Good bioethics will invariably challenge boundaries. As my
friend and colleague Julian Savulescu, Editor of the Journal of medical ethics has found out to his chagrin, publishing
controversial ethical analyses will lead to very serious personal abuse.[1]
His journal published on-line early a paper the authors of which take a stance
on infanticide that is not terribly new or original in bioethics, as Savulescu
rightly notes. The authors apply these arguments to maternal and family interests.
Of course, an argument on infanticide, particularly one that does not reject
infanticide out of hand, will likely upset some or even most readers. The same
is true, to a smaller extent, for other issues. Bioethics runs occasionally invited guest editorials. A few issues
back we published a guest editorial with a plea to ‘queer bioethics’.[2]
Conservative commentators had a field day on the internet with what was
arguably a tame editorial suggesting we should take into consideration patients
belonging to sexual minority groups. As we have discovered in academic analyses
of former US President Bush’s bioethics chief’s indefensible claim that if we
find something repugnant it’s probably morally wrong, feelings of disgust and
even horror are bad indicators of the moral soundness or otherwise of normative
views, behaviors etc. Otherwise interracial marriages would likely have never
come about, given how disgusted people were about this possibility just a few
decades ago.
Good bioethical analyses will continue to challenge and test
boundaries we take for granted. In that context it is legitimate to publish
papers discussing infanticide as much as it is legitimate to publish papers
discussing the participation of doctors in torture under certain circumstances.
As Editors of bioethics journals we are interested in sound critical analysis,
wherever those analyses take the substantive conclusions of papers in question.
At Bioethics we have published
religiously motivated analyses as much as we have published papers driven by
secular modi of analysis. We will continue to do so. Savulescu certainly was
right to publish the controversial paper in his journal, especially given that
his peer reviewers indicated that the manuscript in question was worthy of
publication in the Journal of medical
ethics. No doubt there will be critical responses to the article, and that,
too, is to be applauded. Arguments in our field cannot be tested by other
means. It will be important for editors of bioethics journals not to yield to
ideologically motivated outside pressures. We must not permit self-censorship
to occur in anticipation of outcries by readers who find themselves in
disagreement with content we publish. Instead, we encourage our readers to
submit sound critical responses to analyses we publish. Express your rational
disagreement in letters to the editor, critical notes, even article-length
ripostes. I cannot think of a bioethics journal that would not welcome your
response. Do not expect us, however, to respond to excited hand-waving in non
peer reviewed outlets or on partisan internet sites. Time is too precious for
this.
[1] J Savulescu.
2012. “Liberals are disgusting.’ – In defence of the publication of
‘After-birth abortion’. http://blogs.bmj.com/medical-ethics/2012/02/28/liberals-are-disgusting-in-defence-of-the-publication-of-after-birth-abortion/
[Accessed February 29, 2012]
[2] L Wahlert, A
Fiester. 2012. Queer bioethics: why its time has come. Bioethics 26(1): ii-iv.
