Life As A Commodity

Life As A Commodity

Last night, George W. Bush, the President of the United States, announced a compromise policy on Federal support for stem cell research. His announcement made few people happy because it cut a path straight down the middle of the issue and carefully avoided making any significant ethical decisions about it.

At the ethical heart of the matter is a question about using a human fetus for scientific (read "medical") research. For significant research to happen, the fetus must be "alive." After the research has begun (meaning removal of stem cells), the fetus is "dead." Thus, while there has been scientific research on human beings as long as anyone can remember, this research arguably leads directly to the death of the human involved. In many respects, the ethical issues are the same as those discussed for abortion; though, in this case, the living fetus involved may be created by the scientist himself/herself by fertilizing reserved human eggs with human sperm. However the fetus has been created, the ethical issue centers upon the question of whether a human fetus is a human being and is, thus, covered by the principle of not taking human life.

The creation of a human fetus from reserved eggs and sperm is commonplace, today, but most of these are implanted in a woman's uterus where "nature takes its course" and single- or multiple-pregnancy may occur. Thus far, no one has complained about the deaths of fetuses that fail to survive this procedure or, for that matter, the sad fate that awaits children who are born to women in bizarre multiple pregnancies as a consequence of these techniques. Evidently, these lives were lost "unintentionally."

Others will argue that the whole issue is perched on a "sl...

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... that is shaping world history. In its elementary form, the process is one of rendering some aspect of life into a commodity. That is, some aspect of life which used to be a spontaneous characteristic becomes, in this society, something one can have only by purchasing it. The American economy is a marvelously successful and pervasive consumer economy because so many aspects of life have come to be accepted as commodities. In fact, in the ultimate spiritual take-over of human life, Americans have been convinced that happiness can only be bought. Belief in this myth keeps us all in bondage. Recently, we have become convinced that health is a commodity, and now education is also a commodity. We don't have to struggle for or earn anything -- except for money so that we can buy whatever it is that we want. In the future, life itself, the birth right, will be bought too.