I have similar feelings about the term. Highlighting that something is eugenic really seems like a word game lacking much substance.
Someone could oppose eugenics in principle but who thinks siblings should reproduce? Probably hardly anyone.
I don’t think the term can be entirely abandoned. It will be used against people as a rhetorical tool. The people who like genetic enhancement don’t really care about whether it qualifies as eugenics while the people who oppose it won’t abandon using the term because if they found your argument persuasive they probably wouldn’t oppose it. For rhetorical purposes, I think genetic enhancement works better. But I think the accusation of eugenics will come up and there need to be good strategies for dealing with that. I tried to devise some in my article.
https://parrhesia.substack.com/p/harmless-eugenics
I have similar feelings about the term. Highlighting that something is eugenic really seems like a word game lacking much substance.
Someone could oppose eugenics in principle but who thinks siblings should reproduce? Probably hardly anyone.
I don’t think the term can be entirely abandoned. It will be used against people as a rhetorical tool. The people who like genetic enhancement don’t really care about whether it qualifies as eugenics while the people who oppose it won’t abandon using the term because if they found your argument persuasive they probably wouldn’t oppose it. For rhetorical purposes, I think genetic enhancement works better. But I think the accusation of eugenics will come up and there need to be good strategies for dealing with that. I tried to devise some in my article.
If we’re abolishing words we don’t like, then we can start with “utilitarianism” ;>