4 ms·
> But being taken advantage of is a fact of life Hello? Beth Israel is a non-profit teaching hospital in New York City that is over 100 years old. that they mi
by lmg643 13y ago
> But being taken advantage of is a fact of life
Hello? Beth Israel is a non-profit teaching hospital in New York City that is over 100 years old. that they might have a role in bilking an elderly patient is shocking, plain and simple. (I've been there as a patient myself.)
not to mention exposing the corruption of attorneys, doctors, and various caregivers - people who are supposed to, by virtue of their professions, put the client or patient's interest first.
would this have been a scandal if it were for someone's entire life savings at $100,000? $1,000,000?
at what point on the financial scale does someone become worthy of taking advantage of? some arbitrary metric, where a person is deemed to have "earned" their wealth?
i'm sure this type of thing happens on a smaller scale. we don't hear about it because there aren't enough juicy details to make a 300+ page book. if we're going to talk about who "deserves" our sympathies - imagine it was a family member, then answer accordingly.
- rayiner 13y ago> at what point on the financial scale does someone become worthy of taking advantage of? You're missing my point. You're focusing on whether the actions of the caregivers are justified instead of focusing on our reaction to what happened. People do bad things all the time, surely you don't feel outraged every time it happens. So why feel particularly sympathetic for someone who inherited a tremendous fortune, then didn't do anything to protect it, despite having every opportunity to do so? I can say "who cares?" without justifying the actions of anyone involved.
- derefr 13y agoI think the GP's point here is that we rely on/trust certain institutions to not take advantage of anybody, no matter whether they "deserve it" or not. When they do, it shakes the trust we have in them that they won't take advantage of us. This isn't a story about an old aristocrat; it's a story of a bunch of institutions that were more corrupt than we thought.