You may not be affected by this topic but as one interested in the ethical issues within society, it is important that you don't ignore and cast a deaf ear on an ethics topic that relates to behavioral actions of other cultures attempting to maintain uniformity and comfort.
There is a view in the culture of the Deaf to maintain deafness within the deaf family. The options, which have been proposed in the literature to accomplish this cultural requirement would be to 1) prior to implantation of a preserved embryo to first determine whether it had the genetic makeup to be deaf and, if so, proceed with implantation and 2) have the mother take a toxin during a normally started pregnancy to cause the fetus to be born deaf. Of course, there is a third option: for the family to adopt a deaf child into that deaf family.
So without casting that deaf ear to this topic, do my visitors agree that there is nothing unethical in the culture of the Deaf to maintain that culture by acquiring a deaf child? If the goal of maintaining the culture is ethical, then about the options presented, would my visitors consider them all ethical to meet that goal? If not, which ones and why? I will be interested to read your opinions. ..Maurice.
