Genetic Research and Censorship

Definition: Scientific investigation into the nature of heritable physical, physiological, and behavioral traits of living organisms

Significance: Genetic research aims to elucidate the origin of innate differences among organisms; despite the potential benefits of such research, some critics advocate censorship because of the possibility that genetic researchers may discover material bases for human social inequality or create new recombinant organisms

Questions about the causes of similarities and differences among individuals, and on the interaction between innate and acquired characteristics, have probably been asked by all peoples at all times in human history. Genetic research attempts to provide scientific answers to these questions. Although many genetic researchers investigate these questions solely for the purpose of gaining understanding, other scientists and social activists hope that genetic research will produce understanding and technology for the purpose of improving human biological, ecological, and social conditions. Arguments about the relative importance of nature and nurture have persisted in the intellectual history of Western civilization, but these arguments provoked little censorship until the mid-nineteenth century, following the publication of Charles Darwin’s controversial evolutionary theory on the origin of differences in species. Societal censorship of genetic research intensified during the twentieth century, when powerful genetics tools became available to scientists trained to formulate hypotheses and produce data that can influence social policy.

Mechanisms of Genetic Research Censorship

Censorship of genetic research can occur through one of two processes. The first is the denial of funds for certain genetic research topics. In the United States, this is a very effective mechanism by which the federal government, operating through agencies that support most academic scientific research, such as the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH), can influence the direction of genetic research. For example, in 1993, President Bill Clinton issued an executive order barring federal funds from being applied to research into genetic engineering (cloning) of human reproductive (germ-line) cells. It is important to note that genetic research thus “censored” by the federal government can still be conducted with private funds.

The second process through which genetic research can be censored is by preventing publication of research results. This mechanism provides an opportunity for editors to reject publication of studies perceived to be unethical or inadequate in any way. Publication censorship is not as effective as withdrawal of research funds, because only the formal dissemination of research results is inhibited. Ethical standards vary among journal editors who exercise discretion in accepting or rejecting a research manuscript, and controversial genetic research can be published in non-peer-reviewed books, where topical marketability often prevails over ethical considerations.

Origins of Genetic Research Censorship

The origin of overt censorship of genetic research can be traced to the end of World War II when the German Nazi regime’s extremist policies on heredity, racial identity, and social desirability became widely discredited. The roots of the Nazi policy on genetics and social status were embedded in the development of eugenics, a term coined by Francis Galton in 1883 to describe the scientific study of stock-quality improvement. Galton proclaimed that human eugenics must not be confined to judicious mating but must also include deliberate enhancement of factors that give superior races a better chance of increasing their population at the expense of inferior races. The founding of the English Eugenics Society by Galton and others supported the incorporation of the eugenicist agenda into political and scientific programs in Great Britain and the United States.

By the beginning of the twentieth century, well-known genetic researchers such as Charles B. Davenport, Hermann J. Muller, and Julian Huxley were publishing books and perpetuating opinions in support of eugenics. In 1904 Davenport influenced the Carnegie Institution in Washington, D.C., to establish an organized database for genetic information. The Eugenics Records Office was officially opened in 1910 at Cold Spring Harbor Long Island, New York, with funds provided by John D. Rockefeller and others. The Immigration Restriction Act of 1924 and involuntary sterilization laws passed by the U.S. Congress were based on data accumulated by the Eugenics Records Office. By 1935 more than twenty thousand people in the United States had been forcibly sterilized under compulsory sterilization laws; by 1941 eugenic extermination practices involving procedural “selection and eradication” of “inferior” types by the Nazi regime in Germany was in full operation. A direct consequence of popular revulsion against the Nazi eugenics policies was the acute decline in scientific interest in the idea of genetic “purification” of human races. Funding for human genetic research became scarce, and publication of studies highlighting genetic differences between individuals or races of humans became difficult after World War II.

Dynamics of Genetic Research Censorship

Following the war, developments in the study of population genetics and the birth of molecular genetics (highlighted by James Watson and Francis Crick’s announcement of the molecular identity of the gene in 1953) ushered in a new age of genetic research, far more powerful in diagnostic and manipulative capabilities than that available to the original eugenics program. Throughout the 1980’s, attempts to censor the teaching of genetic evolutionary theory in schools were still noticeable, and many individuals and groups such as Jeremy Rifkin of the Foundation on Economic Trends in Washington, D.C., protested the use of genetic engineering to create new and chimeric life forms. Molecular genetic research led directly to a proposal to map and sequence the entire human genome beginning in 1990. The Human Genome Project, as it became known, precipitated new fears among some genetic researchers and social scientists regarding human intervention in the natural course of evolution. An attempt in 1994 by the NIH to fund a scientific symposium aimed at examining the genetic basis for violent human behavior drew widespread criticism from social activists and some members of Congress. Subsequent to the public outcry, the project was suspended, pending careful re-evaluation of the agenda in order to eliminate ideas that might be misconstrued as eugenic in nature.

In 1998 researchers at the University of Wisconsin and John Hopkins University were able to grow embryonic stem cells in culture. Because stem cells can be grown into many different kinds of cells, stem cell research presented possibilities all kinds of medicinal applications. Embryonic stem cell research caused significant controversy because embryos had to be destroyed to harvest the stem cells for use. In 2001 President George W. Bush enacted legislation that required that federally funded stem cell research could only be performed on stem cells that came from sixty existing cell lines, which were all obtained before August 9, 2001. This legislation significantly restricted research and amounted to censorship, much like President Clinton's previous legislation. In 2009, President Obama overturned Bush's legislation.

Bibliography

Cranor, Carl F. Are Genes Us? New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1994. Print.

Duster, Troy. Backdoor to Eugenics. New York: Routledge, 1990. Print.

Hubbard, Ruth, and Elijah Wald. Exploding the Gene Myth Boston: Beacon, 1993. Print.

"Obama Overturns Bush Policy on Stem Cells." CNN. Cable News Network, 9 Mar. 2009. Web. 24 Nov. 2015.

"The Stem Cell Debate: Is It Over?" Learn. Genetics. U of Utah Health Sciences, 2015. Web. 24 Nov. 2015.

Weir, Robert F., Susan Lawrence, and Evan Fales, eds. Genes and Human Self-Knowledge. Iowa City: U of Iowa P, 1994. Print.