From: bu008@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Brandon D. Ray)
Newsgroups: alt.society.civil-liberty,talk.politics.guns
Subject: Re: interesting [and scary] blurb...
Date: 28 Dec 1992 04:29:45 GMT
Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio (USA)
Reply-To: bu008@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Brandon D. Ray)
NNTP-Posting-Host: hela.ins.cwru.edu


In a previous article, PA146008@utkvm1.utk.edu (David Veal) says:

>> Any attempt to mandate organ donorship
>>>is easily an infringement upon my right to privacy, and I doubt any court
>>>would upload such a law.  Actually, stating what States may not have my
>>>organs and then having the federal government over-rule me may be an
>>>infringement of my rights already, but I'll let the legal scholars ponder
>>>that a bit.  All I want to do is put on the leathers and helmet and ride
>>>this spring without Big Brother telling me I *have* to.
>
>>And, as I also previously pointed out, corpses do not have civil rights.
>
>       That's cute.  I think I'll file that in the same folder as the
>phrase "Metabolically challenged."  *I* have rights, and disposal of
>*my* body would seem to be one of them.
>
Sorry; you are mistaken.  Your corpse is technically the property of your
estate, which means that in your last will and testament you have a certain
amount of freedom over its disposition.  However, your options are severely
circumscribed.  If your wishes were violated, the cause of action would lie
with your heirs, not with you.
>
>>However, this is also a bit off the point.  The original post said that
>>the proposed change was that the *default* situation was that organ
>>donation was permitted.  You could still carrY a card  explicitly
>>withholding consent.
>
>        So it becomes "We will harvest your organs if you do not search
>high and low for the office where you can get a card from us that says
>we won't be able to take your organs to help all these innocent people,
>you evil greedy person, you."
>        Or do you think once they've got the rights to your organs they'll
>put too much effort into helping you take them back?
>
You make the process sound pretty ugly, but why do you assume that it would be
any more difficult to get an organ-non-donor card than it is to obtain a
durable power of attorney or an advanced medical directive?
>
>>I think that is a reasonable compromise, given that
>>the vast majority of people state in surveys that they would have donated
>>Uncle Ralph's kidneys, if only someone had asked them.
>
>        (In order to make *some* referance to tpg) This sounds like a lot
>of the gun control *compromises*, where what you're really getting is
>the other side is deciding to "compromise" by not demanding as much from
>you as they did previously.
>        "We can't force you to donate, so we'll make it your responsibility
>to tell us we can't."
>        It would seem to *me* that if people not asking is the problem,
>we should make an effort to ask, rather than pretending people belong to
>the government unless they object.
>
Well, this has been done.  Most if not all states have "required request"
legislation, which means that whenever a patient dies in a hospital the
hospital is required to request organ donation.  Unfortunately, most hospitals
have neither the time nor the properly trained staff to do this...it usually
winds up being one of several things the doctor or a nurse covers as they go
hurriedly down a checklist of Things to Do When Someone Dies.  The situation
is not very satisfactory for patients, their families or the medical staff,
nor is this time a good time for delicate questions and discussions.

Yes, we won't force you to donate, but I feel it is not unreasonable to ask you
to make an absolutely minimal effort to notify us that you do not wish to 
donate...given the fact that the vast majority of your fellow citizens
indicate that they *do* wish to donate.  But I would never dream of requiring
anyone to donate who did not wish to do so.

The discussion is not at all parallel to the gun control arguments since, as
previously noted, dead people do not have civil rights.  And you can sneer at
that all you want but 1.) it is true and 2.) I have yet to hear from you (or
anyone) a valid reason why a dead person's "rights" should override those of
a living person.

>--------------------------------------------------------------------------
>David Veal     Division of Continuing Education Information Services Group
>               University of Tennessee, Knoxville
>               PA146008@utkvm1.utk.edu
>

-- 
******************************************************************************
The opinions expressed by the author are insightful, intelligent and very
carefully thought out.  It is therefore unlikely that they are shared by the
University of Iowa or Case Western Reserve University.
Newsgroups: alt.society.civil-liberty,talk.politics.guns