4 ms·

If people own their organs, then why can't they sell them? In any case, this seems to be a step in the right direction.

by jlcx 15y ago

abstractbill 15y ago
You own yourself, but cannot sell yourself into slavery, for very good reasons.
- extension 15y ago
  No, but you can sell your posessions, your labor, your ideas, your likeness, and numerous other rights and privileges. Why the arbitrary comparison between organs and slavery?
  - TheSOB88 15y ago
    Because of the pressures it would put on the people most likely to 'take advantage' of it. Do I sell my kidney or tell my kid he can't go to college? Do I sell my liver or live in credit card debt for the rest of my life? Plus, the illegal gaining and trading of organs would spike.
    - daenz 15y ago
      No idea why you're being downvoted. This is some interesting context on paying for organs: In Pakistan, 40 percent to 50 percent of the residents of some villages have only one kidney because they have sold the other for a transplant into a wealthy person, probably from another country, said Dr. Farhat Moazam of Pakistan, at a World Health Organization conference. Pakistani donors are offered $2,500 for a kidney but receive only about half of that because middlemen take so much.[33] In Chennai, southern India, poor fishermen and their families sold kidneys after their livelihoods were destroyed by the Indian Ocean tsunami on December 26, 2004. About 100 people, mostly women, sold their kidneys for 40,000–60,000 rupees ($900–$1,350).[34] Thilakavathy Agatheesh, 30, who sold a kidney in May 2005 for 40,000 rupees said, "I used to earn some money selling fish but now the post-surgery stomach cramps prevent me from going to work." Most kidney sellers say that selling their kidney was a mistake.[35] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organ_transplant#Compensated_donation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organ_transplant#Compensated_do...
      - extension 15y ago
        As has been demonstrated time and time again, the way to get rid of a black market is to repeal whatever prohibition is creating it.
        daenz 15y ago
        You missed the point of my post. The point is that the poor are disproportionately pressured by this kind of market, black or otherwise. A non-black market will just make it easier for the poor to sell their organs, and the rich to obtain them. Re-read what I posted. I've read your other post on the subject and it frankly makes me sick. You've clearly never been poor and exploited by people with money, felt the range and depth of their manipulation to obtain what you have, without them giving a shit about you as a person.
        extension 15y ago
        The poor are disproportionately pressured by every market, obviously. In my experience being poor, all the pressure pretty much stems from one issue: needing money and not having any. The only way to relieve that pressure is to either make people not poor or make money less important. Taking away options without providing alternatives does not help, it just backs people into a corner, making them more desperate and more vulnerable to exploitation. I don't see how my proposal could be much more compassionate. Everybody gets free and equal access to organs, and the trade is exclusively between donors and the government, subject to whatever concessions and protections the public at large has it in their heart to offer the donors. The alternative is what you described, and what we have now: we either get lucky, die waiting for a transplant, or buy our life saving organs from criminals who rip off the poor for their body parts. Does that really make you less sick? If not, what is your solution?
        daenz 15y ago
        > Taking away options without providing alternatives does not help, it just backs people into a corner, making them more desperate and more vulnerable to exploitation. Selling your organs out of desperation is pretty much as low as you can go for money. Maybe selling yourself for sex is lower, but you can argue that you're still physically all there after that. So the argument of preventing them sinking even lower is a non-issue. Selling your organs is right down there with the lowest. > what is your solution? The solution is for people to start supporting sciences to regrow organs from stem cells. That fixes 99% of the issues. Which brings up another point, say you legalize organ sales, and businesses become established, who do you think is going to be opposing regrowing organs? The businesses brokering the sale of organs. They're not going to want kill off their whole industry so everyone can get the organs they need directly. In the long term, selling organs will create more problems and suffering than they'll solve. Let's face it, this is only an issue to rich people who are dying with 5-6 disposable figures. You don't see poor people begging legislators to let them sell their own organs, because deep down, they know that they never want it to come to that.
    - extension 15y ago
      So you would rather force them to not send their kid to college and be in credit card debt for the rest of their life? If you are concerned about people being poor, help prevent them from being poor. Don't deprive them of whatever options they have left because you find it distasteful. They have to do something. If selling their organs is the best option, and they're not allowed to do it, they will just do something worse. Besides, I don't understand why anyone finds it so horrifying. We indiscriminately implore people to donate their bone marrow for free, and we applaud those who do. But if they get paid for it, suddenly they are being exploited? And it would have been better if the leukemia patient died? It's not the selling of organs that I find distasteful, it's the buying of organs. Or more specifically, patients not getting an organ because they can't afford one. That, and middlemen profiting from the organ trade without adding any life-saving value. But both of these things can be prevented by publicly regulating and funding the commercial organ drive.
      - deleted 15y ago
        [deleted]
mynameishere 15y ago
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-11-01/organ-gangs-force-poor-to-sell-kidneys-for-desperate-israelis.html http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-11-01/organ-gangs-force-p...
- staunch 15y ago
  And in some countries people are constantly being kidnapped and held for ransom. We don't have that problem in the US and we probably wouldn't have a big organ gang problem either.
  - sidww2 15y ago
    The difference is that currently the amount a kidnapper could extract from an average person is not very high. If selling organs is allowed, suddenly the body of every person walking in the street is a worth a lot of money. It will drastically increase the probability of getting kidnapped for one's organs.
    - maxharris 15y ago
      But the whole purpose of having a government at all is to prevent people from murdering, defrauding, kidnapping (all of which involve force initiated against another). Some might say that if someone buys an expensive life insurance policy, the probability that they will be murdered by the next of kin goes up. Or that if you buy a nice car, the probability that it will be stolen goes up. But that doesn't mean that anyone should be prevented from buying a nice car or a life insurance policy. Issues of rights and justice need to be handled on an objective basis, and that requires an impartial arbiter to protect the rights of its citizen masters. That ideal arbiter and protector of rights (to life, liberty, and property) is the ideal government. Given the existence of even an imperfect government such as our own, the right solution to kidnapping is twofold: first, encourage the government do its job, which is to provide the conditions necessary to live your life without worrying about others initiating force against you; second, live your life as you see fit, without violating the rights of any other (because to do so would go deeply against your long-term self-interest - in the long run, lying/stealing/cheating/kidnapping etc. are all forms of cutting your own throat).

If people own their organs, then why can't they sell them? In any case, this seems to be a step in the right direction.

by jlcx 15y ago

If people own their organs, then why can't they sell them? In any case, this seems to be a step in the right direction.

abstractbill 15y ago

You own yourself, but cannot sell yourself into slavery, for very good reasons.

extension 15y ago
No, but you can sell your posessions, your labor, your ideas, your likeness, and numerous other rights and privileges. Why the arbitrary comparison between organs and slavery?
- TheSOB88 15y ago
  Because of the pressures it would put on the people most likely to 'take advantage' of it. Do I sell my kidney or tell my kid he can't go to college? Do I sell my liver or live in credit card debt for the rest of my life? Plus, the illegal gaining and trading of organs would spike.
  - daenz 15y ago
    No idea why you're being downvoted. This is some interesting context on paying for organs: In Pakistan, 40 percent to 50 percent of the residents of some villages have only one kidney because they have sold the other for a transplant into a wealthy person, probably from another country, said Dr. Farhat Moazam of Pakistan, at a World Health Organization conference. Pakistani donors are offered $2,500 for a kidney but receive only about half of that because middlemen take so much.[33] In Chennai, southern India, poor fishermen and their families sold kidneys after their livelihoods were destroyed by the Indian Ocean tsunami on December 26, 2004. About 100 people, mostly women, sold their kidneys for 40,000–60,000 rupees ($900–$1,350).[34] Thilakavathy Agatheesh, 30, who sold a kidney in May 2005 for 40,000 rupees said, "I used to earn some money selling fish but now the post-surgery stomach cramps prevent me from going to work." Most kidney sellers say that selling their kidney was a mistake.[35] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organ_transplant#Compensated_donation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organ_transplant#Compensated_do...
    - extension 15y ago
      As has been demonstrated time and time again, the way to get rid of a black market is to repeal whatever prohibition is creating it.
      - daenz 15y ago
        You missed the point of my post. The point is that the poor are disproportionately pressured by this kind of market, black or otherwise. A non-black market will just make it easier for the poor to sell their organs, and the rich to obtain them. Re-read what I posted. I've read your other post on the subject and it frankly makes me sick. You've clearly never been poor and exploited by people with money, felt the range and depth of their manipulation to obtain what you have, without them giving a shit about you as a person.
        extension 15y ago
        The poor are disproportionately pressured by every market, obviously. In my experience being poor, all the pressure pretty much stems from one issue: needing money and not having any. The only way to relieve that pressure is to either make people not poor or make money less important. Taking away options without providing alternatives does not help, it just backs people into a corner, making them more desperate and more vulnerable to exploitation. I don't see how my proposal could be much more compassionate. Everybody gets free and equal access to organs, and the trade is exclusively between donors and the government, subject to whatever concessions and protections the public at large has it in their heart to offer the donors. The alternative is what you described, and what we have now: we either get lucky, die waiting for a transplant, or buy our life saving organs from criminals who rip off the poor for their body parts. Does that really make you less sick? If not, what is your solution?
        daenz 15y ago
        > Taking away options without providing alternatives does not help, it just backs people into a corner, making them more desperate and more vulnerable to exploitation. Selling your organs out of desperation is pretty much as low as you can go for money. Maybe selling yourself for sex is lower, but you can argue that you're still physically all there after that. So the argument of preventing them sinking even lower is a non-issue. Selling your organs is right down there with the lowest. > what is your solution? The solution is for people to start supporting sciences to regrow organs from stem cells. That fixes 99% of the issues. Which brings up another point, say you legalize organ sales, and businesses become established, who do you think is going to be opposing regrowing organs? The businesses brokering the sale of organs. They're not going to want kill off their whole industry so everyone can get the organs they need directly. In the long term, selling organs will create more problems and suffering than they'll solve. Let's face it, this is only an issue to rich people who are dying with 5-6 disposable figures. You don't see poor people begging legislators to let them sell their own organs, because deep down, they know that they never want it to come to that.
  - extension 15y ago
    So you would rather force them to not send their kid to college and be in credit card debt for the rest of their life? If you are concerned about people being poor, help prevent them from being poor. Don't deprive them of whatever options they have left because you find it distasteful. They have to do something. If selling their organs is the best option, and they're not allowed to do it, they will just do something worse. Besides, I don't understand why anyone finds it so horrifying. We indiscriminately implore people to donate their bone marrow for free, and we applaud those who do. But if they get paid for it, suddenly they are being exploited? And it would have been better if the leukemia patient died? It's not the selling of organs that I find distasteful, it's the buying of organs. Or more specifically, patients not getting an organ because they can't afford one. That, and middlemen profiting from the organ trade without adding any life-saving value. But both of these things can be prevented by publicly regulating and funding the commercial organ drive.
    - deleted 15y ago
      [deleted]

mynameishere 15y ago

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-11-01/organ-gangs-force-poor-to-sell-kidneys-for-desperate-israelis.html http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-11-01/organ-gangs-force-p...

staunch 15y ago
And in some countries people are constantly being kidnapped and held for ransom. We don't have that problem in the US and we probably wouldn't have a big organ gang problem either.
- sidww2 15y ago
  The difference is that currently the amount a kidnapper could extract from an average person is not very high. If selling organs is allowed, suddenly the body of every person walking in the street is a worth a lot of money. It will drastically increase the probability of getting kidnapped for one's organs.
  - maxharris 15y ago
    But the whole purpose of having a government at all is to prevent people from murdering, defrauding, kidnapping (all of which involve force initiated against another). Some might say that if someone buys an expensive life insurance policy, the probability that they will be murdered by the next of kin goes up. Or that if you buy a nice car, the probability that it will be stolen goes up. But that doesn't mean that anyone should be prevented from buying a nice car or a life insurance policy. Issues of rights and justice need to be handled on an objective basis, and that requires an impartial arbiter to protect the rights of its citizen masters. That ideal arbiter and protector of rights (to life, liberty, and property) is the ideal government. Given the existence of even an imperfect government such as our own, the right solution to kidnapping is twofold: first, encourage the government do its job, which is to provide the conditions necessary to live your life without worrying about others initiating force against you; second, live your life as you see fit, without violating the rights of any other (because to do so would go deeply against your long-term self-interest - in the long run, lying/stealing/cheating/kidnapping etc. are all forms of cutting your own throat).