Week 6

Coping With Disfigurement:

I thought it was interesting to read about the effects of having a disfigurement. Especially when the article talked about how people can associate myths of evil with disfigurements. This I can kind of relate to because I had instances where family would joke around saying that it's bad luck for someone to be born with a birthmark. My cousin who had the birthmark came with us somewhere, and when we arrived, they were closed. So everyone pretty much blamed it on her. I mean, I thought it was just a cultural myth type of thing but I guess there are other groups of people that view disfigurements as a negative thing. I thought it was sad seeing that people with disfigurements are more likely to be depressed or to have negative psychological effects from it. I understand how they would be more likely, it's just very unfortunate. I definitely disagree with that myth that you have to be physically attractive in order to be successful. Personally, I've dealt with self confidence issues, however, for people to think that you have to look good in order to have a good life- that's really dumb in my opinion. It shouldn't be determined by the way you look, success is found through actions and confidence.

Adolescents Perspective with TCS:

I never heard of TCS before reading this article so it was a little difficult for me to understand what these teens were diagnosed with. However, I learned from this article that it could affect physical appearance and things like breathing. It's nice to know that these teens believe that although they may look a little different, they don't deserve to be treated any different from someone that didn't have TCS. The article had many topics that were touched including how teens dealt with social acceptance, self acceptance, and just how they managed the negativity. The reading said that they say that they are able to make regular close friendships and relationships with people just the same as anyone else their age. It was also kind of sad to hear that they aren't able to do certain things because of it- this could lead to feeling left out or deprived of the teenage life, like pool parties or something. Some teens say they stand out and they're not ashamed of it- they're proud of themselves for being different. Teens in this reading also say that over time, although it's difficult to accept that they are different, they are managing. I feel like all teens go through acceptance issues anyway, so having TCS shouldn't prevent a growing young adult to feel any different. We are all different anyway.

Androgen Sensitivity Syndrome:

This article was a bit of a touchy subject for me. I never really understood that there was a syndrome where an individual could be categorized as either gender. I feel like it is up to the person to decide who they want to be entirely. I also just googled that there are actually models that are diagnosed with AIS, which I thought was interesting. It was a little weird for me to see the actually genitalia of a person who was diagnosed with it, but it did help me understand what it meant to have the syndrome. The article mentioned the issue of being categorized as a specific gender. Peggy Cadet who is the author of this article is the cousin of the patient mentioned in previous articles. The author talked about how he originally was told when he was younger that it was confirmed medically that he was to be identified as a male. It wasn't until later on that he realized he had AIS and that it would be ideal for him to continue life living as a female. He believed that people be who they want to be, to forget about the "ideal" and just to live life with the gender you target to be. I liked how he mentioned that if people didn't become the gender they wanted, there wouldn't be transgendered individuals. The author also mentioned that the way children act can influence the way they see themselves and what gender they want to be percieved as. I agree because you can somewhat tell how they want to be seen by the way their personality is, whether it's more feminine or masculine.

Revealing of the diagnosis:

This article talks about the issue of telling a woman that she actually has the genotypes of a male. I think that revealing that the patient had this genotype at such a late time in her life would complicate things. I feel that it's best to tell that individual that they are diagnosed with this syndrome around teen years. This is the time that their body is changing and they begin to deal with image issues anyway. I feel like it would make more sense to do it then so they'd have time to figure out themselves, who they want to be and what they want to do about their situation early on as opposed to later in adulthood.It might make matters worse later in adulthood especially when they get involved with person relationships. Like what if a girl who was supposed to be a male was with a man she did love and later in life she learns that she was supposed to be a male as well, will her partner love her the same way? I would hope to think so, but that might not be the case.

Week Feb 10

MERP. So after reading Savenlusec's paper, I've honestly come to realize that there are pros and cons for gene selection. He used the idea of a scenario where parents would have been able to choose a child that would not have a predisposition for asthma. Choosing the child without the predisposition with asthma would give them a better life apparently. Okay, so I have asthma. And I am completely fine. Yes, there are activities that I can do with some limitation but it doesn't mean I have a bad life. I can make my life as best of a life I can based on the way I appreciate it. Asthma doesn't hold me back. I think that gene selection for non-disease genes isn't morally right. Why are we creating the perfect child. I believe that children are a blessing, not a being we can mold into the perfect child. Regardless if the child has a disability or not, it is up to the parents on how they raise their child in the long-run. They can still have a happy life.

Week 4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NlgYXaIdr7E
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 This is what hit me the most. This video alone represents my view of abandoning baby girls. I stay hopeful for change. The first article was mainly about the sex preference in China. In basic terms, the article mentioned how boys were preferred because of the belief that the male dominance reflected in workforce and over all success in life. They mentioned that the issue causes infanticide and abandonment of baby girls in the country, not just China though. The effects of having such high ratio of boys and girls is that there could be difficulties finding wives, and even depression in men because they wouldn't have a partner in life. Solutions mentioned included removing the selective sex of children in China and also selective sex abortion. According to the article, global SRB should be at its peak and is hopefully going to be winding down. This is good because the negative effects of it have really taken a toll on these countries culture and their outlook of both genders.


Journal of Child Neurology:

Ouu, this particular article was extremely interesting to me. The thought of choosing the traits of  partner and having the same predispositions for your future child seemed really interesting. The article basically talked about how we have come to that stage where it is possible to have children using selected genes from partners. Or at least the idea of it, preimplantation of genes. The whole point in the beginning of this idea was to prevent disease, almost like selections of embryos. How morally right is selecting embryos? I think that although it is an interesting topic, the whole designer baby thought kind of fits with it. You pretty much are planning what your future child would look or be like on the inside. I feel like it isn't okay to do this because if a trait is meant to be it's meant to be, not necessarily because we make it happen ourselves. I feel like this is somewhat playing God's plan. One solution mentioned in the article was that American Medical Association made it immorally right to do an implantation of genes with the motive of choosing genes that aren't medically/ disease concerning. If they were just physical traits for example, this would not be legal or right. Another problem aside from that ethical issue incudes the price of the study and the practice itself. We also have to think about how much it would cost to make this method of gene selection possible, according to the article. It makes sense; I mean seriously, it would cost more money thinking about the traits of your baby than to raise the baby you will love regardless as he or she is.