Last week an interesting concept was arrived at by myself and a small group of my friends. For the moment, this concept remains in the realm of science fiction, but I thought that from the immense amount of discussion it created between my little group that it might make a good topic here in the Cave.
The topic is Reverse Contraceptives, and it goes something like this.
One member of my group commented on how in certain countries everyone is assumed to be an organ donor - meaning, of course, that when they die, unless they've stated otherwise, that their organs will be donated to help others. Now, there's an easy opt-out for this, something like going somewhere akin to our Department of Motor Vehicles here in the States, and just signing a form saying you don't want to donate your organs. Therein lies the rub: most people don't opt out. In the countries where organ donation is simply assumed, the organ donation rate is phenomenally high, because people just don't want to think about it. They'd rather just stick to the "default settings" and not deal with it.
That got us thinking.
The idea of Reverse Contraception would go something like this: At birth, a simple procedure (that is as yet unavailable in the real world), something low-risk like a circumcision, would be performed on baby boys and girls. This procedure would make them effectively sterile.
Once these young people were 18 years of age, they could produce photo identification at any local drugstore or hospital and receive a "reverse contraception" pill for little or no money. If both the man and the woman were taking this "RC" pill, they could become pregnant.
Think about it.
The 18 year old minimum would effectively eliminate childhood pregnancy.
The notion that you couldn't get knocked up unless you put some thought into it, unless you and your partner were sure that it was what you really wanted, would drastically reduce the abortion rate, would drastically reduce the crime rate, would drastically reduce the poverty rate.
Are their problems with the idea? Of course. Who's in charge of the RC pill? Would it be mandatory that all children get the reverse contraception procedure at birth, or would it be a parental decision? Even if it was a parental decision, my opinion is that an overwhelming percentage of parents would "opt in" for it. If you could guarantee that your kid wasn't going to get pregnant until they were out of high-school... that's a pretty great motivator.
Anyway, I thought the concept warranted a little conversation. What do you think? Is a Reverse Contraception pill a great idea, or something that infringes on human rights? Do we have a "Right" to conceive as humans? Interesting questions, and I'm looking forward to hearing your insights.
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2 comments:
The problem I see, is with no consequences involved, kids fuck like rabbits from a young age. Sooner or later, STD's come in to play, and before long, it will be an epidemic.
But doesn't that make it an either/or problem?
What does our society want, unwanted children or unwanted std's? Neither are desired, of course, and I'd maintain that the elimination of unwanted children would lead to better parenting on the part of people who do decide to have children, which would in turn lead to better parental education of such children, which would lead to wiser decisions by young people when it comes to unprotected sex.
I don't think that you can eliminate STD's in any scenario w/out medical breakthroughs, but I do think that kids raised in families where they're actually "wanted" by their parents would lead to a wiser populous.
Thanks for your comment by the way. Appreciated!
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