Yes, you are "clever"...but this article refers to the misuse of the word "dignity", not the heartfelt and thoughtful use of it by Obama.
"The President's Council has become a forum for the airing of this disquiet, and the concept of "dignity" a rubric for expounding on it. This collection of essays is the culmination of a long effort by the Council to place dignity at the center of bioethics. The general feeling is that, even if a new technology would improve life and health and decrease suffering and waste, it might have to be rejected, or even outlawed, if it affronted human dignity.
Whatever that is. The problem is that "dignity" is a squishy, subjective notion, hardly up to the heavyweight moral demands assigned to it. The bioethicist Ruth Macklin, who had been fed up with loose talk about dignity intended to squelch research and therapy, threw down the gauntlet in a 2003 editorial, "Dignity Is a Useless Concept." Macklin argued that bioethics has done just fine with the principle of personal autonomy--the idea that, because all humans have the same minimum capacity to suffer, prosper, reason, and choose, no human has the right to impinge on the life, body, or freedom of another. This is why informed consent serves as the bedrock of ethical research and practice, and it clearly rules out the kinds of abuses that led to the birth of bioethics in the first place, such as Mengele's sadistic pseudoexperiments in Nazi Germany and the withholding of treatment to indigent black patients in the infamous Tuskegee syphilis study. Once you recognize the principle of autonomy, Macklin argued, "dignity" adds nothing.
Goaded by Macklin's essay, the Council acknowledged the need to put dignity on a firmer conceptual foundation. This volume of 28 essays and commentaries by Council members and invited contributors is their deliverable, addressed directly to President Bush. The report does not, the editors admit, settle the question of what dignity is or how it should guide our policies. It does, however, reveal a great deal about the approach to bioethics represented by the Council. And what it reveals should alarm anyone concerned with American biomedicine and its promise to improve human welfare. For this government-sponsored bioethics does not want medical practice to maximize health and flourishing; it considers that quest to be a bad thing, not a good thing.
To understand the source of this topsy-turvy value system, one has to look more deeply at the currents that underlie the Council. Although the Dignity report presents itself as a scholarly deliberation of universal moral concerns, it springs from a movement to impose a radical political agenda, fed by fervent religious impulses, onto American biomedicine.
How about Webster? "Dignity": The quality or state of being worthy, honored, or esteemed.
You know, that quality that is usually left out when your mechanic, plumber, contractor, priest, or doctor works over your backside without a kiss or a rose. Death with dignity. Life with dignity. The proper use of pride, patriotism, good works, gentleness, esthetics, art, good neighbor policies, good friends, fellowship, family.....goddamn it, we are talking abour real "quality of life". Dignity, man, dig it, reassess your assessment, get your head back up on your shoulders, and support my man, Barrack. He brings hope and change and "dignity" to the presidency, to the country, to the world. What do you or I bring?
I'm glad to have had the opportunity to offer this little adrenaline rush.
You realize there is a small service charge.
I know I didn't mention it before I sold it to you.
Failure to pay could cause serious harm to your credit.
Most people give in to this kind of intimidation so I can afford a high altitude lawyer to get it out of you because you can't afford to fight back. It's only a couple thousand bucks. Plus service charge that wasn't mentioned in the ads either. And collection fees.
If you could find a lawyer stupid enough to fight us, it would cost much more than it's worth.
We're willing (and able) to spend millions just to cheat you out of a couple thousand.
In a cynical gesture to fair play, we are happy to comply with federal disclosure regulations and point out that our scam is completely unethical, illegal, and probably a venial sin. But, what are you going to do about it? You don't even know what or where the appropriate government office to complain to is, do you. the paperwork alone would break you. If you did win a judgment, we'd just ignore it and you would have to do it all over again. You are just an American taxpayer fool and we are the movers and sneakers that run things, so bring it on.
By the way, while you were reading this, late fees have been accumulating.
Love from the people who make the world go 'round. Your reward will be in heaven
Oh, yeah, dignity. Dignity is rich people using my face to keep the mud off their fancy Italian shoes. And tazing me if I complain about it.
As long as I'm into annoying you, you realize that there's no such thing as moving pictures, don't you. It's just a bunch of still pictures flapped in front of your face to fool you into thinking you're having a good time.
3 Comments:
Yes, you are "clever"...but this article refers to the misuse of the word "dignity", not the heartfelt and thoughtful use of it by Obama.
"The President's Council has become a forum for the airing of this disquiet, and the concept of "dignity" a rubric for expounding on it. This collection of essays is the culmination of a long effort by the Council to place dignity at the center of bioethics. The general feeling is that, even if a new technology would improve life and health and decrease suffering and waste, it might have to be rejected, or even outlawed, if it affronted human dignity.
Whatever that is. The problem is that "dignity" is a squishy, subjective notion, hardly up to the heavyweight moral demands assigned to it. The bioethicist Ruth Macklin, who had been fed up with loose talk about dignity intended to squelch research and therapy, threw down the gauntlet in a 2003 editorial, "Dignity Is a Useless Concept." Macklin argued that bioethics has done just fine with the principle of personal autonomy--the idea that, because all humans have the same minimum capacity to suffer, prosper, reason, and choose, no human has the right to impinge on the life, body, or freedom of another. This is why informed consent serves as the bedrock of ethical research and practice, and it clearly rules out the kinds of abuses that led to the birth of bioethics in the first place, such as Mengele's sadistic pseudoexperiments in Nazi Germany and the withholding of treatment to indigent black patients in the infamous Tuskegee syphilis study. Once you recognize the principle of autonomy, Macklin argued, "dignity" adds nothing.
Goaded by Macklin's essay, the Council acknowledged the need to put dignity on a firmer conceptual foundation. This volume of 28 essays and commentaries by Council members and invited contributors is their deliverable, addressed directly to President Bush. The report does not, the editors admit, settle the question of what dignity is or how it should guide our policies. It does, however, reveal a great deal about the approach to bioethics represented by the Council. And what it reveals should alarm anyone concerned with American biomedicine and its promise to improve human welfare. For this government-sponsored bioethics does not want medical practice to maximize health and flourishing; it considers that quest to be a bad thing, not a good thing.
To understand the source of this topsy-turvy value system, one has to look more deeply at the currents that underlie the Council. Although the Dignity report presents itself as a scholarly deliberation of universal moral concerns, it springs from a movement to impose a radical political agenda, fed by fervent religious impulses, onto American biomedicine.
How about Webster?
"Dignity": The quality or state of being worthy, honored, or esteemed.
You know, that quality that is usually left out when your mechanic, plumber, contractor, priest, or doctor works over your backside without a kiss or a rose.
Death with dignity. Life with dignity. The proper use of pride, patriotism, good works, gentleness, esthetics, art, good neighbor policies, good friends, fellowship, family.....goddamn it, we are talking abour real "quality of life". Dignity, man, dig it, reassess your assessment, get your head back up on your shoulders, and support my man, Barrack. He brings hope and change and "dignity" to the presidency, to the country, to the world. What do you or I bring?
Glenn
I'm glad to have had the opportunity to offer this little adrenaline rush.
You realize there is a small service charge.
I know I didn't mention it before I sold it to you.
Failure to pay could cause serious harm to your credit.
Most people give in to this kind of intimidation so I can afford a high altitude lawyer to get it out of you because you can't afford to fight back.
It's only a couple thousand bucks.
Plus service charge that wasn't mentioned in the ads either.
And collection fees.
If you could find a lawyer stupid enough to fight us, it would cost much more than it's worth.
We're willing (and able) to spend millions just to cheat you out of a couple thousand.
In a cynical gesture to fair play, we are happy to comply with federal disclosure regulations and point out that our scam is completely unethical, illegal, and probably a venial sin.
But, what are you going to do about it? You don't even know what or where the appropriate government office to complain to is, do you.
the paperwork alone would break you.
If you did win a judgment, we'd just ignore it and you would have to do it all over again.
You are just an American taxpayer fool and we are the movers and sneakers that run things, so bring it on.
By the way, while you were reading this, late fees have been accumulating.
Love from the people who make the world go 'round.
Your reward will be in heaven
Oh, yeah, dignity.
Dignity is rich people using my face to keep the mud off their fancy Italian shoes.
And tazing me if I complain about it.
As long as I'm into annoying you, you realize that there's no such thing as moving pictures, don't you.
It's just a bunch of still pictures flapped in front of your face to fool you into thinking you're having a good time.
What's more there's no Santa Clause.
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