Delicious Irony: How Gattaca is Actually Rand Paul's Ideal Society

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Unlike Rand Paul, I actually saw Gattaca.

I even wrote a paper on it for a freshman economics class. This was before any of us even knew about Wikipedia, so back then we had to bite the bullet and actually attend the event to do the assignment. For the topic of the assignment, I ended up analyzing the ways in which economics would be vastly altered if we did, in fact, life in a Gattaca-like world. It was intriguing to consider the consequences of this world upon society as a whole. It was a world where both the economic as well as social well-being clearly sat in the hands of a privileged elite class while the rest of society was forced to live among the shadows as a permanent underclass.

What’s ironic is that the movie points out a very dystopian future. A future that is very much in line with the worldview of Senator and presidential hopeful Rand Paul. Whereas he has been using the film as a cautionary tale against the evils of Obamacare, the movie actually paints an accurate picture of what would happen if President Paul was ever elected to the Oval Office. The views of the film express a world that Senator Paul not only believes in, but also one for which he has openly supported.

If Senator Paul had actually seen the movie, he would know this.

The film Gattaca is centered upon the concept of government-controlled healthcare. Specifically, having government control by means of technology. Parents can analyze their child’s genes and know instantaneously about the child’s current as well as future medical conditions. The vast majority of parents genetically engineer their child to have no health issues and to live a long, healthy life. It’s only the “invalids” who are born naturally who are at risk. Despite all the advancements in technology, there are still some foolish parents who want to give birth to their child the old-fashioned way who inevitably have children who are born healthy but will experience health problems down the road. It is this futuristic class of untouchables who are forced to take menial jobs and live meaningless lives. With known health defects in an otherwise healthy world, it’s no wonder these people permanently occupy the lowest rung of the social ladder.

That’s as far as Rand Paul got. His crack staff team of researchers clearly got as far as “genetic engineering movie” before they clicked on the first option, which just happened to be a Wikipedia entry for the film Gattaca. Knowing that the students of Liberty University don’t believe in actual science, they clearly thought that this movie would be a good boogeyman cautionary tale about big, bad government imposing its will and leading to a dysfunctional society where there is a clear division of the haves and have nots. It’s the card the Republican Party has been playing for years: With government’s invasive actions into heath care, it can only lead to anarchy and dystopia. It seemed like the perfect anecdote to win over the not-so-free-thinking students at Jerry Falwell’s university.

Here’s the fun part. As much as Republicans like Rand Paul try to spin it, the fact is that we would be headed toward a Gattaca-esque world if we didn’t have ObamaCare in place. How’s that for irony?

You see, the problem in Gattaca is the fact that the distinction between the haves and have-nots has become so great that there is essentially an underground world for people who want to “beat the system”. In the film, these have-nots will go to great lengths to try and integrate themselves into the affluent society. They will, in fact, circumvent the law in order to pursue opportunities afforded to them simply because of how they were born. In other words, they will cheat at an unfair game because the game has been rigged against them.

Here’s what Senator Paul doesn’t get: The unfair system in the film is exactly the one he has and continues to advocate. He still does not support the Affordable Care Act that actually gives 15 million Americans an opportunity to move out from among the shadows and purchase health insurance. He proved this with his vote in the Senate signifying the fact that he would rather crash the global economy than allow the Affordable Care Act to go into law. He would much rather have private insurers deny coverage to those with preexisting conditions than help out those millions of Americans who have had the deck stacked against them simply because of their health upon their birth.

If Rand Paul had actually watched Gattaca, he would realize that by the end of the film the viewer ends up rooting for the invalid to achieve success. The viewer sees this character as someone who has amazing potential and who, through the fault of society, hasn’t had a chance to realize his potential. The viewer realizes the system is broken and when that happens it is up to the individual to take matters into his or her own hands. This is the world that Rand Paul and today’s Republicans are openly advocating. It is a world where those privileged elite are born into success and those who are not are stuck in cyclical poverty with no hope of ever advancing up the social ladder. Health care is just one small piece of this distorted sense of reality. What Rand Paul “libertarians” really want is not freedom for all, but freedom for a select few at the top.

Rand Paul doesn’t need to see Gattaca. His policies are already making that world a reality.