CRISPR and other tools aren’t science fiction anymore. If the wealthy get there first, what happens to everyone else?

  • mnemonicmonkeys@sh.itjust.works
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    5 hours ago

    Tbh, I think GATTACA barely touched the topic. It focussed so much on the brothers’ rivalry that you could strip out the genetic engineering part and it’d barely change the movie

    • LibertyLizard@slrpnk.net
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      4 hours ago

      Yeah it’s a cool movie but the message of systemic disadvantages don’t matter if you try hard enough is a little questionable at best.

      • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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        3 hours ago

        The issue wasn’t “try hard enough”. It was how systematic disenfranchisement hobbles people far more than their genetics.

        Once you brand someone as “lesser”, their actual capacity is irrelevant. They won’t be given the opportunity to succeed (much less to fail and try again) while the presumed-superior cohort is offered advantage after advantage in order to prove they are better.

      • ryannathans@aussie.zone
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        4 hours ago

        I think it’s trying to show we are more than just our genetics, there’s a lot of nurture/environment/action that affects outcomes. The protagonist had drive, determination, exercised and worked for the dream. Most eugenic people didn’t have the same drive and took life for granted, so he could outperform them.

        • rainwall@piefed.social
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          1 hour ago

          Its complicated in its portrayal, for sure. It comes off at a glance like “just signam grindset bro,” but really the protagonist had to lie, cheat and steal his way to his dream, while also being an absolute fatalist while pushing his body near to death. Even then, he still needed to convince a doctor to fake his results at the end. That’s not a pro “grindset” or “you can overcome” message really. It shows how absolutely fucked you are if you aren’t born into advantage, how weighted everything is against you.

          The movie would have hit harder if he got to the end and got caught and denied his dream. Just end with him in prison, staring out a window up at the stars.

      • NuXCOM_90Percent@lemmy.zip
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        3 hours ago

        For the kinds of class based gene editing we are likely to see, it kinda isn’t. More attractive, bigger boobs, better predisposition to fitness, etc. That is all surmountable.

        Where it falls apart are “goofy” looking people likely Michael Phelps who are straight up genetic freaks. But those aren’t the kinds of genes the rich want… For themselves.