The goal of a governement isn't to stomp on personnal liberties for fun, it's 1. to stop people to abuse from each others
2. make things better while stepping as little as possible on personnal liberties (unless you believe in communism or something (not meant as an insult)) What is wrong with the protest against gay marriage is that it impose rules on something personnal. If the body of someone is not personnal, I don't know what is...

Someone being dead mean you can do anything with his body/property? Fine, make buying coffins illegal because they are a waste of money and give the governement the right to alter the testament of people any way they want.

Even as a atheist who wouldn't care if you gave his corpse to a necrophile, I seriously think this is against religious freedom. Look, even if you still think people for whom how their body is handled when they'll die is something they are deeply affected by right now as they are living should be completely disregarded, You still must admit that an opt out system would in practice be almost as efficient as a mandatory one and, as this thread shows, pisses people off a lot less.

At 1/9/13 12:58 AM, poxpower wrote: This is called "crime". Crime exists. We punish crimes with things called "laws".

You cannot prosecute someone you cannot catch, and very simply, we're speaking of individuals quite capable of covering their own tracks. All a driver would have to do is take a wrong turn or get stuck in traffic, and you're dead. All an EMT would have to do is stick a syringe full of air into your vein, and not only are you dead, there's no trace of it ever happening.

So, to answer my own question -- which you think you're being smart by not answering -- there's really nothing stopping an unethical EMT or Doctor from killing you just so they can harvest your organs.

Why aren't you paranoid about doctors RIGHT NOW?

Who said I wasn't? A individual who has the ability to take a life and make it look like an accident, now gets the added ego boost of saving multiple lives with the organs of the one person he "tragically" could not save? If that doesn't create a God or Superhero complex in somebody, I don't know what will.

I don't once I am dead, but I do enjoy a much better quality of life not worrying about being murdered, say, every night when I go sleep.

Yeah, I'm sure the weather is nice in pox-land this time of year.

there are cases of doctors letting donors in critical condition die so organs can be harvested and the doctors get a nice paycheck.

I think we can all learn from robocop on this one.
But in all seriousness why shouldn't I or someone in MY family have the final say in regards to my body? I wouldn't be happy knowing I took organs that someone genuinely did not want to give. And this is coming from a marrow and blood donor.

Pox, I am sorry, but your own responses just crack me up with how ridiculous they sound. You are so stubborn, and stuck in this mind set, that you have completely shut yourself off from listening to reason. You can NEVER force someone to give up their organs, even after death, because that is a complete violation of a persons freedom of choice. And your argument saying that, "You'r dead! You no longer have ownership", is basically saying that it would be ok to loot a corpse, or the house of someone who has recently passed because they are dead, and no longer have ownership over their things. To me, you are completely foolish and in my opinion, are making a complete ass out of yourself.

At 1/9/13 01:34 AM, blobliblo35 wrote:

If the body of someone is not personnal, I don't know what is...

Nothing of a dead person is "personal". A dead person is not a person.

Someone being dead mean you can do anything with his body/property?

yes

Fine, make buying coffins illegal because they are a waste of money and give the governement the right to alter the testament of people any way they want.

You can buy anything you want while you're alive.
Once you're dead, it's questionable what you should be able to pass on. There are already laws that restrict this.

You certainly shouldn't be able to take your organs to your grave, depriving others of them.

Again, I'm 100% sure you wouldn't sacrifice yourself to let someone have peace of mind about his death. If you were about to die and the only way to save yourself was to yank some lungs from a dead person who doesn't want it, you would take them.

I seriously think this is against religious freedom.

No, in fact it's the opposite. The government shall NOT respect any established religion such that religious reasons cannot get you out of following the laws that everyone else have to.

There is no religious motive behind what I am suggesting, it's purely a life-saving policy. As far as we know, it's an objective truth that death is the end of a person, therefore this law does not infringe on reality.

You still must admit that an opt out system would in practice be almost as efficient as a mandatory one

Probably.

At 1/9/13 01:38 AM, Proteas wrote:

You cannot prosecute someone you cannot catch, and very simply, we're speaking of individuals quite capable of covering their own tracks.

That's true of every crime and criminal.

So, to answer my own question -- which you think you're being smart by not answering -- there's really nothing stopping an unethical EMT or Doctor from killing you just so they can harvest your organs.

You are aware that all these people work in teams under the oversight of medical direction? They are accountable to higher authorities and you can sue them for malpractice already.

And again, there is a way to check this. Do people who sign their donor cards have a lower survival rate than those who don't? I cannot find evidence of this, but if you could, then you would have a valid suspicion that medical professionals are indeed letting people die to get organs.

Who said I wasn't?

Well good luck with that haha.

At 1/9/13 03:21 AM, HiredAssassin15 wrote: You can NEVER force someone to give up their organs, even after death, because that is a complete violation of a persons freedom of choice.

Hm that is true.
You shouldn't be able to force someone to pay taxes, that is indeed a violation of freedom of choice.

Well, here's your ass on a silver platter. Enjoy chewing on it while I laugh at you.

And your argument saying that, "You'r dead! You no longer have ownership"

Correct, dead people do not legally own anything under our current system. The reason you cannot steal people's shit is that they can pass it on according to the law. There are limits to what you can pass on already, but I don't see any of you idiots being up in arms about THAT.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estate_tax_in_the_United_States

I love winning, it's awesome. Man I have a boner right now.

Meanwhile 19 people a day are dying in the USA because they are waiting for organs and not receiving them. Whoops.

But yeah, you keep on going about how an estate tax makes perfect sense but not a mandatory organ donation, which really is the same as a fucking tax except not even as bad since your living relatives can't go live in your liver or invest your pancreas in the stock market.

Shit you guys make it too easy. Arg.

For instance you could have read the wiki on this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organ_donation
Which offers many much more valid points than what you guys have come up with.

SON, I AM DISAPPOINT.

Only one guy basically solved it by remarking that opt-out systems have almost unanimous participation ANYWAY, thus negating the point of making it mandatory, however it's easy to note that aside from that, there are really not convincing arguments against this, other than people being stupid, as usual.

At 1/9/13 03:45 AM, poxpower wrote: There are limits to what you can pass on already

There are also limits on what you can take from the dead. You are right in saying we should harvest organs from people who die of natural causes. You are wrong in saying the government should have that kind of power.

We need to gain some kind of consent first or there may be unfortunate side effects of this policy.

At 1/9/13 07:11 AM, science-is-fun wrote:

We need to gain some kind of consent first or there may be unfortunate side effects of this policy.

There's already negative side effects of the reverse policy: 19 people die every day.

Welcome to the world, where choices have to be made and nothing is perfect.

At 1/9/13 03:37 AM, poxpower wrote: You are aware that all these people work in teams under the oversight of medical direction?

Most criminals work in teams under the direction of somebody else.

They are accountable to higher authorities and you can sue them for malpractice already.

Again, proving that they intentionally killed somebody in order to harvest their organs is going to be a difficult thing to prove when they plainly have the ability to make things look like accidents.

And again, there is a way to check this. Do people who sign their donor cards have a lower survival rate than those who don't? I cannot find evidence of this, but if you could, then you would have a valid suspicion that medical professionals are indeed letting people die to get organs.

No, it wouldn't, because you're up to the same antics you always are. Even if such a number could be found, you would simply discount it as crap and provide your own hypothesis as a universal infallible truth, thereby frustrating any attempt to discuss the issue logically.

At 1/8/13 11:26 PM, poxpower wrote: The law.

Where?

I don't see how that's much different from saying that all a person's wealth and property should be confiscated by the government once they're dead -- and that's something I definitely would not support. Either the person decides what should be done with their body *before* they kick the bucket, or, let the next of kin choose what to do with the carcass.

At 1/10/13 10:23 AM, SteveGuzzi wrote: I don't see how that's much different from saying that all a person's wealth and property should be confiscated by the government once they're dead -- and that's something I definitely would not support. Either the person decides what should be done with their body *before* they kick the bucket, or, let the next of kin choose what to do with the carcass.

Then why do you support taxation? Or any laws?
Why do you give the government the ability to take away rights and property from you at all times, except not in this case?

??

with the same argument stupid people use to defend abortion you can contradict this statement. but in this case it makes less sense
for abortion they say a woman can kill a child because its inside her body, well... organs are inside your body as well, with the difference your organs have 100% your dna (a child has his own). so following this logic, a person should be more able to decide about his organs than a woman about abortion

At 1/10/13 12:50 PM, poxpower wrote: Then why do you support taxation? Or any laws?
Why do you give the government the ability to take away rights and property from you at all times, except not in this case?

It's like you're making the presumption that I support every tax and every law on the books, which I do not. As if this is the ONE thing I don't or wouldn't support the government doing. I don't know where you're coming from with that.

I don't support the existence of inheritance tax or sales tax, I don't support the broad use of imminent domain laws, I don't support the existence of a large number of license/permit requirements (not pertaining to guns, but more towards business licenses e.g. peddler permits, cabaret licenses, etc). I'm not cool with EVERY attempt by the government to dip its hands in people's pockets, but there are others instances that don't bother me so much, and that I do in fact support.

Now, if people were able to pick and choose where their tax dollars were spent or get exemptions from paying for services that they can demonstrably prove that they have not and will never utilize, then that'd be pretty neat. But in any case it's nice to be able to drive on roads that are paved plowed salted and repaired when they crumble, it's nice that there are folks who will zoom on over with ladders and water hoses if your home catches fire, etc. If you use a resource or service then it makes sense to chip in to make sure that you and everyone else can continue to use it.

Mandatory organ donation is the equivalent of saying that the government owns your physical body from birth -- it just has to wait for your death to cash it in. You claim that you can pass on wealth and property but you can't pass on organs, yet, that's what organ donation is, isn't it? Aren't family members better matches for organ transplantation anyway? Why should next of kin have LESS right to the body than those who are entirely unrelated? Just because you think that burial, etc. is a waste doesn't really matter, it should still be the individual's/family's choice of what to do with the body.

At 1/10/13 04:44 PM, SteveGuzzi wrote:

It's like you're making the presumption that I support every tax and every law on the books, which I do not.

No, but you support the idea of taking away property by force.

I don't support the existence of inheritance tax or sales tax

Alright, what are your reasons?

Now, if people were able to pick and choose where their tax dollars were spent or get exemptions from paying for services that they can demonstrably prove that they have not and will never utilize, then that'd be pretty neat.

That just doesn't work, it's like running the country on charity.
There's people who's jobs it is to determine where the money should go so things run smoothly. I certainly cannot spend my day worrying about what 1000 places I want to put my taxes into and in what amount.

The current system is by far the most efficient for everyone. Sadly, it is corruptible, but I doubt there's a way around that and there certainly isn't no way that doesn't involve everyone spending massive amounts of time worrying about tax money / services instead of enjoying their lives / working.

Mandatory organ donation is the equivalent of saying that the government owns your physical body from birth -- it just has to wait for your death to cash it in.

Meh, this is already the case. If I commit a crime, I get jailed. I'm already not free to live how I want. What difference does it make if you call this "owning"? The government doesn't "own" me but it can put me in jail. It can take my stuff. My rights were decided for me by others before I was even born.

You claim that you can pass on wealth and property but you can't pass on organs, yet, that's what organ donation is, isn't it?

No, I never claimed that.

Aren't family members better matches for organ transplantation anyway? Why should next of kin have LESS right to the body than those who are entirely unrelated?

I don't mind the organs going to family first, but why waste them if they're not using it? This is thousands of lives we're talking about here.
People have taken away much larger freedoms for much less.

it should still be the individual's/family's choice of what to do with the body.

Why? People keep repeating this as if just saying it made it true. "It's a right because it should be a right!!". Hum.. ok...?? I don't agree?