Phil McCarron wonders why profits trump morals.
Would you help someone that was dying in the street? Or would you let them die?
If you take the healthcare debate from the realms of rhetoric and place it into a real life palpable situation, it becomes easier to figure out what side of the fence you should be standing on.
At the simplest level of compassion, I’d like to believe that no one would wander by a fellow human being in need of medical attention. Imagine seeing someone walk by a bleeding man? What would you think of them?
Out of sight out of mind
It’s become a case of ‘out of sight out of mind.’ Since the people affected by the failings of privatized healthcare aren’t in our line of sight, we assume that it’s nothing to do with us. That somehow it isn't our responsibility. The debate of ‘healthcare freeloaders’ aside, which is despicable to say the least, there are some people out there that for one reason or another have fallen on hard times. I for one, don’t believe that they should die because of it. When you put a price on the life of a human...you trivialize that life.
Fundamental right to live
At this stage in our society the right to live should be a fundamental right for EVERYONE, and that right should never be subject to the profit margins of private health insurance companies. Simply put, when you put a profit margin against someone’s health it makes their live an investment opportunity. Which means if someone else can’t make money off that life, it’s not worth saving. That is the travesty of a greed culture.
Anything less than free universal healthcare for all, and we will have to drastically re-think our definition of a civilized society. And I would go so far as to say, that we could no longer call ourselves a civilized species.
Money is new alpha in a dog eat dog Darwinian world, which a capitalistic health care system enshrines. Until the right for a person to live a healthy life is totally and completely split from the cash in their wallets, we as humans, are no better than the wild animals we call 'uncivilized.'
This is capitalism/socialism debate. This is an uncivilized/civilized debate. This is a debate about choosing to become better, as a species, or slip back down the ladder into the world of the pack mentality primates.
Written by: Phil McCarron
