Have a heart, mate
Is this the penultimate expression of socialism?
on 01/13/2008 at 04:13 PM
Saw this and was appalled. I came into this world with x amount of stuff. I intend to leave this world the same way. No, you can’t have my eyes (unless you pay my estate mucho money), or my liver, kidneys, heart, lungs, any part of my body unless you pay my estate MUCH money.
Much money. My wife has instructions if I pre-deceasce her.
Reminiscent of the US’ “volutary” income tax. You didn’t know it was voluntary, or how to opt out, and they took it out of your check w/o asking, and you filed a return. So now you are REQUIRED to pay it for the rest of your life. Why? because by filing that first time, you “volunteered”.
Here is the opposite side of this nightmare in the making - while the fiberals are into the death/destroy culture while ‘claiming’ to make everyone’s life better or make Superman walk again. . .The real scientists and compassionate people with brains, ideas and values are making strides that actually do make the injured better, make corporations where there were none (jobs, for lots of people, even the uneducated) and will make everyone’s life better.
I find this ironic that this appears to be also from the UK (I was going to email you these Drew, but I am behind already this week):
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/health/article3177646.ece
Hopes of custom- built organs.
First this shows a stupid reporter - the heart is a muscle not an organ.
However, I have personal experience with this - and it works. Genzyme in Boston takes a piece of donor skin (unburnt skin from a burn victim) and scrapes it down to just skin cells and then grows sheets of skin to use for skin grafts. It is the person’s ‘own’ skin and in the case of my son who had a 99% burn - it was the only way to get enough ‘donor’ skin for skin grafts. It is called Cultured Epicell Application. And no, in burns - ‘donor’ skin or an autograph - i.e. cadaver skin can not be used for grafts -they are used simply to cover grafts while they are healing. This is one area where the donated dead ‘organ’ is a help but not the cure.
This is just like the Stem Cell issue - Adult Stem Cells work but the fiberals still push the Embryonic which thus far have been a failure. As it does not seem to be about success and cures - I have to think it is about $$$$$$$.
I’d much rather be living in a create and cure culture than a destroy and take culture - Any day.
Personally, I can’t understand why someone can, in good conscience, not be an organ donor. It’s not like you’re going to need them after you die and if it can help extend the life of someone else why wouldn’t you allow it? It’s much better to not need the organs, for sure, but you no longer need them when you’re dead. The only purpose it serves is an aesthetic one. If you are the religious type of not wanting to give up your organs, do you really think your god can’t just give you new ones on judgment day? Even with ample organs, there’s still the immunosuppressants needed for the rest of the person’s life after receiving an organ. There is also the possibility of rejection. Point being, there’s always going to be reason to develop ways of growing new organs out of our own cells even with more than enough donated organs. Taxes are one thing, pulling the plug to be able to harvest organs is different as well, but how you can knowingly deny organs to somebody after you die?
I can imagine someone deeply religious feeling that after all, the soul is immortal, and that it is cruel to keep someone here at the mercy of a cultural philosophy determined to trap you in your body for as long as possible. Especially when you’re fairly well assured to pauperize yourself and all your immediate family by doing so, given the price of such surgery.
However, I consider that entirely beside the point. *WHY* I do or do not choose to donate my organs is not germane to the issue at all, in my mind. In a free society, it is not the duty of the citizen to justify to the government why he/she should be allowed to do something. It is the duty of the government to justify to the citizen why he/she should be prohibited from it. Mr. Government Worker or Mr. Politician, if you can’t give me cogent reasons why *I* should be held personally responsible for ___________, then you can damn well shut your pie hole. I’ll take responsibility for ___________ if I *choose*.It’s very simple Elliott. Most people do not deserve my organs. They need a new kidney why? Because they boozed it up too much and pickled theirs? No kidney for you, Not yours. I’m taking it with me.
For any other reasons, see the previous post by Grumpy.
Hey Grumpy! Can I adopt you as my grandpa? Both of mine are dead…
When the doctor’s are deciding whether or if I should get a procedure that might prolong my life or restore me to health, I do not want them contemplating how many cute kids on the next floor could be saved by my parts. One old S.O.B. with bad habits verses several young children, or someone’s wife/husband/brother; it’s a twitchy and very emotional judgment call on a good day.
Doctors in India and China have already succumbed and given up much of their ethics. I hope ours retain theirs, but I do not want to tempt them.
I just had another interesting thought… I have a vague memory of “pro-choice” philosophy being that a woman in a free society should have complete control, complete choice, in how to deal with any issue involving her own body.
Okay so I gotta ask… what’s the deal, does this only apply to women and not men? Or only to healthy people and not dying people? Or young people but not old people? What if you’re a black lesbian of childbearing age, does that get you a special deal? Can she sweeten it further by being Muslim?Is it gonna be the usual thing of ‘Rights and entitlements apply to everyone.... except straight white males.... unless you’re Christian or conservative or, God forbid, both, then you shouldn’t have rights no matter who you are...’ Is that gonna be how this works?
It’s not like I expect I’ll get any say in it anyhow, but I really do think we could play this game better if we were allowed to look at the rule book now and then....
P.S. Dammit, can you at least wait until I’m in my 50s, or until my own son has a kid, before I have to become a grandpa?
