April 22, 2004

• When did Michigan become part of the Deep-South Bible Belt?
• Jehovah's Witnesses opppose blood tranfusions. This bill protects them if/when they refuse to perform one. I assume also that any medical professional can refuse to treat an HIV/AIDS patient, on moral/religious grounds. Slippery slope, indeed.
• I fail to see the problem with this bill. On Preview: Oh. Missed that part about discrimination based on the PATIENT, as well as the procedure - that gets dicey IMHO. Still, I fail to see a problem with a law that prohibits the firing of health care professionals who refuse to broach their ethics. We need more bills like this - regarding not just things like abortion, but things like patient safety and cost management. Not fewer.
• Captain Psyko : Would you go to a doctor who'd refuse chemo because a loved one, at some point in time, smoked?
• I could have phrased that a little more clearly.
• 1) I don't want a doctor morally opposed to abortions performing abortions on a woman anyway. Why should he be fired for shuffling off this work, if he's an otherwise perfectly good obstetrician? and 2) The provisions of this bill dealing with refusal of PATIENTS do worry me - and I missed those at first. Docs should have every right to issue blanket refusals of particular procedures for ethical reasons. But not to deny particular patients.
• I'm fine with this as long as companies are allowed to not hire people who won't uphold their company policies (like say, a policy to fill birth control prescriptions). Somehow I think these people want to have their cake and eat it too though. Sometimes this country makes my ass twitch.
• Doctors who don't want to perform abortions can work at hospitals that don't perform the procedure. Health care workers have an obligation to serve the health of their clients. If there is an overwhelming contradiction between their own sense of morality and the job description they are unfit to hold the job. In fact, I would say they have a moral obligation to find a new job, one that jives with their understanding of the divine. But you can't have it both ways. If pharmacist A won't give me Pill X, but his co-worker pharmacist B will, then is there any righteousness in A's actions? He is merely shifting moral culpability onto the shoulders of his co-worker. If A feels that selling X will land him in hell (or whatever) how can he rationalize letting B go instead? In fact, how can he let anybody go? Doesn't he have a 'moral obligation' to stop everybody from using this vile pill? American's need to take the country back from the zealots.
• SHHHHHHHH! shotsy, you'll give them more ideas!
• I was going to mention something about the Oath of Hippocrates, but then I read it and noticed that it is against abortion as well.
• Why should there be a legal means to conscientiously object to an individuals private medical needs, but no bill to allow conscientious objectors to, say, war to promote their feelings on the subject. Equal rights for all protesters!
• American's need to take the country back from the zealots. Zealots? These people genuinely believe abortion is murder. Shouldn't they have a choice not to perform abortions? Because choice is important. Right? Unless you think choice is only matters when it fits in with your ideology.
• de Carabas: Of course they have a choice not to perform abortions. However, if they take a job knowing that one of its responsibilities will be to perform abortions they have no ethical recourse for their objection. Don't want to do the work? Don't take the job. There are a lot of ways you can be a doctor... I don't object to their belief that abortion is murder and that is not the foundation upon which I base my assertion of zealotry. My accusation of zealotry comes from their imposition of an extreme agenda upon others. In the pharmacy by refusing to sell you an abortion pill they take away your right to purchase a legal product. Why? Because they don't like it. That is definition fanatical.
• That's good. Now we can do something about those lunch counters that have to serve just anybody.
• so are these objecting doctors going to have a great big sign in the window, or are they going to place advertisments, stating who they do and do not serve and why they do not serve them...? 'cause there are a whole lot of people who would rather take their health care dollar elsewhere, even if they fall into the category of morally acceptable patients. god, what a sickening state of affairs.
• My accusation of zealotry comes from their imposition of an extreme agenda upon others. In the pharmacy by refusing to sell you an abortion pill they take away your right to purchase a legal product. Why? Because they don't like it. That is definition fanatical. So go to the next store or the next counter where they'll sell you an "abortion pill". The market will take care of that -- pharmacies are not going to all of a sudden remove birth control pills and condoms from their stock. The people of Michigan elected state lawmakers. State lawmakers, representing the people of Michigan, voted for the bills. Either the majority of the people in Michigan will be happy with those bills, or they'll voice their displeasure in the next election. Which, even if you don't agree with it, sounds a hell of a lot more like democracy than the major societal changes we've experienced at the whim of a handful of judges. An "extreme agenda" to you is common sense to some people, and vice versa. After all, I'm sure there are things you support that get the Bible Belt crowd worked up. This country is built on a history of compromise, which means you're not going to like every law on the books. If you don't like it, show that with your vote. If you don't live in Michigan and can't vote there, tough -- the people in Michigan get to decide their own laws.
• de Carabas - By your logic a state legislature should be free to pass any law they saw fit, regardless of how it might abrogate individual rights, civil liberties, or constitutional freedoms. Fortunately we have the courts, and 'activist judges' to balance the occasional foolishness of the legislature. To a degree you are right, that this will likely take care of itself, but not by votes. A suit will come up, a court will strike the law down. Maybe not initially, but upon appeal.
• The general consensus seems to be, "As long as you don't become someone who will have to make a moral choice to deny someone treatment or certain procedures, then it's fine to hold those views."
• de Carabas - By your logic a state legislature should be free to pass any law they saw fit, regardless of how it might abrogate individual rights, civil liberties, or constitutional freedoms. Pretty much. Have you tried to have a cigarette lately in New York?