What hatred leads to

So often in these posts when someone spouts off about disliking this group or that group, or not approving of something, they say it is their right to feel that way, and I agree. However, the following shows how far that kind of hatred and intolerance of a particular group can go.

http://www.365gay.com/newscon04/04/042204MichMed.htm

According to that article, lawmakers in Michigan have created legislation that makes it legal to refuse medical treatment to someone on the grounds of moral beliefs. This directly translates into saying it is fine to deny a gay or lesbian patient treatment, which is who this law has been targeted at. Reading this article made me absolutely disgusted to be a Catholic, as it was spearheaded by a Catholic group, and sad to be an American.

I thank God I don't live in Michigan, even though I am not gay, I would not want to live in a state (or a country) where this kind of sickening discrimination goes on. As doctors, you take an oath to first do no harm. Discriminating against treating someone because you don't agree with their lifestyle is not only harmful, it's pathetic and cowardly.

Cristiano

And if you think this does not apply to you - the same law can be used to deny treatment to athiests, Jews, drug users, etc.. It is a broadly written law allowing a conscientious objection clause to protect a healthcare provider from having to provide service to anyone they object to on moral/religious grounds.

The site is blocked at my work. Is that legislation proposed or passed?

Passed by the House, moving onto the Senate, which is Republican controlled - expected to pass.

Sad, sad state of affairs. I always wonder how people make this type of thing "OK" in their mind. How do you make hate on that level OK?

why would that site be blocked from your work?

Good thing I don't live in Michigan anymore. "Oh, you're an atheist? I'm sorry. We can't treat you then." Religion is full of love, ain't it?

Probably a blanket ban on the keyword "gay". Before anyone gets too outraged about that, they also ban every site with the word "game" in the URL.

You're an atheist, just lie about it when they ask.

I wouldn't worry too much about it.

It's not only harmful, pathetic and cowardly.... it's also a violation of the hippocratic oath, and more importantly a violation of the equal protection clause of the 14th amendment.

Hence, the law itself is illegal and willl be overturned.

Did anyone even read the text of this bill? Because you have completely missed the boat both on its effects and the motivations behind it.

This bill says nothing about refusing service to particular persons or groups. It is all about giving doctors the right to refuse to perform certain services. In particular, it means that a doctor that formally refuses to offer abortions or contraceptives cannot be fired or sued for it.

This is being pushed by Catholic interest groups. Their motivation is the aforementioned right of doctors and Catholic hospitals to refuse to offer contraceptive services.

Now, personally I'd hope my doctor would provide these. However, I think it is important that doctors have moral integrity as well as professional integrity. They should not have to offer things such as contraception or psychotropic drugs if this goes against their own principles.

Now what would really be the effect of this bill? Simply that you'll continue to have a hard time getting an abortion or the pill in a Catholic hospital. You'll not see many more doctors refusing to treat gay patients, at least not because of this bill. Any who do are going to find out the bill doesn't protect them in that case.

You in turn have also missed the boat about the bill. I have read the text of all four bills in their entirety, and as they are broadly written, the only group of people that cannot have objections raised against are those protected by the Elliot-Larsen Civil Rights act (race, religion, ethinicity, gender, etc..). Sexual orientation is not protected under this list - I do retract what I said about Jews after reading it more closely.

The problem is how the laws are worded. As they are broadly written, the objection to the service could be not the service itself, but the classification of patient that causes the objection. There is nothing written in the text that says it is the medical procedure alone that they can object to. Again, the only exemptions are for protected groups. What is interesting is that as written, it does not seem that they can object for any of those groups, invalidating the bill except in the case of unprotected groups. How can you object to providing birth control to a woman if women are covered by exemption, as shown below:

The problem with the bill is in section 11 of the primary bill:

(b) A health care provider shall not assert an objection to providing or participating in a health care service based on the classification of a patient or group of patients protected under the Elliot-Larsen civil rights act, 1976 PA 453, MCL 37.2101 to 37.2804, or based on a disease or other medical condition.

Anything that does not fall into exemption b is fair game for objection I could object to provide health care to a patient that i know is gay. As the bill is written, it leaves this possibility there, and completely legal. There is no specific wording that says the object must be solely to the procedure itself, not to the patient - or else clause b would not be necessary in the first place. This is the entire problem with the bill.

You are assigning hatred where there is no reason to suppose it is intended. As you say in the Elliott-Larsen civil rights act there is no protection afforded against discrimination based on one's sexual orientation. This would be considered an omission of the original civil rights act then, NOT as a new attempt to legalize hatred of gays.

Did you seriously expect that a bill designed to protect doctors from discrimination based on their religious beliefs would also contain a provision specifically granting a new right to homosexuals?

This bill does not give doctors the right to discriminate against gays. It just happens not to specifally prohibit them from doing so.

Don't get all hyped over a law meant for something else. This doesn't all of a sudden mean there will be more discrimination against gays in Michigan. After all, Michigan still had a sodomy law on the books before they were declared unconstitutional.

Ananda,

If the intent is what you say it is, why is it not worded as such. The bill does not state that it is the procedure alone they can object to (ie, abortion, providing birth control). This I understand. However, as it is written, the justification for the objection to peforming a procedure can be THE PATIENT not the procedue itself. That is the problem. Again, I find it interesting that they specifically spelled out that you can't object based upon the patient ONLY if it is covered by the civil rights act. Why not spell out that no objections based on the patient themselves are allowed, if in fact that is not the intent?


I did not pick up on this and jump all over it - has been reported in the press both before the legislation passed and now that it has passed the House (including the Miami Herald today). These concerns are not out of left field. What a law leaves out or states too broadly is as dangerous as what a law says.

As the bill is written, it does provide legal protection to discriminate against a gay patient, as they are the only group left out of the exemptions and a common target of religious/moral based objections. I hope the entire thing is declared unconsitutional anyway, but the fact that it exists is troublesome.



Cristiano

no shirt, no shoes, no service

I really really hate to say it, but Christopher has a point.

Discrimination against gays was already legal in Michigan. This law is giving the doctors the right to make their own judgements on what treatments to give and if you really stretch the point, the right to refuse treatment to someone.

I don't see this as a bad thing! Doctors have been increasingly constrained in what they can and cannot do, by insurance companies, HMOs and the like. Giving them a chance to retain a little moral integrity is fine with me.

I'll reiterate: this bill itself does not give the right to discriminate. It was already there. This bill just made a convenient target in the fight to prohibit such discrimination.

(Takes off pants)

Siggy.

As a Michigander resident, this isn't anything new...

Our wonderful legislator bodies have a terrible tendency to over-write laws... I can't remember offhand but there was another major bill a year or two ago that had something to do with telecommunications that was REALLY bad... can't remember what, though

Michigan is full of gun-toting knee-jerk deer hunters. It's best to avoid us when possible

LF

This may be too simplistic, but you can shop for your doctor. Its a two way street. Does your doctor look and act like a jerk with bad breath? You are not required to have him treat you based on nothing at all.

Why would you want a doctor that doesnt want you? I would rather find someone interested in treating me.

Economically, for every doctor turning someone away, Im sure there are plenty accepting the new business.

Why do people hate it when I am right and they agree with me?
LOL

Loki,

The same argument could be used for places to live, for example. There are plenty of them...why would you want to live somewhere that doesn't want you there. It comes down to the basis of protection against discrimination on something as arbitrary as who you are born (which is all a roll of the dice - any of us could easily have been born staight, gay, black, white, handicapped, or any combination under the sky just as easily as who we ended up being). I understand your point - however many people are limited in their choices of doctor, and the quality of them by their insurance companies. Ironically, insurance companies have been added to the mix as well in this bill, so they can deny treatments on moral grounds too. Yay! You have the entire chain from the ambulance worker picking up a patient all the way to the insurance company, and along the way everyone is proctected. So you may just find a doctor you like and still have the insurance company deny the procedure.

It is a flawed, overly broad bill that should not be passed, and is not something in any way for the Michigan Catholic Conference to be proud of. Hell, just the whole anachronism of not offering contraceptives when we have overcrowding, extreme poverty, and how many unwanted children in a terrible foster care system is quite sad. On top of that proud achievement, they also spelled out explicit legal protections to discriminate against any patient not covered by law.

Cristiano

Having been there a time or two, I can't imagine that Michigan is a real gay mecca anyways. The only group that really seems to be growing there is conservative Muslims. Conservatives period, really. Gore won Michigan last election and this time Bush will take it for sure if poll figures hold up.

hate leads to suffering.
that was an easy one!

here's one for you:
what leads to hate?

Actually frequently this is not the case.

I'll admit that most of this thread has missed the point. The basic drive here is so that Catholic hospitals and doctors (of which there are a LOT) can avoid giving out birth control and performing abortions without being sued. All well and good, right? If such practices violate their religious tenets, they have the freedom to not perform them, right?

Except that in many cases, the local catholic hospital is literally the ONLY medical facility for 2-300 miles in any direction.... and the only one that someone's insurance will cover.

The Church has gone to some lengths to make sure that this is the case.... they've cornered the market in many areas. So legally they're obligated to provide services they might not agree with, since those services are legal, and they've made sure there isn't anyone else to provide them.

By that logic, can you think of any bill currently on the books that SHOULD have been passed? (Okay maybe some of the civil rights bills out there are not overly broad... but then again what politician would willingly grant overly broad rights to mere citizens? )

Anger! And Fear leads to Anger!

Duh!