As someone who works in the mental health sector, I love seeing all the mental health-related content from news sources and social media during the month of May — Mental Health Awareness month.
What is disappointing is how much of that enthusiasm wanes come June 1. Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s fantastic that the topic of mental health gets the positive attention it does this month, especially considering that for many, the topic is very charged.
In recent years, society has made huge strides in reducing the stigma around mental illness. For instance, seeking help for depression and anxiety is becoming common. You don’t even need to leave your home to see a therapist with telehealth and text-based options. At the same time, suicide rates among teens are rising at an alarming rate and no one can pinpoint why.
People have strong feelings about why teens are struggling today more than ever, and I hear from a fair share of adults who believe that they have the solution. However, if we knew what was wrong, wouldn’t we have solved the problem by now?
My work centers on teen mental health by managing the You Be You Teen Mental Health Campaign in local schools in the Greater Kansas City area. Our campaign seeks to encourage students to accept themselves and others as they are, and to embrace the concept of making progress in their lives rather than perfection. The campaign is led by a student group at each school — a critical component of You Be You — and I help support their efforts, keep them on track to reach their goals throughout the year, as well as provide resources for therapy, staff and parent education through my organization, Jewish Family Services. You Be You provides students with materials to share, including T-shirts, stickers and posters, all with affirming messages. You Be You supports student-organized programming throughout the year, including self-care activities during free periods, spirit days that center on self-acceptance and other activities that promote a cultural shift away from perfectionism toward radical self-acceptance.
More than 20,000 local students have been touched by this positive mental wellness campaign.
“I think the campaign is amazing,” said one student participant. “Spreading the message of self-love is important and You Be You is an incredible facet of that mission at our school. Thank you to the campaign for its support.”
Some say the You Be You campaign won’t be effective because it is too “soft” and doesn’t get to the root of the issues that lead to teen suicide. On the contrary; the research suggests that resiliency is a major protective factor against suicide, as is social connectedness, both of which the You Be You campaign promotes.
I believe that what we are doing with the You Be You campaign and how we are doing it are at the forefront of suicide prevention. I just wish more people understood that in order to create real change, we need longer than a month to address mental health. We need comprehensive mental health programs to be integrated into the school curriculum the way that physical activity has become a required course. It is an easy topic to brush to the side to make room for subjects with a more quantifiable impact. If we want our teens to be successful in life and mentally healthy, we must teach them skills like resiliency and the importance of social connection. We must do so as if their lives depend on it, because, if you ask me, they do.
Sarah Link Ferguson is the coordinator for the Greater Kansas City Mental Health Coalition, housed at Jewish Family Services of Greater Kansas City. She also administers the You Be You teen mental health campaign that will begin its third year in Kansas City area schools this fall.
I was fortunate to call Henry Bloch my friend and mentor. He was so kind, gentle, positive and truly cared for people.
In 1979, I met with Henry and his wife, Marion, and asked them to consider accepting Hyman Brand Hebrew Academy’s Civic Service Award, to be presented in 1980. After touring the school and visiting with the teachers and students, they enthusiastically agreed to accept the award.
Seventeen years later, in 1996, on behalf of HBHA I asked Henry for a favor. We wanted Henry to ask Lamar Hunt to be HBHA’s 1997 Civic Service Award honoree. Although he had only met Mr. Hunt twice, he said he would give it a try. Sure enough Lamar Hunt told Henry he would be honored to accept the award and then added, “Henry, the fact you felt this award was so important and you took the time to call me, I feel privileged to be at the event.”
Henry made it a point to visit HBHA every two or three years to speak to the senior class about Kansas City’s business community and economy. The students were honored to hear from him and were mesmerized by his lectures.
I once asked Henry what motivated him and Marion to accept the award from the Hyman Brand Hebrew Academy. He replied that after he and Marion toured the school, he made a point to call several former recipients — including Mayor Richard Berkley, Arthur Mag, Don Hall and Mayor Ilus Davis — to hear their impressions of HBHA. He learned they all felt that Hyman Brand had a vision that they shared as well. For Kansas City to be ranked as a first-class city it had to have great hospitals, a first-class museum, a great university, a first-class symphony and a first-class Jewish day school like the Hyman Brand Hebrew Academy. He then added, “We don’t ever want to be in a position where Kansas City might lose a potential candidate — be it a scientist, lawyer, doctor, educator or business executive — who might not move to Kansas City because his or her children required a Jewish day school education and curriculum. One that would allow the graduate to be the best and the brightest and prepare them to qualify for the college of their choice.”
Henry was the ultimate gentleman’s gentleman. He loved most of all his partner and wife, Marion, his children and grandchildren, and he was eternally grateful to Kansas City. He devoted his life to giving back to Kansas City.
I, along with thousands of people, will miss Henry Bloch. May his memory always be for a blessing.
Marie Torres and her daughter, Dolly. United State Holocaust Memorial Museum. (Courtesy of Katy Torres McCormack)
Dolly was a wondrous child born to Marie and Moise Torres in 1937. In the studio portrait with her mother, Dolly, with her springy curls, smiles bashfully. This sweet girl wears her sailor suit with a jaunty cap in the nautical theme of her birthplace, Salonica, a port city in Greece. She and her mother are unaware of the larger world events that will soon take over their lives.
Salonica was called by some the Jerusalem of the Balkans since Jews had settled there in large numbers after being expelled from Spain and Portugal. Dolly spoke Ladino (the Judeo-Spanish language written in Rashi Hebrew script) at home with family and with her little friends.
Moise was the owner of a photography studio and Marie was busy as a part owner of a manufacturing business. In a snapshot, Marie looks as if she has stopped off from work to pose briefly in front of her husband’s studio. Their lives as Sephardic Jews centered around the Sabbath and celebrating Jewish holidays. A constant worry in their lives began when Katy, their older daughter, developed tuberculosis in 1939 at the age of 4 and had to be hospitalized. No one knew at the time that she would have to remain as an inpatient for six years.
Soon war raged in Europe with Germany defeating Greece and entering Salonica in 1941. Marie and Mosie, like other Jews, were singled out for abuse. The catastrophic anti-Jewish measures began in February 1943. Dolly’s life changed dramatically; she was told they had to leave their home, her dear friends and favorites toys. They were being forced to move into a ghetto. Somehow Dolly and her mother ended up there without Moise. In March 1943, the Germans tricked the Jews into boarding “transport” trains. Marie had packed clothes for the work she was misled to believe would be waiting for her in Krakow, Poland. Dolly and Marie boarded a car with the other people.
When the doors of the freight car opened, 6-year-old Dolly had arrived in Auschwitz. The effect of chaotic shouting and dogs barking was instant terror for her. Still, mother and daughter were allowed to stay together. Told they needed to bathe, they undressed. Unaware, Dolly walked with her mother and the others from their beloved city into a gas chamber; they were locked in and killed. By August 1943 the last trains had reached Auschwitz and the Jewish community of Salonica had ceased to exist.
The plight of Dolly was simple. Girls and boys under the age of 12 years were dispensable. In one transport from Poland of 2,500 individuals, 80 percent were young daughters and sons, sisters and brothers, and playmates who were never officially registered but just killed in Auschwitz. Hundreds of baby carriages were shipped to Germany, hinting at the number of babies who had died in the camp. Dolly left almost no trace. She didn’t write letters or sign official documents, possibly only a single photograph of her remains. Hundreds of thousands of Jewish girls and boys shared Dolly’s end. The future generation of European Jews had been destroyed.
During these Days of Remembrance, it is our sacred duty to cherish the memories of our own loved ones and all victims. When we mourn their loss, we join in the history of our people, l’dor vador. We are the link between past generations and future ones. What we do to remember, therefore, matters.
We Jews are a people who have a passion for defending our freedom. In their time, so did the victims; but those who spoke up were treated with ruthless violence. We have the freedom to pay tribute to them, though, by exercising our rights to speak up for the values and principles we believe in. We can defend causes about which we care deeply, like safeguarding the lawful rights of vulnerable groups (by opposing religious freedom bills), protecting and strengthening voting rights, and pressing for bail reform to stop punishing the poor and racial minorities under the current system. Though if we are indifferent or complacent, we will choose a different path. Then we must ask ourselves, “Am I sacrificing speaking up for silence?” Silence is easier but it doesn’t protect our way of life as we know it.
Mary Greenberg, Ph.D., serves on the State of Kansas Holocaust Commission. Her speaking engagements on preventing anti-Semitism and the link between leadership and anti-Semitism are based on her research that advances the study of the Jewish people in the Diaspora. This column is written in memory of her relatives, the daughters and sons of the Haguel and Levy families from Salonica, who perished in Auschwitz during Passover 1943.
Yom HaShoah — Holocaust Remembrance Day
The local Yom HaShoah service, commemorating the 76th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising and the 56th anniversary of the dedication of Kansas City’s Memorial to the Six Million, will take place at 1:30 p.m. Sunday, May 15, at the Lewis and Shirley White Theatre.
Israel officially began commemorating Yom HaShoah at sundown yesterday, May 1.
This is deeply personal. But what I have experienced should resonate with the entire Jewish community — the one we know and the one to come. In the whirlwind that seizes me and all who are communally aware, I have reached a new and stunning personal location, wedged between the searing past and the uncertain future.
My story begins before I was born, when my grandmother Fanya seized her slender teenaged daughter — my mother-to-be — Edyka, and pushed her out of the small vent at the top of a suffocating boxcar rumbling inexorably from Bialystok, Poland, toward the Treblinka deathcamp. Together, they made the split-second decision that at least one person should escape. My mother became a “jumper.” That day, she jumped into a hostile and dangerous Polish forest, was shot by local forces, and then buried in a hastily-arranged mass grave in the snow. Buried, yet one nearly lifeless limb protruded.
Teenaged Herschel, an audacious forest fighter, came upon the area. Spying Edyka’s leg moving. He pulled her out of the pile. For two years, under cloak of night and by raw courage, they lived in the woods as brave partisans. They survived. After the war, believing millions of Jews had been killed, they decided to continue living as Jews, precisely because so many tried to kill our people. After two years in a displaced persons camp, they found their U.S. home in Chicago. Their courage and determination allowed me to be born.
Growing up, I eagerly inhaled my Jewish heritage and love of Israel. With imbued purpose, I devoted my life to unmasking and addressing the hidden players and hidden hands behind the darkest evils and injustices. I adopted the identity of a Second Generation author long before the larger Second Generation movement developed its own national identity.
Among the disparate generation of unique survivors that came to America, many parsed themselves into two types. One group was determined to boldly keep the memory of Nazi crimes intensely illuminated as a warning beacon to all humanity — that was my family’s group. This group robustly fought for commemoration, investigation and compensation. They demanded unending X-rays and dissection of the sick international body politic that perpetrated, facilitated and tolerated the Holocaust. My eye was focused on corporate complicity by those too big to be exposed, such as IBM, Ford, GM, Carnegie and Rockefeller.
A second group of survivors preferred not to talk about the unspeakable experience except among themselves — the so-called “sha-sha” survivors. Perhaps, while some were proud to survive somehow they also felt shamed by the degradation they had overcome. Some felt guilty that they lived while their loved ones had perished by gas, gunshot or other gruesome means. Each had deeply personal reasons for their reticence. But all were protective of their American-born children. Many wanted to shield their sons and daughters from their traumatic experiences as a further act of conquest over their anguish. Even so, by this century, many “sha-sha” survivors had found their voices and sought rooftops to climb and vociferously proclaim their identity. But by now, a new generation had grown up with far fewer nightmares.
During those post-war decades, the “sha-sha” mindset among survivors was accompanied by the nonchalance of comfortable, non-refugee Jews who felt no threat to their safety in fortress America, the land of equality, freedom and personal protections. Too many saw the bond with Israel to be a cultural encumbrance to their assimilated American existence. Family traditions were replaced with internet communities.
Commentary
Like many in the corridors of the communally aware, I have been repeatedly shocked by the eruption of open anti-Semitism and anti-Jewish violence in Europe, the mainstreaming of anti-Semitism in the United States, and the eroded position of Israel within certain flanks of the Jewish community. Like many who worry about such matters, my outlook was bleak.
Then two things happened to me.
Last year, my operatically-trained, rock-pop singer/songwriter and cantorial soloist daughter Rachel Black — with no advance notice to me — wrote a haunting Holocaust ballad. It is among the first songs of the Holocaust written in contemporary musical style. I was astonished to learn that it was titled “Edyka,” named for my mother. In piercing rhythms and searing lyrics, “Edyka” retold the story of my grandmother in that ghastly boxcar, saving my mother, which made it possible for me to exist and for my daughter to also exist, thereby keeping the memory alive. When we live beyond our days, it is only because we live in memory. My mother has passed, but her inspiring struggle lives on. I have repeatedly written about my parents’ story, and now my daughter has ignited a new vector of remembrance in song.
Then, Rachel was invited to sing and deliver a keynote address at the state of Kansas’ official Yom HaShoah commemoration in Topeka in 2018. At the last minute, she received permission to sneak preview her song in a solo performance, evoking a rousing, emotional reception. Soon, Rachel performed “Edyka” elsewhere in Kansas, where she lives, now with accompanying musicians, attracting a following who connected with the message. Crowds teared up and stood in applause when she chanted the song’s pulsing injunction to survive. The Kansas City Star learned of the buzz and published an extended Mother’s Day feature about my daughter, her grandmother, her great-grandmother and the song linking them all. The newspaper also videoed a performance of the song for its website. Quickly, the Star’s coverage was syndicated, and then picked up by the Associated Press. Within days, the feature had been published by several dozen American newspapers including the Washington Times and Miami Herald. A few weeks later, Rachel and her group of accompanying musicians found themselves in a recording studio. Shortly after the CD was released, Amazon issued a big order, and it briskly sold as a single. In October 2018, Rachel flew to Washington, D.C., to perform her song at the National Press Club before a prestigious gathering at a Holocaust Legacy ceremony. A few weeks later, she rendered a house-chilling performance at a large commemoration of the 80th anniversary of Kristallnacht held at Temple Israel of the City of New York, sponsored by the Suzanna Cohen Legacy Foundation.
I said two things happened to me. One was my daughter’s song about my mother and grandmother.
The second was learning that Rachel would be bringing into the world another descendant, made possible by my grandmother and mother, eternalized in song by my daughter, now giving birth to my granddaughter as the generation-to-generation slow-motion staccato trumpet ceaselessly blasts. Second Generation, Third Generation, now Fourth Generation.
The new 4G arrival is baby Cora Edyka. Korach gave rise to the original cantors who sang at the Ark of the Covenant. Edyka was in the boxcar. Thus comes Cora Edyka, fit and fighting to take her place in the legacy of survival. I received a video of Cora Edyka’s first moments in the world as her mother gently sang to her in Hebrew — Hinei Mah Tov. “How good it is … to dwell together.” Hence, the first sounds heard in Cora Edyka’s existence were not Sesame Street cheeps or baby doll squeaks, but the very sounds the Nazis worked so hard to extinguish.
Whether “sha-sha” or fiery activist, the generations of the Holocaust have been determined to fortify and protect the ones to follow. Quite soon, all the survivors will be gone. The Second Generation, including me, will also soon be gone. The Third Generation has the duty to ensure that the Fourth Generation will carry the torch. Sha-sha is no more. It will be the Third and Fourth Generation’s challenge that we “Never Forget,” for ourselves and for the world. This challenge will be immeasurably more difficult in the decades to come than it was for me over the past half century.
At issue is the question of whether the next generation of Jews will walk furtively looking over their shoulder, or boldly toward a gleaming horizon. I know Rachel and Cora will be among the bold. But they will need plenty of strength and help.
Edwin Black is the New York Times bestselling author of IBM and the Holocaust and many other books. He can be found at www.edwinblack.com.
Yom HaShoah — Holocaust Remembrance Day
Yom HaShoah, also known as Holocaust Remembrance Day, occurs on the 27th of Nisan and is observed as Israel’s day of commemoration for the approximately 6 million Jews and 5 million others who perished in the Holocaust. In Israel, it is a national memorial day and public holiday. It was inaugurated on 1953, anchored by a law signed by Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion and the President Yitzhak Ben-Zvi. This year Yom HaShoah begins at sundown on Wednesday, May 1.
The local Yom HaShoah service, commemorating the 76th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising and the 56th anniversary of the dedication of Kansas City’s Memorial to the Six Million, will take place at 1:30 p.m. Sunday, May 5, at the Lewis and Shirley White Theatre.
I don’t get it. I need enlightenment. Some leaders of Jewish organizations are opposing Netanyahu’s promise to annex Jewish West Bank settlements. How dare they say that they speak for their organizations! Did they poll their members? Of course not!
Let’s look at the record. When these same liberal leaders opposed moving the American embassy to Jerusalem, they warned, sternly, that it would cause an Arab uprising. Nothing happened. When Netanyahu annexed the Golan, they warned, sternly, that it would cause an Arab uprising. Nothing happened. Now they warn, sternly, that annexing the Jewish settlements will “lead to greater conflict between Israelis and Palestinians.” So far, in the Arab world, nothing has happened, save for pro forma huffing from the Palestinian authority. The most vocal denunciations are coming from liberal Jews. They were wrong before, they are wrong now.
These pundits seem to have missed the fact that there is now detente among the Arab states and Israel. These states no longer care about the Palestinians. They care about Iran. This is a golden moment, and Netanyahu is taking advantage of it. Good for him. If these leaders have so much empathy for the Palestinians, let them try wandering into Hebron unguarded. Doubtless we would never hear from them again.
Ten years ago 70% of Israelis supported the two-state solution. That number now stands at 30%. These liberals obviously think they know, so much better than the Israelis themselves, what is good for Israel. Safe here in America, not under the daily threat of rocket attacks, they pity the poor Palestinians who, in three genocidal wars, tried to annihilate every Jew in Israel. Israel has once more made Netanyahu prime minister. They are the ones that are quite literally under the gun. Trust them. So far, they have been doing pretty well deciding what is in their own best interest.
Secret Lives at Birth of Israel,” by Matti Friedman, Algonquin Books, 2019.
In 1948, the Palmach, a branch of the newly formed Israeli army, developed the Arab Section, a group of Jewish men born and raised in the Arab communities surrounding Israel. The intent of this group was to be able to pass as Arabs and to gather intelligence for the army without raising suspicion. All the men were in their early 20s and strong supporters of the potential Jewish state.
In his new book, Matti Friedman describes the trials and issues these men faced. He lists their accomplishments, their failures and their patience in waiting to be sent on missions.
Friedman particularly follows the adventures of four men: Gamaliel Cohen, Isaac Shoshan, Havakuk Cohen and Yakuba Cohen, all of whom survived the Israeli war of independence and went on to lead successful lives. He located Shoshan — still alive in his 80s — whom he interviewed at length for the book.
These men went on many successful missions to protect the nascent Jewish state. One such mission was the attempt to destroy Hitler’s yacht. They operated from a kiosk with a radio disguised as a clothesline. Some members of the Arab Section were discovered and executed, but the group Friedman describes was successful in their endeavors.
The book’s narrative is gripping and the reader will be unable to put it down.
Andrea Kempf is a retired librarian and award winning book reviewer who speaks throughout the community on various topics related to books and reading.
Friedman to discuss book May 2
Matti Friedman will be onstage with JFED CEO Helene Lotman at 7 p.m. Thursday, May 2, in the Social Hall of the Jewish Community Campus. Their discussion of his book and Israeli politics will be followed by a reception, book sale and signing. Tickets are $16; call 913-327-8054 or go to thejkc.org/spies to register.
This event is presented by the Jewish Community Center in partnership with the Jewish Federation of Greater Kansas City and made possible by a grant from the Sam M. Schultz Jewish Book Fair Fund.
Dr. Bedell, parents have been trying to talk with you for over three years about opening Southwest High School. On Friday, March 29, you announced you did not want to talk with them.
I am the newly elected representative for the Kansas City Public Schools (KCPS) Board of Education Sub-District 5. Are you willing to talk with me about reopening Southwest High School? The Henry and Marion Bloch Foundation, Stowers Foundation, DeBruce Foundation and McDonnell Foundation have been willing to donate $20 million over five years to reopen Southwest.
At the present time, 80% of students in Kansas City Public Schools are black and Latino and 20% are white. The system cannot honestly be called public education as it does not represent the population of the city accurately. The system cannot honestly be called integrated. The middle class has voted with their feet and have left KCPS for other educational avenues.
Dr. Bedell, the students and their families are still living in our neighborhoods. We are taking their tax money to run a public-school system. Somehow, we are failing to offer the taxpayers what they want.
The most underserved part of KCPS is Sub-District 1. During the past year, you have mentioned you want to raise $450 million to repair schools. Why should folks in the Southwest corridor participate in funding a system that does not operate in their part of town? The people are there; the schools are not.
If we are going to talk about raising money for repairing buildings, let us talk about a firm timeline to open Southwest High School first. Give us an inclusive district so that black, white and Latino students can study and live together.
If you don’t know about ALYN Hospital in Jerusalem, I suggest you read all about it. ALYN is the only rehabilitation hospital for kids and teens in Israel. They create unique plans for each child depending on their individual needs, which often involve a variety of therapies and equipment. You can read all about the hospital and its amazing programs here: .https://www.alyn.org/
Last year my son and I raised a good deal of money for this fantastic organization. And all we needed to do was jump out of a plane! The experience was thrilling on so many levels. It was a blast being able to have that level of quality time with my son. Flying through the air was breathtaking. And being able to do all of this for such a great cause was possibly the best part.
Well, we’re back doing it again another time around. We’d love it if you could help. Last year we raised over $2,700 and this year we’re hoping to do even more. We’d love it if you’d help us make the world a better place. Please consider donating at: https://www.jgive.com/new/en/usd/donation-targets/15585/about.
My son Shlomo and I miss Kansas every day. I taught for two years at HBHA and I was a very active member of BIAV. Shlomo was HBHA’s 2014 first “Mensch of the Week.” I’ve lived in a lot of places throughout my years. Kansas City was the first place I ever left not wanting to. We miss you all a ton, and I’m truly happy to find any excuse to remind you all of how much you meant to us.
On April 15, I retire from Safehome. For the better part of my 19 years working at Safehome, Johnson County’s only domestic violence agency, I served as the Jewish outreach coordinator on domestic abuse. When I initially started, half my position involved this responsibility, due to Steve Israelite’s vision to fund this type of outreach and his collaboration with Sharon Katz, former executive director. The other half regarded my field of volunteer management. When the grant from Jewish Heritage Foundation ended, other places provided funding: Flo Harris Foundation, J-LEAD, and gracious anonymous donors. It remained a small but vital part of my professional life.
Like myself, the learning curve for our Jewish clergy was more straight than curved … how could this happen in the Jewish community when we believe in Shalom Bayit? No one talks about it, therefore it doesn’t exist. After a couple of years, and speaking to many groups who invited me to discuss the topic, I figured out how to explain this complex situation so it made sense, and allowed people to believe that yes, it does exist in our idyllic corner of the world.
You know what happened? As people learned about abuse, and the emergency cards started appearing in all the temples, synagogues and at The J (thank you, Marge!), people started calling, asking questions about abuse, the agency, and for resources, including names of rabbis who truly understood this horrible dynamic; i.e., someone spiritually s/he could talk with who would believe them. There were many successes with calls, some heartbreak, and definitely education. Education enables us to move forward with good decisions. As Rabbi (Vered) Harris wrote after she moved to Oklahoma, “Because of your advocacy and the educational programs you provided, I learned enough to at least help me know who to call and what questions to ask when I’m faced with a person living in an abusive relationship.”
Though I leave April 15, Safehome continues to serve the Jewish community. If you have any questions about the agency’s sensitivity to needs of people in our community, contact Babs Bradhurst, assistant finance director, who will serve as Safehome’s Jewish Outreach Resource (913-432-9300). She will answer questions involving kashrut, holidays and any other curiosity you have about the program or shelter service. Safehome’s volunteers will continue to distribute the emergency cards. Safehome’s hotline number is 913-262-2868.
Thank you to our community’s wonderful rabbis for your valuable support of Safehome’s program and learning along with me; thank you to all the wonderful groups who invited me to speak; and thank you to those volunteer groups who chose Safehome as their place to volunteer on Mitzvah Days these last 19 years.
“Hacking Darwin: Genetic Engineering and the Future of Humanity,” by Jamie Metzl, Sourcebooks (2019) $25.99
A dear physician colleague recently died. His death may well be attributable to a genetic anomaly. The rare nature of the cancer he had and its insidious development has his best friends and closest research associates wondering about the genetic connection. Me too.
Jamie Metzl — an incredibly gifted young writer, technologist and futurist — believes that genetic engineering may hold promise for preventing or eradicating such tragic deaths and, in doing so, save lives for generations to come.
It’s an optimistic view that many share.
But my dear deceased friend would be the first to ask: So when we start changing people’s DNA, are we getting a little close to playing God? Especially if in the repair we rewrite genetic code for future generations? And, if you change this part of my genetic code, should you be able to change other aspects of my makeup? Should we really go there, even if we can?
Like it or not, Metzl writes, we are there and — now that our genetic identity cannot only be read but hacked — it’s time to get serious about addressing a host of questions about the future of humanity.
“Hacking Darwin” is a fast paced and fascinating look into the history of gene exploration, from the early days of Charles Darwin and Augustinian friar Gregor Mendel to the latest advances in CRISPR and CAR T-cell therapy offered legitimately by advanced academic research, medical and cancer centers around the world (and some not so legitimate experimentation as well).
Metzl’s expansive grasp of the issues and tight knit way of weaving the development of plant, animal and human genetic science into a tapestry worthy of thoughtful reflection kept me wondering where we were going next on this journey. He describes with fluid ease the concepts and impact of synthetic biology, gene mapping and alphabet soups of GMO and IVF. I learned more than I ever wanted to know about naked mole rats, but was captured by his descriptions of the diverse cultural factors and religious convictions that affect perspectives on this science.
It’s an ambitious book, perhaps a bit much for some readers, but I found it accessible and downright essential if we are going to engage in the discussions he calls for within our families, communities and society about what we ought and ought not to be considering.
Metzl encourages us to be curious and open to this journey. To contemplate what’s possible on the one hand and contemptable on the other. We have a sordid history in this country of accepting the arguments of eugenicists, and we’ve experienced evils worldwide when such theories have been allowed to run amok.
As we conquer the genetic code, as Metzl confidently claims we will, how could we possibly say no to mitochondrial therapies, the eradication of sickle cell disease or the annihilation of mosquitos that carry malaria?
My dear deceased friend would encourage us to explore the path that leads to human flourishing and caution us on the trail of self-indulgence and aggrandizement. I think Metzl would welcome that challenge, but he suggests a deployment of our best values, a dialogue that will be difficult, painful and conflict ridden, for we will not easily agree on the goals or the path. He admonishes that conversation must begin with urgency. We can’t leave it to chance, nor to tomorrow.
Darwin’s been hacked and the future of humanity is entrusted to us in ways never before imagined.
This need not be a dystopian moment, but to avert disaster we must set ourselves on a path to respectful dialogue, thoughtful reflection and authentic discernment. Safe journey to all of us.
John G. Carney is president and CEO, Center for Practical Bioethics.
Metzl to present lectures
Jamie Metzl, author of “Hacking Darwin: Genetic Engineering and the Future of Humanity,” will present free lectures titled “My Future, My Family: The Ethics of Engineering Ourselves” in Kansas City next week. The lectures will explore the genetics revolution and discuss the following questions: Will we use genetic engineering to expand or limit our humanity? How will genetic engineering affect diversity, equality and justice? Who will make decisions that could affect the entire human gene pool?
Metzl will speak at 4 p.m. Monday, April 1, at the Kansas City Public Library Plaza Branch, 4801 Main St., Kansas City, MO. On Tuesday, April 9, he will speak at 9 a.m. at Kansas City University of Medicine and Biosciences, 1750 Independence Ave., Kansas City, MO. Both lectures have limited seating, register at practicalbioethics.org/events-education/events-calendar.html. For more information, email or call 816-979-1357. Tuesday evening Metzl will also speak at the Center for Practical Bioethics’ annual fundraising dinner.
The lectures are presented by Center for Practical Bioethics and Kansas City University of Medicine and Biosciences and co-sponsored by BioNexus KC, KC Digital Drive, Linda Hall Library, The Barstow School and Young Friends of the Kansas City Public Library.
