The fourth chapter form the book Intervention and Reflection by Ronald Munson talks about Reproductive Control. The chapter includes a large amount of information about the various ways that allow couples to have children in the contemporary society, includes examples and detailed explanations of advantages and disadvantages of these practices, and presents case studies about real situations that happened sometime before this book was written. From the chapter itself and the different types of information that it proves, it can be concluded that its main idea is to shine a light on various procedures that individuals decide to go through in order to grow their families and discover what are the possible consequences of these strategies for the modern society in the long-term perspective. Thus, it seems essential to read and analyze this chapter in detail and acquire new knowledge concerning this subject.
In general, the whole chapter was extremely interesting and insightful for me to read. I found it important to analyze the real-life situations and have a possibility to look at them from the perspective of the book author. However, the most important ideas that I found in this chapter were about the negative consequences of various artificial reproductive practices. This is probably due to the fact that we, as individuals, are only informed about the beneficial results that people might have from specific procedures. We know that IVF, GIFT, IVC, and many more can help individuals who are unable to have children naturally to achieve the desired happiness and grow a normal family with as many children they want. Nevertheless, we often do not know at what risks these procedures place not only the life of these children but also our individual values. Therefore, this was the most interesting thing for me to learn because it gave a possibility to look at this issue from a different perspective.
Talking about my personal opinion, I can say that I really enjoyed reading and analyzing this chapter. This is probably due to the fact that I have always been interested in reproductive practices which present unique possibilities to have children for those individuals who have health issues and are unable to conceive naturally. As it is already mentioned, the thing I liked the most in the chapter is that the author was able to present to different opinions about this topic. Nevertheless, he neither was supporting or judging these procedures. He simply was rethinking and reanalyzing the observations he had, and, as a result, this strategy added to my feeling of trust and professional nature of whatever I was reading. Thus, it was interesting to read the chapter for the purpose of both acquiring new knowledge and understanding how professional writing should look like.
One thing that I probably did not like in the chapter is that the author put a lot of emphasis on the negative consequences of various reproductive procedures. There definitely are many complications that can arise and influence the physical well-being of children; however, I do not think that in the contemporary world the probability of bad outcomes is high. There is always a risk but the latest technological advancements allow specialists to reproduce children that will be healthy and developed. In addition, the ideas highlighted in this chapter a relatable to my personal experiences and beliefs. I am sure that every person should receive a possibility to have a child; nevertheless, our society should not forget about the individual values and ethical concerns that emerge because of these practices.
Reference
Munson, R., & Lague, I. (2017). Intervention and reflection: Basic issues in bioethics (10th ed.). Cengage Learning.