From a netfriend:

A couple of years ago I attended a conference on the Human Genome project. The conference was organised by Sydney University's Institute for Development Disabilities. A number of people who have children with inheritable development disabilities told stories of how they were pressured to have abortions and are still made to feel guilty for not having had abortions. Some of the comments they reported were nasty, as if a person with a disability is not really a person. The genetic counselling specialist horrified most of the audience with her stories of how her research was rescuing families from one of these genetic disorders - she seemed to assume that the children with the particular condition should be aborted, and seemed unaware that the audience was quite shocked by her attitude.

The following year UnitingCare sponsored a conference on genetic technology. Our keynote speaker was Tom Shakespeare, who gets a mention in one of today's papers - the Sydney Morning Herald, I think. He came to Australia for a conference on disability organised by UNSW, and then spoke at ours as well. He also did a lot of media stuff. On the 7.30 report, he had some "expert" tell him that people with disabilities are better off not born. Tom, who has achondraplasia, was not at all impressed. His father had it, his children have it. They all embrace life. He is an academic, who has a higher profile and empowers more people in the community than most "non-disabled" academics manage to do.

The technology of genetic and chromosome testing is dangerous. Bombs are dangerous. Bombs (and their modern substitutes such as depleted uranium "penetrators") only have one use - to kill and destroy. Their normal use is misuse. They damage people and environment long term. In that sense, the bombs are at fault. Guns may have more than one use, but societies are also damaged by their widespread misuse. Societies without guns are different from societies with lots of guns. Certainly the people who use them are at fault, but the guns are also faulty technology - their intrinsic characteristics are harmful. Guns were not invented for the sport of target shooting but to kill. Similarly, genetic counselling is sometimes misused by wellmeaning people who find it hard to recognise that there are other viewpoints. The problem is that the people who work the technology tend to be in control of the interpretation of the results. Some of them present the results of tests and the genetic counselling in a particular way that makes it hard for people to make up their own minds. They all say that they offer unbiased advice, but it is hard to believe this when you hear some of their personal views and recognise that what people say is only part of what they communicate to people. They and their technology are not entirely separable from each other. So it is not enough to say that the problem is people - it is partly the technology, which shapes the power and identity of those who work it, and also shapes the sort of questions (and answers) that people consider.