If a child is not good enough for a parent, that parent should not have a child. If a child is not good enough for itself, the parent should help the child in any way possible, except changing the NATURAL thing that happened.

It is awful for parents to choose their childs sex or traits! Be happy with what Gos blesses you with! If you want a child a praticular way, don’t have a child! He/she won’t be an individual if you do that! Absaulutly horrid!

The world is ugly and every child needs to learn that. If you choose a perfect baby, then he or she would never learn about life and would never ever have to work hard or develop any skills. I think that would make life dull and boring. Just imagine getting everything you ever wanted, what else could you strive for?

I just want a child who’s healthy, happy and well off. Their look does not make a difference, okay maybe if i had 7 girls and was pregnant, i would want a boy, but it doesn’t matter. I’ll love my kids no matter what, I just want them to have the option of loving.

every child you have will be beautiful to you because it is yours, it does not mater what they look like because as soon as they are born and you look in their eyes you will fall in love and think they are the most beautiful baby ever born. i would never try to make the “perfect” baby because mine will be perfect no matter what.

_Ash

How would a parent know what their child wants before the child itself even knows what it wants? Yes, parents should try giving their child a chance with having a happy life, but using genetic engineering??? Come ON! The world’s already corrupted. Genetic engineering is just another way to make the world a “perfect” place, and perfection is something that should be obtained… that would take the entire meaning out of life.

I think the title of this opinion is self explanatory.

Well ya I’d say that’s kinda wrong on a lot of different levels (none of them religious). Evolution is something I believe in and if we engenieer children to fit the newest ideal we may fuck things up for our entire species. And I don’t know how you would select traits, as a lot of traits, I think (science isn’t quite clear on it yet) are in born in a way not really relating to genetics, or taught through life. And besides all that people always want what they don’t have. When you get a kid with the randomness of normal life you can still hate or like, but there wasn’t any favoritism. If you engineered them you might decide you don’t like blue eyes when they’re 5. So why keep them around? Get rid of that one and make one with green eyes. It creates a sort of cheapening of life. And why should the parent get to decide? I have no doubt my mother would have made me blond and blue eyed, and I would have hated her. It would give a parents too much feeling of control, if the child did ANYTHING they didn’t want they’d feel cheated and kids would have too much pressure to live up to an ideal. And then there’s the whole where could this go in the wrong hands? Could the government engineer perfect soldiers for more disgusting wars? Would they? I dunno damn government is so freaking secretive no one can (and with the crazed wealth-mongering idiots that usually rule countries it’s not that far fetched). It’d just be a long bad twisting road that could cause a lot of harm but I doubt any real good. EXCEPT if you mean there’s a LARGE chance the child would turn out deformed, then usuing medication to help get them to a more “normal” or better yet healthy state would be perfectly acceptable.

Isn’t it a parent’s responsibility to give a child the best chance possible in life? Won’t they be happier if they’re smarter, better looking, etc?

I’d sure be angry with my parents if they short-sheeted my chances in life. I admit I’m worried what gattaca-like existence this pushes us towards, but I don’t see any alternative.

that would mean that everyone would be “perfect”. then we would have to define “perfect”. and there would be now fun anymore, and there would be a bunch of resistant diseases. that is so stupid. it takes out all the suprises.

I can understand using this for many purposes. For anyone who wants to do this, more power to him. I think it is a great choice. For me, I would be happy with however my kid turned out. I do think that it is good to stop genetic diseases and what not. And if someone REALLY wants a kid with blue eyes, GOOD FOR HIM! As for me, when I have a kid, I’ll love him/her no matter what color hair/eyes/skin he/she has.

I would never want to do that. Whomever i give birth to will be a child made by my husband, myself, and god. So that’s all the beauty in the world i need. it really doesn’t matter to me what my child LOOKS like,because i think that every parent should love thier child for who and what they are, not caring about appearance or gender or sexuality, whatever. as long as they are my child i will be fine.

A baby is born neat and clean, free from all the evils prevailing in a society where he is born. It is the social norms, mores, customs, values etc which make him a nice or a nasty member. Home is the first institute from where baby learns basic things about life. But it is also a reality that siblings of the same parents may be either virtuous or sinful. Life is a very complex whole; nothing can be said with certainty. But one thing is crystal-clear that family,peer-group and school/religious institution make a personality.

It is a fact that whatever someone wants you to do or be, you’ll foil them- it is a human survival trait not to be predictable, and it’s fun!

I'm just playing devil's advocate, but what harm comes from choosing your child's physical traits? If all of these traits are insignificant, then what is the big problem?

My observations preclude that parents often do more harm through the process of conditioning, anyway. Although our understanding of genetic code is fairly dysfunctional, let's assume we're beyond the process of reverse-engineering genomes and we could somehow modify the code in a failsafe manner. When you compare the results to that of an overbearing stage mom, for instance, the "damage" is hardly anything.

No, I would not consider this for my own children; such things are so insignificant to me that I wouldn't care. Is it morally wrong for parents to do this? Maybe, but then again, I'm a moral relativist.

Anyone who makes a big deal out of wether a baby is a boy or a girl or what he or she looks like, shouldn't be having children.

I'll keep it brief and say this much... I have seriously thought on "choosing" the sex of my baby.

Mind you, I have three children; all boys. I love each one dearly and would never give them up. I agree that the only meaningful desires to have for an unborn child is that he/she is born healthy and happy. However, there is sooo much more to all that as most mothers and/or parents would admit...

On September 11, 2001, I lost a baby to (what the doctor termed) an ectopic pregnancy terminated by spontaneous abortion... Believe you me, after two full weeks of horrid pains, blood tests every other day, emotional roller-coaster, depression, and desperate hoping... had I NOT lost the child, I would have been overjoyed to have another son... However, I couldn't help but think afterwards that maybe that was my only chance at realizing my lifelong dream of having a daughter.

I am now 33, having started motherhood at 17... who knows if I'll ever have the chance to have another child. (If I had my choice, I'd have one a year until I was finally blessed with a girl.) If I had the funds to finance such a venture, I would seriously consider it further.

Put yourself in my shoes and think about what you would do....

HELL NO!!!! Sometimes scientists are so smart they're stupid. Let whats suppose to be, be. My friend, You can't change something to be beautiful. Who cares anyway? Think about it. That would loose humans all orginallity. And that's just creepy.

I think that it would be OK if the child is gonna be born disabled or really stpid or ugly, but creating the perfect child is bad. It won't be the parents' child anymore, it will be scince's child.