TOW 23- (written) Scientists Call For Moratorium on Human Genetic Experiments (Dan Vergano)

Though this is an undoubtly very scary article, the author uses an allusion to make it easier to understand. Or at least easier to understand for people alive in 1997, because it references the 1997 movie Gattaca. I was not alive in 1997, so I guess I was a year too late to get the joke. Anyway, this article is about how close scientists are to being able to genetically engineer babies and how they are struggling with how unethical it could turn out to be. At first, to me, genetically engineered babies didn't seem so bad, but then I remembered something my AP Bio teacher had told us in our DNA unit. She had been talking about how if people could genetically engineer babies, they could choose what traits they wanted their babies to have. Meaning, they could choose if they wanted babies with any hair color, any eye color, any body type. This isn't build-a-bear people, this is a potentially extrememly unethical thing.
Just think of the modern standard for beauty, thin, possibly blonde and blue eyed. I mean, if Hitler had this technology, we would all look exactly the same right now. Our differences are what make us beautiful, not all looking the same and this technology endangers that. Now, this can still be used for tweaking the genes of people with debilitating diseases, like HIV, but it should be kept away from most everyone else. Just think of the book the Uglies, a society where, at the age of 16, everyone goes through a surgery to become "beautiful", but really, they are just being brainwashed into following the government's every decree. We deserve better, and the world must stay diverse, because diverse, is beautiful.