This essay analyzes the discourse surrounding one of the new reproductive technologies, sex "choice," which allows prospective parents to control for male offspring through sperm separation technology. Topical analysis is used to make the case that the deployment of political claims within technical argument serves only to mystify audiences and obscure ideological motives. This analysis reveals the standards of appropriateness suited to judging both technical and public claims. Feminist critiques of reproductive technologies provide emancipatory criteria for judging new technologies. Both standards, those of appropriateness to a specific realm and those of emancipation, are necessary to judge the selection of "choice" as the descriptor of technologies that will most likely narrow women2 choices as individuils and a group. The essay takes the position that making distinctions between the different spheres of argument is necessary for judging the appropriateness of standards proffered within each sphere. Neither standards appropriate to any individual sphere nor 'yusion discourse," which bridges spheres, should be confused with idealized and transcendent emancipatory criteria.
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