are directly proportional with the odds that you chased pain-killers with a bottle of Nyquil and eight shots of tequila the night before.
But still, President Dubya’s on the case. You can rest assured that we will remain perfectly safe from the dire threat posed by man-squirrels.
And pig-men. Don’t forget the pig-men.
Or the monkey-men. We have no worries that, one day, a half-man, half-chimp will seize the reins of the government ... oh, never mind.
One point of contention, though. Some pundits have raised the possibility that Bush was calling for legislation to outlaw “Manimal,� but it should be pointed out that on “Manimal,� the lead character, Jonathan Chase, was able to change into animals and technically speaking, was not a half-human, half-animal.
The only problem with living in fear that one day mad scientists will be doing crazy things like creating man-mice is that, well, they’re doing it now.
And technically, they aren’t creating man-mice.
What they’re doing is looking for ways to treat Down syndrome.
Down syndrome is a genetic disorder caused by the presence of an extra chromosome. In addition to mental retardation, people with Down syndrome also have weakened immune systems and heart defects — things that cause them to have lowered life expectancy. Scientists looking for ways to treat those maladies have put human genes into mice embryos to create the genetic anomaly that causes Down syndrome. The mice that scientists have created are “a tool to help us understand a debilitating human problem,� biologist P. Z. Myers wrote on his blog, Pharygula.
One of the researchers, Roger Reeves, a geneticist at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, told the journal, Science, “This is going to have a huge impact on Down syndrome research. This mouse not only solves problems, but it raises the next round of questions and creates a way to solve them.�
And, Myers wrote, “George W. Bush would like to make (the man-mouse) illegal.
“He’s trusting that everyone will think he is banning monstrous crimes against nature, but what he’s really doing is targeting the weak and the ill, blocking useful avenues of research that are specifically designed to help us understand human afflictions.� Myers wrote. “His message isn’t ‘We aren’t going to let the mad scientists make monsters!’, it’s ‘We aren’t going to let the doctors help those ‘retards.’
“Once again, the ignorance and the bigotry of the religious right wins out over reason and humanitarianism. I think I know who the real pig-men are.�
See, the scientists are only trying to treat maladies and ease human suffering and leaving the man-squirrels to our imaginations — and the pain-killers chased with Nyquil and tequila.
Mike Argento, whose column appears Mondays and Thursdays in Living and Sundays in Viewpoints, can be reached at 771-2046 or at mike@ydr.com.
ARGENTO AND THE PIG-MEN
I like Mike Argento. I know some people don’t. I think he is a good writer, your most playful wordsmith since Leslie Streeter left her gig as the Flickchick. He makes me laugh and he makes me think. I am not one of those who love to hate him.
Of course sometimes I think he gets it wrong. (For instance, he is mistaken in his analysis of intelligent design, but that is another matter.) Still, I don’t want to be misunderstood: I am not one of these readers who just want him tossed out.
However, I must protest Argento’s increasing grumpiness. He is getting nastier, it seems, and his critique of established power---a venerable calling, I’d say---is becoming so shrill that it doesn’t even work as satire. Sometimes he’s just down right dirty.
For instance, on Feb. 5th, Argento takes exception to the part of President Bush’s inaugural speech where he said we should disallow human-animal genetic hybrids. He had some fun with it—you can imagine---but I was irked by his casting an important and complex matter as a no-brainer. Surely he doesn’t think that all the quandaries about genetic engineering and medical ethics are just dumb rantings of the far right, does he? I’ve made my share of “Hello Dolly� jokes after they cloned that sheep, but sooner or later, tough ethical questions do need to be explored. Maybe laughing about it has a place, but it is snide and glib to mock the President’s legitimate concerns with these goof-ball zingers.
My concern grew to outrage when he cited a terribly mean-spirited piece which accused the President of meanly saying, “We aren’t going to let the doctors help those retards.� That author accused Mr. Bush of “targeting the weak and the ill.� Argento goes on to quote (approvingly) the piece that skewers “the ignorance and bigotry of the religious right.�
For starters, it is vicious to accuse a person of holding bad motives unless you can document that, indeed, he holds those motives. To accuse Bush of antagonism against the mentally retarded is a huge accusation and is so over the top ugly that it can only harm civil public discourse. To point out that the President’s proposal may have unintended consequences for certain populations is a valuable contribution; we can research the claim and try to determine if it is really so. To accuse him of “targeting� the ill, as if he is specifically trying to harm them, is ugly rhetoric and has no place in our political debates.
I disapprove of Bush’s war policies, for instance, and I believe it is fully appropriate to point out the number of war dead, and the significant numbers of civilians that have been killed. To accuse Bush of not caring about their deaths (as some anti-war activists do) or to imply he knowingly targets civilians, would be inappropriate (unless it can be shown that this is so.) I believe we must wage war against war and injustice by using just means; we must only speak truth. Unfortunatley, the author whom Argento cites slanders the President by ascribing to him motives that we cannot know and using violent rhetoric that doesn’t advance public debate on this matter.
And, it uses bigotry. Calling anyone who disagrees with you a bigot is itself a form of bigotry. And to accuse those who have serious misgivings about the complexities of genetic engineering—folks as diverse as environmental writer Bill McKibben or liberal, anti-war, Catholic Bishops---of being a part of the “religious right� is itself a pretty good example of “ignorance.� And calling those who have ethical concerns about the implications of human cloning “pig-men� ain’t even funny.
I think Argento is stooping a bit too low on this one.