The New Horoscope
My blood type, I found out when I first donated (amid much ‘ow’ and ‘eek’ at the sight of needles) is O-. It’s the same blood type that Kevin the Vampire can drink in those books where he appears, and I believe he describes the owners of the O- blood group as some of the most unsanitary people he’s ever met. That said, Kevin is obsessive about all things hygienic or dental, so perhaps we shouldn’t take his word for it…
My first thought when finding out that I was O- was a mingling of ‘take that, conformity’ followed almost immediately by a heavy dose of ‘oh no’. On the one hand, my blood group is rare in this country – less than 8% of the population – but it’s also extremely useful in that O- blood can be given to absolutely everyone, and is thus a prized commodity in A&E if you need to give a transfusion to a patient of an unknown blood type. On the other hand, when I end up in A&E it’s a source of mild concern to me that only 8% of the country can donate this high-demand blood group, since it seems to increase the chances that, while lying bleeding on the floor, a doctor might come up to me and go, ‘ah, Ms. Griffin, this blood transfusion you need… thing is, we’re running a little low…’
To put it another way; all yea O- donors out there, donate NOW! Just in case…
What I hadn’t realised about my blood group, is that it also means I am a natural athlete, and prone to gamble. Fact.
Anyone who spends much time around me will discover that one of my regular phrases is, ‘you know, I heard something interesting, listening to a podcast…’ … and lo it cameth to pass that, while listening to a podcast, I heard a long and detailed examination of a new theory, very popular in Japan but also spreading elsewhere, that your blood type determines your personality. For example, those people with AB are likely to be emotionally less sensitive than O-types; while type As might be conservative, introverted and prone to stubbornness. Interestingly, I read one Korean website which listed ‘conservative’ and ‘introverted’ as positive qualities, which is, I personally think, curious in and of itself. This was the same website which also suggested that type-As were ‘farmers’, type-Bs were ‘hunters’ and type-Os were ‘warriors’ as well as joining in the general view that type-Os were physically imposing and strong. For anyone who’s met me, I hope a wry laugh is produced at this notion…
Now. Curious and entertaining as this is, there are of course two major problems with it. Firstly, it’s complete and utter bollocks. Sorry. Find me a suitable scientific study which shows that a protein marker on a floating transport cell in any way affects that concept loosely described as ‘personality’, and I will eat my words and my favourite teddy bear, but until then – bollocks bollocks bollocks.
Secondly, and flowing from this first – people take it seriously. And that’s a bit worrying. In Japan, it’s actually possible to find yourself discriminated against for your blood type; for if a type A walks into a job where creativity is important, well, she may well be overlooked for a type B because you know, it’ll just come more naturally to them. Judging someone by a blood group is pretty much up there with turning to me and saying, ‘well, Kate, you would say that wouldn’t you – you’re a Taurus.’ It’s just as stupid, just as blind.
Mankind has striven for thousands of years to find neat categories for itself, and more importantly, for people who aren’t quite like whatever the fashionable definition of ‘itself’ is at the time. He’s Taurus, she’s Pisces, and that’s why the relationship failed. She’s blond, he’s got blue eyes, they are destined to be together; she’s Muslim, he’s a Jew; he’s blood group A, she’s B+ – “why, this can never work! Think of the children.”
We desperately strive to find ways to justify our natures, to explain catastrophe as an act of ‘fate’, to look to the stars and say ‘today was shit, tomorrow will be better because Jupiter is in the ascending’ but now – now we do it with blood. We extend old ideas and superstitions and still, desperate to believe in some power on our lives greater than the things we do with it, we take modern science and corrupt it into a horoscope, and at the end of the day, it is damaging. If we attribute our natures to our blood type, it is an excuse to forgo responsibility for our own actions, good or bad. If we attribute generalised meanings to a blood type, it becomes yet another tool of stupid discrimination, no better than when Europe shunned the Jews or Stalin butchered the kulaks. Surely – but surely – the day we discovered blood groups, how to transfuse blood and save lives – was a day for celebrating one of the greatest medical achievements of mankind, and the act of giving blood is one of the easiest bits of generosity going. To let mankind’s need to not be responsible for its own fate blight this otherwise sublime bit of scientific achievement seems to me, to be nothing short of obscene.
