Last year I figured it would be fun to purchase a DNA ancestry kit. The average cost for a DNA test that traces your likely ancestral origins costs between 300-400 dollars on average. You pay them, they send you little swabs and containers. You swab your mouth a few times, send the kit in, and voila! A few weeks later, they send you a report on your ancestral origins. Pretty neat, eh?
The problem: Once the kit arrived, I wasn't able to go through with it. A nagging feeling in the back of my mind kept telling me that my DNA would end up in some massive database, and the people storing it would eventually be forced to hand the information over to the government.
I do realize how absolutely paranoid that sounds. I have no history of mental illness. The idea just really bothered me. I decided to take a bit of time to think about submitting my DNA to the ancestry service. The more I thought about it, the more I decided against it.
This evening I was having dinner and drinks with a girlfriend and this very topic came up. My friend's father was adopted and she's always wanted to know her paternal ancestry. A service like this would have been ideal.
I've never been arrested, I have nothing to hide, so why should I care? When I ran across the article above this evening, I began to think about what other uses the government could have for my DNA.
Do you feel this is a violation of your privacy? Do you feel they are justified in taking it? How do you feel about this?
I have to kind of be on the fence post with this one. I mean while it isn't right that the government forcibly come and take your DNA from you for unjust causes. It is a tool that can have it's immense benefits. Given if you are a criminal and you are wrongfully convicted of a crime that you didn't happen to commit be it rape, murder, kidnapping, or whatever the crime. An enlarged DNA database could assist in your aquital and capture of the one that actually committed the crime. On the other hand, in an instance such as mine, if I have an episode where I don't know who I am or where I am, though these episodes are always short and I almost never any where that my wife isn't at least close in the area, it is good to know that my DNA is not something that has never been recorded so if I get lost or conditions worsen and I am alone or hospitalized without my wife knowing there is a way for me to become identified....So there is actually to sides to the DNA database issue both good and bad, and sometimes the good uses of something can out way the bad. Another possibility with a DNA database is to release the DNA to Pharmaceutical and Research laboratories without identity information attached of course to allow for medical treatment and medications that are more directed to work on rather than a general population but on people of a particular DNA category or group. This would cause for a higher rate of successful treatment and a lower rate of side effects or negative responses.
Well we will all be required to carry some sort of federal id card in the future i'm sure, so why not have some DNA too
Actually, it's tax week in the US and I'm more pissed off about having to pay six figures in taxes every year to help support the very people who back this sh!t.
its ok, I think in this case that privacy would have only been invaded if you let them. but then again what can the government do with your DNA? aside from keeping it in their database for future references, and not unless your a rapist or something, then you should be scared of government having your DNA records.
what can the government do with your DNA? aside from keeping it in their database for future references, and not unless your a rapist or something, then you should be scared of government having your DNA records.
It's not so much being afraid of them having it as it is allowing them to have it. The government erodes freedom. They do this not by snatching it away...people would revolt. They do it by chipping away at it.
Here's what I mean. The anti-gun liberals want the second amendment completely squashed. They can't go banning shotguns and they know it, so here's what they do.....
They bring up instances where police were outgunned or some events where guns were misused and use that as an avenue to ban "certain" guns. They cry on television and group a certain number of guns under the ugly name "assault weapons". Surely nobody could object to banning "assault weapons"! We allow them that. Now they have the right to regulate, all they have to do is narrow the focus of what is an "assault weapon". The next thing you know they're including "armor piercing bullets" (another ugly name nobody could object to banning). Guess how they define an "armor piercing bullet". Any bullet that can pierce police armor. Yes, that includes high powered hunting rifles. If that had worked then at least four guns I currently own would have suddenly become illegal.
Get the point? The liberals intent was never to simply get rid of fully automatic machine guns. It was to draw a line that they could move inch by inch til they were close enough to get what they were really after....every privately owned gun in America.
So do I want the government allowed to extract and store DNA from convicts? No. Because that opens the door to collecting DNA from detainees. That opens the door to extracting DNA during traffic stops. That opens the door to collecting DNA when getting or renewing a drivers license.
Why do I care so much if the government has my DNA? It's not about the DNA. It's about a government that's already so power sick and has already pushed so far beyond the bounds set by the constitution that it's disgusting. There's not one thing in my DNA the government needs to carry out it's constitutional duties.
"...government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem. From time to time we've been tempted to believe that society has become too complex to be managed by self-rule, that government by an elite group is superior to government for, by, and of the people. Well, if no one among us is capable of governing himself, then who among us has the capacity to govern someone else?"
~Ronald Reagan.
We could use him again.
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He that lives upon hope will die fasting. ~ Benjamin Franklin
So do I want the government allowed to extract and store DNA from convicts? No. Because that opens the door to collecting DNA from detainees. That opens the door to extracting DNA during traffic stops. That opens the door to collecting DNA when getting or renewing a drivers license.
We're halfway there.
Quote:
Originally Posted by South
Why do I care so much if the government has my DNA? It's not about the DNA. It's about a government that's already so power sick and has already pushed so far beyond the bounds set by the constitution that it's disgusting. There's not one thing in my DNA the government needs to carry out it's constitutional duties.
"...government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem. From time to time we've been tempted to believe that society has become too complex to be managed by self-rule, that government by an elite group is superior to government for, by, and of the people. Well, if no one among us is capable of governing himself, then who among us has the capacity to govern someone else?"
~Ronald Reagan.
I too am on the fence about this subject...I don't want Big Brother watching everything I say and do, but I'm not sure that I'm opposed to them knowing my DNA?
In 2006 I found a daughter that I gave up for adoption back in 1986 and we did the DNA testing to make sure. I never thought about my DNA going into a database. But on the other hand, it's no different really than the government having my fingerprints in my opinion.
I also do not have any problem with people who are arrested for crimes having their DNA taken. I've know a couple of people who have been raped and didn't know who did it - I think they would sleep better at night if they could have provided the DNA that was left with them after the assault and the police were able to identify the attacker. Not knowing who committed such a violent crime and knowing that they could be the person standing behind you at the grocery store is always much more frightening than the actual crime itself.
The government already knows your name, social security info, probably has your fingerprints, can tap your phones, hack into your computers, etc. - I'm not sure that your DNA really provides any more info than what they have on you already - or could get if they really wanted it.
I haven't seen that in a while. I'm old enough to remember it in current rotation on MTV. I miss the 80s. The 80s were good to me. I understood the world then.
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He that lives upon hope will die fasting. ~ Benjamin Franklin
I remember that video! :-) those were the good old days for sure.
Ok, let me say something and see what gets said about it, should we all be put into a DNA database whenever we do something such as buy life insurance, get a DNA test done for whatever reason....no that's a bit dangerous and there are no safeguards and no way for us as a population to control what the future would hold for it.....on the other hand, should a criminal have their DNA put into a database? This I'm going to say yes, and make the precedent for criminals of a particular degree only and block the advancement of it into the general population.
I may very well be remembering this wrong but I thought at some point and time when someone committed and was convicted of a crime that was a particular degree such as a felony 2nd degree plus or something along those lines that they then lost their rights, both while in prison and at least for some period of time(long period of time) after they got out. They lost the right to bear arms, they lose the right to vote, and the right to do many other things that law abiding citizens enjoy. This I was under the impression was one of the reasons for people to not want to become criminals. And I think in this instance the right to privacy on the level of not putting their DNA into a database etc be included in that.....Just as once they are arrested they have a record, it's recorded what they did what came of it, and their finger prints and other data are also recorded, why not DNA.....you commit a crime on a certain level and you should not be allotted all the rights given to everyone else in the world that doesn't.
"...government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem. From time to time we've been tempted to believe that society has become too complex to be managed by self-rule, that government by an elite group is superior to government for, by, and of the people. Well, if no one among us is capable of governing himself, then who among us has the capacity to govern someone else?"
~Ronald Reagan.
... 
I miss the 80s. The 80s were good to me. I understood the world then.