a question on context

[Black Cat.1]

how to answer this question?
In the text you have studied (‘Gattaca’) what evidence is there of both the positive and negative impact of membership of a group on an individual’s sense of self?

[Surgeon]

Alright - Gattaca is the film but what is your actual context?

A couple of things spring into my mind when I read that (bear in mind I studied Gattaca in 2007/2007 so it's not very fresh in my mind.

1) Alienation of and discrimination against certain individuals in society based on their genetic make-up. (Although it's displayed that an "invalid" can come out victorious over a "valid" despite their respective genes). For example, the scene between Anton and Vincent swimming and he drowns, relies on his invalid brother to save his life.

2) False sense of confidence and achievement is bestowed upon those individuals in society with "perfect genes", which can result in them not achieving anything despite their inherent advantage. They rely on these genes to set them up for life but they may not.

Sorry if none of that can be considered a rational thought.

[Black Cat.1]

Alright - Gattaca is the film but what is your actual context?

A couple of things spring into my mind when I read that (bear in mind I studied Gattaca in 2007/2007 so it's not very fresh in my mind.

1) Alienation of and discrimination against certain individuals in society based on their genetic make-up. (Although it's displayed that an "invalid" can come out victorious over a "valid" despite their respective genes). For example, the scene between Anton and Vincent swimming and he drowns, relies on his invalid brother to save his life.

2) False sense of confidence and achievement is bestowed upon those individuals in society with "perfect genes", which can result in them not achieving anything despite their inherent advantage. They rely on these genes to set them up for life but they may not.

Sorry if none of that can be considered a rational thought.

sorry about the lack of info. its 'identity and belonging'. this is excellent by the way i can see u getting a 50 (49 at least). and for your second point, what sort of example would be appropriate? Anton becomes arrogant due to his status as a 'valid', having been procreated in a test-tube and without physical flaw, and consequently loses the game of 'chicken' to his genetically inferior sibling (because of his false sense of confidence? and sorry for this, but would it be possible for u to think of a positve outcome as well (im so sorry if i sound very forward and rude, but i cant really convey my humility through a post). what youve written is great by the way. uve really helped already

[Black Cat.1]

oh god, i didnt read the '2007' in ur comment. let me correct myself. u PROBABLY got 50, or at least 49

[dilks]

He studied it in year 7 by the sounds of it.

[monkeywantsabanana]

bear in mind I studied Gattaca in 2007/2007 so it's not very fresh in my mind.

You mean 2010?

[dilks]

http://adamcadre.ac/calendar/13335.html

I thought it was interesting enough to link article, but not all of it is relevant to the topic in question.

A few bits that caught my eye:

Human conception is generally the product of one of the 100 million sperm in a typical ejaculation reaching one of the 400,000 eggs a woman could potentially release during her lifetime. That's a whole lot of combinations. Could get Molly, could get Krieg. Gattaca presents a world in which widespread embryo screening has allowed parents some measure of choice in the children they bear. No genetic engineering is involved — it's merely a matter of selection. You could have wound up with that phenomenally healthy, brilliant, beautiful Olympic athlete on your first try, if that's the way the chromosomes had happened to line up. But it's pretty unlikely, and when the parents in Gattaca have their first child without a preimplantation genetic evaluation, they wind up with a kid whose postnatal report indicates myopia, ADD, and a heart defect that'll kill him at thirty. Thwarted in his attempts to gain a spot on a space mission, he grumbles in a voiceover that "it didn't matter how much I lied on my résumé — my real résumé was in my cells. Why should anybody invest all that money to train me when there are a thousand other applicants with a far cleaner profile?" This strikes me as actually a pretty reasonable question. Especially given that the answer essentially turns out to be little more than "because I'm the star of the movie, dammit!"

And you don't prove that inborn disadvantages can be overcome with sufficient determination by having a fictional man win a fictional swimming contest with his fictional brother. Which raises the question: why would you want to?

The answer, I think, is simply that people tend to believe what they need to believe to live with themselves. Put aside the window dressing about genetics for a moment. The message of Gattaca is that (a) any disadvantage can be overcome and (b) overcoming your disadvantages is a matter not of luck but of character. To those who would lose in a fairer division of wealth and power, that's a very attractive message: it means that there's no need to remedy social inequities, because people get what they deserve. "What? You say the reason your life sucks is that you grew up in poverty and had only a tiny fraction of the opportunities an affluent kid would have? Well Vince here grew up in the same neighborhood, and now he's got a nice house and drives an Acura! You just lack his Human Spirit!" The fun part comes when this conviction inevitably conflicts with reality. Take our ongoing economic slump. Yes, some people are finding jobs. But for every new hire there are many applicants turned down — hundreds, in some sectors of the economy (education springs to mind). The Gattaca creed insists that chance can't be to blame for the applicants' inability to find work, nor insurmountable disadvantages... and that means it must be their fault. The result has been a parade of Republicans lashing out at the unemployed. If they'd written this movie the swimming contest would have ended with the protagonist screaming at his drowning brother to shut up about the lack of air and just breathe.
Of course, once you do throw genetics back into the mix this line of argument starts to look dangerous. The Glenn Becks and Jonah Goldbergs of the world delight in reminding us that the Progressives of the early 20th century believed in improving society not only through more equitable economic policies but also biologically, through eugenics. And you know who else believed in eugenics? NAZIS!! The very word "eugenics" conjures up visions of death panels sending the unfit off to extermination camps, or at the very least, "birth panels" of scientists and bureaucrats deciding who can and can't have children. To its credit, Gattaca avoids the easy dystopian route and offers up a eugenics program that seems innocuous, even attractive. As the geneticist in the movie puts it, all he's doing is making sure that the children of the next generation have "no critical dispositions to any of the major inheritable diseases" and are free from "any potentially prejudicial conditions: premature baldness, myopia, alcoholism and addictive susceptibility, propensity to violence, obesity, etc." That's a tougher target.

Actually on second thoughts just go read the darned article already. The equivalent of an A++++ Context Piece (assuming it isn't too close to the text, which I don't think it is).

[Surgeon]

Alright - Gattaca is the film but what is your actual context?

A couple of things spring into my mind when I read that (bear in mind I studied Gattaca in 2007/2007 so it's not very fresh in my mind.

1) Alienation of and discrimination against certain individuals in society based on their genetic make-up. (Although it's displayed that an "invalid" can come out victorious over a "valid" despite their respective genes). For example, the scene between Anton and Vincent swimming and he drowns, relies on his invalid brother to save his life.

2) False sense of confidence and achievement is bestowed upon those individuals in society with "perfect genes", which can result in them not achieving anything despite their inherent advantage. They rely on these genes to set them up for life but they may not.

Sorry if none of that can be considered a rational thought.

sorry about the lack of info. its 'identity and belonging'. this is excellent by the way i can see u getting a 50 (49 at least). and for your second point, what sort of example would be appropriate? Anton becomes arrogant due to his status as a 'valid', having been procreated in a test-tube and without physical flaw, and consequently loses the game of 'chicken' to his genetically inferior sibling (because of his false sense of confidence? and sorry for this, but would it be possible for u to think of a positve outcome as well (im so sorry if i sound very forward and rude, but i cant really convey my humility through a post). what youve written is great by the way. uve really helped already

No worries at all - you are far too kind. I wish I could get a 49-50, I'm in year 12 this year. That's a great idea for the false sense of ability and achievement. In terms of positives, I'm not sure. Perhaps the benefits of being able to advance through any social hierarchy with doing next to nothing which would put them in a "high and mighty" position? I honestly have no idea haha. Sorry I couldn't be of more assistance.

[Black Cat.1]

Alright - Gattaca is the film but what is your actual context?

A couple of things spring into my mind when I read that (bear in mind I studied Gattaca in 2007/2007 so it's not very fresh in my mind.

1) Alienation of and discrimination against certain individuals in society based on their genetic make-up. (Although it's displayed that an "invalid" can come out victorious over a "valid" despite their respective genes). For example, the scene between Anton and Vincent swimming and he drowns, relies on his invalid brother to save his life.

2) False sense of confidence and achievement is bestowed upon those individuals in society with "perfect genes", which can result in them not achieving anything despite their inherent advantage. They rely on these genes to set them up for life but they may not.

Sorry if none of that can be considered a rational thought.

sorry about the lack of info. its 'identity and belonging'. this is excellent by the way i can see u getting a 50 (49 at least). and for your second point, what sort of example would be appropriate? Anton becomes arrogant due to his status as a 'valid', having been procreated in a test-tube and without physical flaw, and consequently loses the game of 'chicken' to his genetically inferior sibling (because of his false sense of confidence? and sorry for this, but would it be possible for u to think of a positve outcome as well (im so sorry if i sound very forward and rude, but i cant really convey my humility through a post). what youve written is great by the way. uve really helped already

No worries at all - you are far too kind. I wish I could get a 49-50, I'm in year 12 this year. That's a great idea for the false sense of ability and achievement. In terms of positives, I'm not sure. Perhaps the benefits of being able to advance through any social hierarchy with doing next to nothing which would put them in a "high and mighty" position? I honestly have no idea haha. Sorry I couldn't be of more assistance.

no no this was exactly what i needed im only in year 11, and by the way u articulate urself, i can see that u are a very talented and can easily get a very high score in english. and if u dont believe, u should, because if a complete stranger can sense ur abilities through a post, uve got some epic skills man. go get 99.95 and become the surgeon u deserve to be haha

[Russ]

One of the best scenes in that movie is the swimming scene, where he admits he left nothing for the trip back. It's also a great example of the negative effects on self. He's lost his sense of worth and all that is left is to (try to) beat his brother.

Gattaca is a great movie, I rented it yesterday but haven't watched it yet

In terms of positives, the obvious one is that those designed to be successful seem to be more confident etc. You could also spin something out of membership of the elite astronaut club defining the pride Jerome has in himself

[Black Cat.1]

Gattaca is a great movie, I rented it yesterday but haven't watched it yet

it was superb. i thought the ending was excellent, although a lot of people thought it was an anti-climax... i thought it was amazing though. poor jerome... genetics isnt everything i suppose

[Black Cat.1]

*aren't everything... damn im crap at english!

[Surgeon]

Alright - Gattaca is the film but what is your actual context?

A couple of things spring into my mind when I read that (bear in mind I studied Gattaca in 2007/2007 so it's not very fresh in my mind.

1) Alienation of and discrimination against certain individuals in society based on their genetic make-up. (Although it's displayed that an "invalid" can come out victorious over a "valid" despite their respective genes). For example, the scene between Anton and Vincent swimming and he drowns, relies on his invalid brother to save his life.

2) False sense of confidence and achievement is bestowed upon those individuals in society with "perfect genes", which can result in them not achieving anything despite their inherent advantage. They rely on these genes to set them up for life but they may not.

Sorry if none of that can be considered a rational thought.

sorry about the lack of info. its 'identity and belonging'. this is excellent by the way i can see u getting a 50 (49 at least). and for your second point, what sort of example would be appropriate? Anton becomes arrogant due to his status as a 'valid', having been procreated in a test-tube and without physical flaw, and consequently loses the game of 'chicken' to his genetically inferior sibling (because of his false sense of confidence? and sorry for this, but would it be possible for u to think of a positve outcome as well (im so sorry if i sound very forward and rude, but i cant really convey my humility through a post). what youve written is great by the way. uve really helped already

No worries at all - you are far too kind. I wish I could get a 49-50, I'm in year 12 this year. That's a great idea for the false sense of ability and achievement. In terms of positives, I'm not sure. Perhaps the benefits of being able to advance through any social hierarchy with doing next to nothing which would put them in a "high and mighty" position? I honestly have no idea haha. Sorry I couldn't be of more assistance.

no no this was exactly what i needed im only in year 11, and by the way u articulate urself, i can see that u are a very talented and can easily get a very high score in english. and if u dont believe, u should, because if a complete stranger can sense ur abilities through a post, uve got some epic skills man. go get 99.95 and become the surgeon u deserve to be haha

Haha thanks, mate. It's impossible for me to get 99.95 based on the marks I got in my two 3/4 subjects last year, though.

[Black Cat.1]

Haha thanks, mate. It's impossible for me to get 99.95 based on the marks I got in my two 3/4 subjects last year, though.

well im sure u can still get 99.00+, and just full mark the umat. i KNOW u can do it. my bro got into med with a 95.95, but he full marked the umat (100%ile anyway) and murdered the interview. he got a 38 for accounting for his yr 11 3/4. i swear u can do it. he always says that it wasnt study that got him med, it was his belief in himself. thats all u need

[pi]

Guys, can we get back onto Gattaca please haha?

I used this occasionally when we did a little of this movie in yr11 http://www.vcehelp.com.au/vce-english-gattaca-notes-506/