{harangue}
Encountered yet another spectacular piece of idiocy today- why is it that whether at home or in
I don’t believe that denying medication to a child is a parent’s right. Give me patience, because I’m a civil libertarian in everything except this: what parents have a right to do to their children.
Deny them any worthwhile sex education, increasing their chances of both STDs and underage pregnancy? Unfortunately, yes.
Deny them a decent science education, excluding huge chunks of the information which shapes the world they live in, opting instead for some inadequate explanation of human progress which leaves them in the cold when it comes to any meaningful interaction with the world around them? Tragically, yes.
Denying them medication which could save their lives?
HELL no.
I don’t care what moronic conception of the universe you have, what you think is “morally right” or what will get you “saved”. The right to physically harm somebody- never mind a helpless human being- ends when the tips of your fingers do.
Off yourself. Be my guest. Die of easily treatable pneumonia (and deprive generations of children of your talents). Succumb to a form of cancer that’s curable. Kick the bucket because a wound develops gangrene from an easily-remedied infection. Every instinct howls in protest at this, but it’s your right.
But you have no right to kill your child in this fashion.
Forget the state’s legitimate interest in keeping its citizens alive. Forget that freedom of religion includes only the right to practices that do not physically harm other human beings.
You cannot- should not be able- to deny your child medical treatment because by so doing you are wreaking havoc you have no right to wreak on another innocent and vulnerable human being.
Because that child lives inside a different skin than yours, and has the right to maintain its integrity.
Because it treats the child as an object, a chalice with which to prove one’s faith, not as a living, breathing human being.
Because it’s wrong.
Just how far are we from the days in which Abraham whetted his knife next to an altar on which his only son lay bound?
I don’t care what gods or demons, what imps, spirit, sprites or brownies you think will come to save you. I don’t care what magic you want to try. I don’t care if you spend nights and days on your knees or in the lotus position. I don’t care if your living room is decked with “healing crystals”.
Humans are cured from ailments not by their right to be so, not because the universe provides ambient healing for them. Humans are healed because they want to live longer, better lives, because they fight the vast abyss of ignorance to pluck from the maw of the universe information that can help all of us.
If we are to be treated, healed, made better- if the world is to be made better- it will be by our hands, our work; our faith in the worth of each other, and our fierce defense of that worth in the face of deliberate ignorance and fatal egotism.
Not by a bearded god who looks unmoved at the anguish of children.
And those of you who do the same- you don’t deserve the keeping of another human being.
{/harangue}
