Truth in Advertising: a Mortifying Bumper Sticker, and a Sadly Quixotic Ad Campaign

March 27, 2009

A bumper sticker for homeschooling families, guaranteed to broadcast to the world that your child is an incredible mama’s boy: 

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Really?  Really now?For being on the Honor Roll to mean anything, someone else has to not be on it.  You might as well get a bumper sticker that says, “My other children are somewhat less intelligent.”

And here’s one that, dear god, I wish could be true: 

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I see these “Every Child Born Healthy” posters all over New York, and sigh.  The March of Dimes is a force of good, no doubt — they freaking cured polio in the fifties. 

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But … nature doesn’t believe in “every child born healthy.”  Ever had a cat or dog give birth?  Did you get a fucked-up kitten or puppy that the mother didn’t want anything to do with?  Oh, all the time?  Ever meet anyone who grew up on a farm?  Birth defects are very common in nature.  A very small proportion of them become useful mutations, thus furthering evolution.  But mostly, these two-faced kittens and eight-legged calves die.  

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On the human front, if we can perform open-heart surgery on fetuses, why, I’m all for it!  That’s great.  But humans will always produce offspring with incurable genetic maladies, and the only way to have “every baby born healthy” is to give everybody amniocentesis and abort all the “unhealthy” babies.  Which people can do if they want.  But I doubt that’s what the March of Dimes is trying to advertise.

From Reason Magazine: 

John Opitz, a professor of pediatrics, human genetics, and obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Utah, testified before the President’s Council on Bioethics that between 60 and 80 percent of all naturally conceived embryos are simply flushed out in women’s normal menstrual flows unnoticed. This is not miscarriage we’re talking about. The women and their husbands or partners never even know that conception has taken place; the embryos disappear from their wombs in their menstrual flows. In fact, according to Opitz, embryologists estimate that the rate of natural loss for embryos that have developed for seven days or more is 60 percent. The total rate of natural loss of human embryos increases to at least 80 percent if one counts from the moment of conception. About half of the embryos lost are abnormal….

So, 80% of all naturally conceived embryos don’t make it, and half of those were abnormal to begin with?  Yes, indeed: birth defects are more common than healthy babies.  Some of those birth defects can be treated or cured, but a promise to eradicate them completely is simply irrational.  I know of nothing to object to in the actual work or mission of the March of Dimes — just this slogan.  Which is silly, to the point of betraying a lack of basic scientific competence on the part of whomever wrote or approved it.

Enjoy this ABC slideshow of animal oddities, such as these conjoined fish:

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Posted by jen | Filed Under Jen says, advertising 

Comments

3 Responses to “Truth in Advertising: a Mortifying Bumper Sticker, and a Sadly Quixotic Ad Campaign”

  1. Vicki (Jen's Mom) on March 28th, 2009 1:41 pm

    The half horse/half zebra looks fake. How is the cat with wings possible? What was it’s mother into?

  2. Ray Harryhausen homage through genetic mutations « Remixed Metre on March 30th, 2009 5:21 pm

    […] Posted March 30, 2009 Filed under: Film, Random stuff, Science | A friend of mine recently blogged about strange birth defects in animals and included a link to an eye-popping slide show. I took a glance, and I was particularly impressed […]

  3. Rich on March 30th, 2009 6:23 pm

    In response to your comment about the turtles ending up fine and the kittens and calves dying, I’d wager the turtles ended up okay because they had two separate and full functioning heads, which means the two brains developed fully and healthily.

    The kittens and calves reminded me of a cell in the middle of mitosis. The faces looked like they were in the process of developing separately, but never quite made it.

    It means that each “pair” of malformed faces is probably sharing one very defective brain, thus the reason they die so quickly.

    Although I was freaked out by the fact that one of those calves had two tongues that functioned independently (unlike “Blinky”, whose four eyes blinked simultaneously).

    God is one twisted bastard…which would explain the attraction to Harryhausen and creature features :-P

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