So, I went ahead and started The Ship Who Sang. I have read this one before, it was among my mother's books when I was growing up. I loved it back then- I still very much like it-but love it? Not so much- So you can have babies, without having sex- ok- and they can be grown up to a certain point without a uterus-um ok- but then they have to be implanted or die. Gross- People like sex, no getting around that, and they have sex even if it means no procreation so ok- but-
I got to the part where they are shipping the zygotes to another world to help repopulate it after a catastrophe and found myself sick to my stomach while reading it. Anonymous doners and all that it's hard for me to read that sort of stuff. I lost my oldest child to a coerced adoption. I find it morally and ethically repugnant to take another's sperm and egg to create a child who will have no idea where it really came from. I know that in the world of Helva that these donor's children will have all the information they need to be healthy, they know what the genetic predispositions are for these soon to be tiny "humans" It is the not knowing part that really bothers me, you know the not knowing who their actual mother's and father's are It bothers me alot, it reminds too much of my own life up to the point where I was reunited with my daughter. Who did not know her medical background-at least not the really important things about it, because all of the important information only became available as I aged.
Yeah, I know this is a bit far afield from the book, it's personal-but I can't help but make it personal. Adoption as a topic for me just sucks-no matter where or what universe it takes place in. It is never far from my thoughts, and it always seems to show up when I least expect it. It's like being slapped in the face by an unsuspecting trout. I get why it's important to this story, I get it-really I do. But I don't have to like it do I?
It's been far too long~
7 years ago
I think your comments are very germane to the book. We're definitely asked to see babies and genetic material very differently in this future society. The whole idea of the big bank of sperm and eggs is very unsettling. Notice that McCaffery totally avoids the question of worrying about them getting into the wrong hands because the bureaucratic powers are so strong that there seems to be no legitimate challenge to them.
ReplyDeleteLisa, I thought about that too. The whole section of the book just reminded me so strongly of what is objectionable in this world. I talked about Heinlein and Stranger in another post, the whole growing and Decanting/implanting thing. What would happen if it got out of control? We know Helva was conditioned, is the general population conditioned too? Is that why there is no serious challenge to the Powers That Be? If they are conditioned, does it go on and on, or does it end as it did for Heva? I think I am going to read the rest of the books in the series again- maybe I am cynical or have a more jaundiced eye than I used to, but I wonder if this is a re-occuring theme.
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