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A few weeks into sixth grade, Colman Chadam had to leave school because of his DNA.
The situation, odd as it may sound, played out like this. Colman has genetic markers for cystic fibrosis, and kids with the inherited lung disease can't be near each other because they're vulnerable to contagious infections. Two siblings with cystic fibrosis also attended Colman's middle school in Palo Alto, California in 2012. So Colman was out, even though he didn't actually have the disease, according to a lawsuit that his parents filed against the school district. The allegation? Genetic discrimination.
Yes, genetic discrimination. Get used to those two words together, because they're likely to become a lot more common. With DNA tests now cheap and readily available, the number of people getting tests has gone way up—along with the potential for discrimination based on the results. When Colman's school tried to transfer him based on his genetic status, the lawsuit alleges, the district violated the Americans With Disabilities Act and Colman's First Amendment right to privacy. "This is the test case," says the Chadam's lawyer, Stephen Jaffe.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 03 2016, @08:52PM
- Kids with markers for disease D are a member of set S1
- Kids with disease D are a member of set S2
- A member of S2 cannot be near another member of S2 (I think it's more along the lines of: if you are a member of S2, you are more prone to get any infectious disease and since members of S2 are vulnerable to contracting them, you should stay away from them all - assume they are loaded with disease at all times!)
- Kid K1 is a member of S1, but _NOT_ S2
- Kids K2 and K3 are siblings of one another
- Kids K2 and K3 are members of S1 _AND_ S2
- In the past, both K2 and K3 attended the same school as K1, they attended at the same time
Result
K1 is told not to come back here because at some point, you may become a member of S2 and then easily contract some infectious disease from school even though, right now, you are a member of S1 and not of S2.
Questions
Now, why were K2 and K3 allowed to attend the school at the same time? What sets them apart from K1?
For one, I think that because they would already infect one another at home (since they are siblings), separating them from each other at school wouldn't do anything to prevent this. Additionally, if they are so infection-laden, then sending them to two different schools would now expose two schools to infection-vectors (K2 and K3) instead of only one school (combined force of K2+K3).
The school has multiple goals to satisfy:
1. The health and safety of all its pupils
2. The health and safety of each individual pupil (this is not the same as 1)
3. Provide an education to all its pupils
So the question really is: how prematurely is this school jerking its knee? How quickly or easily does one go from S1 into S2? Are there warnings?
What is the real reason that the school provided for why this kid should not attend?
Lastly, if this is a public school: doesn't the school system have a duty to provide education to the kid? How are they proposing K1 gets his education and how are they accommodating this? I'm ok with the school system saying "you can't go to school X" but then it has to provide the parents (and kid) with an alternative to the parents and kid at the same cost as if the kid DID go to that school.
(Score: 1, Disagree) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday February 03 2016, @08:57PM
If you don't draw that in a simple diagram, nobody (of any decision making level importance) is ever going to expend the mental effort necessary to understand what you've communicated: TLDR.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 3, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 03 2016, @09:05PM
Sorry, but I don't have the crayons it would take to explain it to you.
(Score: 2) by kurenai.tsubasa on Thursday February 04 2016, @01:53AM
In the spirit of AC's reply, I'd also like to confirm that there is no diagram or PowerPoint presentation which accurately captures GP's post that anybody at any decision making level importance will understand. It's a complicated point that AC makes illustrating multiple fallacies.
I found the length of GP's post to be adequate: terse and to the point, illustrating the complete logical failure happening here, presuming the facts have been presented in good faith.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday February 04 2016, @03:19AM
Posting from bizarro world.
I completely agree.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 03 2016, @09:09PM
Marker for the disease != suffering the disease. Gene expression is a little more complicated than that.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday February 04 2016, @03:21AM
Marker for the disease != suffering the disease.
Isn't that what typhoid Mary said?
Hopefully we're a little past that kind of reaction today.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday February 03 2016, @09:12PM
That, in turn, led doctors to discover that he carried some genetic markers associated with cystic fibrosis. His markers are no guarantee of a disease though, and Colman never developed any cystic fibrosis.
Its like running genetic tests on Moslem immigrants in Cologne and if they have genetic markers for arab-ness, that means they're susceptible to being arabs, which means they would be more likely to rape the german women, so we should kick them out purely for genetic marker reasons, not because of who they are, or what they've actually done or not done. Pre-crime enforcement, more or less. This is assuming the german authorities don't want german women to be raped, which of course is false as has been demonstrated, which complicates the example.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 03 2016, @10:03PM
"moslem" ey... ?
(Score: 2) by darnkitten on Thursday February 04 2016, @01:00AM
Probably a generational thing--When I was younger, "Moslem" was in all the textbooks I ever read. For that matter, some of the older (usu. British) books I read used "Musselman" and other books from the late 1700's used "Mohammedan" or "Mohametan."
(Score: 3, Funny) by Alfred on Thursday February 04 2016, @02:43PM
Don't they like make applesauce or something? My racist heritage will demand I find a new brand now.
(Score: 2) by compro01 on Thursday February 04 2016, @02:49AM
"Moslem" is a valid romanization of the Arabic word, though it is generally considered to be outdated.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Wednesday February 03 2016, @09:34PM
Now, why were K2 and K3 allowed to attend the school at the same time? What sets them apart from K1?
k2 and k3 are siblings, and live in the same household, and thus any risk to each other from attending the same school is moot.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 03 2016, @10:40PM
But yet their parents get to whine and complain to get another kid WHO DOESNT EVEN HAVE THE DISEASE kicked out of school.
If your kids are the ones at risk, it is your job to keep them from potentially dangerous situations. Its like peanut allergies, if your kid is so sick that even sniffing a peanut from twenty paces will kill him then you need to home school that kid.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Thursday February 04 2016, @03:00AM
This kid is not at risk. That is the whole point.
Further he presents no risk to the others. He does not have cystic fibrosis. Please read the story.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.