Tuesday, September 14, 2004
Precisely why is race relevant to this story?
'Suit settled after white woman gives birth to black baby' - headline, WFTV.com.
The story, and the underlying lawsuit, turn on the implantation of the wrong embryo in a surrogate mother. Since such embryos are tiny little buggers that cannot be distinguished with the naked eye, this tort reflects a failure in record-keeping. Indeed, one might imagine that the doctrine of res ipsa loquitur would apply. But why is the race of the infant relevant, other than to fan ancient fears that we should be working to extinguish?
If we wanted to be charitable, we would say the writers of the article and the headline (probably different people) were highlighting its most curious aspect to increase the audience for the story, an objective I understand I am abetting with this post (I, at least, am doing so in the service of pointing out the fairly ugly assumptions that underpin the story). But does the media really need to bring out the worst in people in this way? I would rather read ten stories about celebrity catfights or alien abductions than this sort of "respectable" but anti-social sensationalism.
UPDATED to resolve a confusing sentence in the original post.
The story, and the underlying lawsuit, turn on the implantation of the wrong embryo in a surrogate mother. Since such embryos are tiny little buggers that cannot be distinguished with the naked eye, this tort reflects a failure in record-keeping. Indeed, one might imagine that the doctrine of res ipsa loquitur would apply. But why is the race of the infant relevant, other than to fan ancient fears that we should be working to extinguish?
If we wanted to be charitable, we would say the writers of the article and the headline (probably different people) were highlighting its most curious aspect to increase the audience for the story, an objective I understand I am abetting with this post (I, at least, am doing so in the service of pointing out the fairly ugly assumptions that underpin the story). But does the media really need to bring out the worst in people in this way? I would rather read ten stories about celebrity catfights or alien abductions than this sort of "respectable" but anti-social sensationalism.
UPDATED to resolve a confusing sentence in the original post.
1 Comments:
By 
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Sat Oct 01, 10:50:00 PM:
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