We, as humans, are always curious about our origins. Where did we come from, and what else is there to know about our DNA? These types of the question have always been around. However, organizations like Choice DNA and Ancestry.com are providing you with DNA testing. In addition, these organization also provides you with paternity testing and ancestry testing. These tests reveal the information related to your DNA History and clarify paternity confusion and also relationship issues.
There are no borders within us:
A Mexican airline name Aeromexico used DNA testing to run a campaign called DNA discounts, followed by the slogan “there is no border within us.” They gathered a group of North Americans who were going to take ancestry testing. Additionally, there were some members of the group who had a negative view of Mexico. The ad stated that people would get discounts based on their DNA results. The value of the discount was directly proportional to the percentage of Mexican ancestry. For instance, if the DNA result had 15% Mexican DNA, that means you will get a 15% discount. People were amazed, shocked, and even felt distressed with their results. Almost half of them had Mexican ancestry in their DNA.
This particular feature of DNA testing or paternity testing displays the difference between what we think we are and who we really are. In many cases, your ancestry might be different from your culture. Moreover, this also points out how much things have changed and how much ancestry testing has entered into this modern culture.
The Dark Side of DNA testing
As mentioned above, humans have always been interested in their origins, but in many cases, it wasn’t for good reasons. There were some scenarios where DNA testing was used for bad and dark purposes. Additionally, that wasn’t done a very long time ago. For example, the eugenic movement was made on the idea that there are some traits like being criminal, feeble-minded, poor, and lazy were inherited from generation to generation. These things were associated with specific racial groups and ancestries. The idea of Eugenics was that humanity could build a better tomorrow by identifying and correcting these groups with science and technology.
In the United States, within the time period of the 20th century, this ideology was taught by almost 400 colleges and universities. Moreover, in 1910 the Eugenics Record Office started to collect ancestry information, and they literally went door to door. Afterward, it used this information to create racist agendas and initiated things like the 1924 immigration Act to limit the immigration of southeastern Europeans and ban many Asians and Arabs.
Using flawed science for racism
The events of the past are still linked with the past. Additionally, seventy years have passed, and we are still seeing racist things. For instance, during the tenure of Trump and he created restrictive immigration policies. Nowadays, we are seeing the return of these kinds of policies that we rejected not a long time ago. People are using science for inappropriate reasons to justify their racist agendas.
For instance, New York Times reported a trend among the white supremacists to drink mil. This trend was popular because a certain gene called the lactase gene evolved in northern European. This gene helps adults to digest milk properly. The white supremacists use this scientific bid to justify their racist agendas. However, they ignored the proper research. Through DNA testing, it was found that a similar kind of gene evolved in cattle breeders in East Africa too.
DNA does not define culture:
Ancestry testing or Paternity testing isn’t just a pop culture thing. Similarly, DNA testing has also become a part of political culture. The right-wing Australian nationalist One Nation recently stated that DNA ancestry is necessary for Aboriginal identity to access benefits. However, many geneticists think that this will not work.
If you look carefully, cultural identity is a bigger picture than what our DNA simply says. The communities like Aboriginals decide who is indigenous and who is not. Similarly, these things identify a dark side of genetic testing.
To make it more clear, genetic testing companies use scientific language to display their results. However, people think that these results are very reliable and accurate. Meanwhile, these results are more of an estimate. For instance, if you look at the outcome of a DNA test, you will see that it shows 16% German, but this doesn’t mean that you are 16% German. You can say that it’s more of an educated guess based on statistical inference.
