So, if you've seen the Meaning of Life you will be familiar with the harvesting of the organs scene. Gruesome, innit. But that could never actually happen. Could it?
This week, Wales is expected to be the first part of the UK to introduce a 'Presumed Consent' into place for the harvesting of organs from dead people who never knew their organs were going to be harvested! Is this really the mark of a civilised society?
If a society accepts that organ transplantation is an acceptable process to allow someone to carry on living then we have to address the circumstances under which such organ harvesting takes place. This relies on the establishment of ownership of said organs. We can probably assume that your internal organs are yours, yes? What about after your dead, does legal ownership still apply? Does it matter anyway, you're dead! The worry here is that it appears to be the state coming along to take bits of you and give them away. To a non-religious person it probably doesn't matter. To your family it may be massively upsetting to find out your little Gerald has been carved into life-saving morsels and distributed among the waiting lists for heart, lungs, liver and so on. There are so many moral questions here that a definitive answer is probably impossible to arrive at, so let's just make one up then, shall we? We, the Govern-mental institutions that control such issues shall make a decision that will affect ALL of you by blithely stating that we have presumed consent to harvest your organs after your death, sorry, Death! Is this fair or moral? Well, no and no. Presumed Consent really means 'we can't be arsed to, or haven't the financial wherewithal to put in pace sufficient education about the life-saving advantages of organ donation. An arbitrary assumption we can have your bits. You have to proactively tell me you don't want me to do something. any idiot with three neurons firing can see how this philosophy, if extended, could lead to all sorts of negative assumptions, further reducing the ability of the public to have a clue as to what's going on. If we could trust the Government it wouldn't be a problem, but we don't, because they've consistently fucked things up to such a degree that their competence in anything has to be questionable.
I'm against this on principle. I'm quite happy to give any bits that are still roadworthy removed and transplanted into a more worthy container, but the parents of a dead child may not be so happy to have their bundle of joy carved up into life-saving portions, and it is their absolute right to be able to be assumed to feel that way. It is a wonderful gift to give to another human being and I would heartily recommend you do so.
But I don't think it should be assumed you do so.
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