Progressive Values: Do Not Waste Human Life
Progressives favor using human life instead of throwing it away in a manner that helps no one. That’s a fundamental moral value that counters the absurd conservative religious contention that the only proper things to do with frozen embryos are either to implant them to become babies in the wombs of volunteers who want to become the mothers to other people’s children, or to throw the frozen embryos out in the garbage. The clear truth is that there are not anywhere close to enough women to become mothers for all the frozen embryos in the United States. Developmental biologist James Thomson explains, “The bottom line is that there are 400,000 frozen embryos in the United States, and a large percentage of those are going to be thrown out. Regardless of what you think the moral status of those embryos is, it makes sense to me that it’s a better moral decision to use them to help people than just to throw them out.” There are not 400,000 women in the United States volunteering to become mothers to these frozen embryos. Even according to the anti-stem cell research group Embryo Adoption Campaign, the most successful organizations that work to get frozen embryos implanted in volunteer women’s wombs only manage about 40 embryos per year. So, the genuine moral choice for dealing with the vast majority of the hundreds of thousands of frozen embryos that exist and continue to be produced as a by-product of in vitro fertilization is between throwing them away like garbage or working with them to develop and implement therapies for people suffering from grave illnesses. Right wingers ignore the reality of that moral decision. Progressives, on the other hand, have the wisdom to accept the reality of an imperfect situation and bring the most help to the most people out of it. Presidents must deal with constrained moral choices like this everyday. We need a new President with the flexibility to accept that abstract moral concepts do not always fit the reality of our world. We need a new President who has the wisdom to make the better moral choice, even when a perfect moral choice does not exist. Watching a flurry of snowflakes fall out of the sky and melt on her driveway, |
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Mother Davis brings us reason #68 to vote for a progressive President in 2008 as she writes,