"I decide who lives or dies"
Chilling words, arent they? first time I heard them was in an episode of The Pretender where he begin to learn about Jarod's evil equal in the TV show. As everyone knows, all life has to balance equally for there to be a good story line or struggle. After all, Superman had his Lex Luther, Batman had the Riddler/Joker/Catwoman/Dr.Freeze/Penquin (among others), Dr. Samuel Beckett had 'the Evil Leaper', of course God has to have Satan and Sherlock Holmes had to have Professor Moriarty. If there was only one side in the world, then there really would be no point in going through the motions of life because then there would either be absolute hell on Earth and death abounding, or there would be nothing but good and peace..but even then you could argue that we would never have absolute hell or absolute heaven because no matter what happens there would always be someone a little more evil or a little more good than the next guy.
Anyways, back to the mind meander. 'I decide who lives or dies', those words often creep into my mind when I am thinking of things that happen in the world. Does anyone truely have the right to decide who lives or dies? Recently, while working at serving supper on the camp line, we had the news on in the background and I caught snippets of the conversation topic. The topic being the pandemic of flu that is coming, or at least is expected to come, to North America. Wasnt sure if they were talking avian flu or mad cow or perhaps a new strain of the common flu or influenza or something that would wipe out mankind. The main gist of the situation I gathered was that the doctor are really not expecting the best and there is a chance that this might be something in the lines of The Black Plaque that struck England in 1347A.D. that basically took out 1/3 of the total population. Granted the disease is different, but the outcome might very well be the same, mass deaths and major population decrease.
However, on the bright side the Canadian and American gov'ts are producing vaccinations to help stop this plague from going through the country and killing everyone. The articles I have read said that they have come up with a cure, or at least a vaccination for it, that could help us survive. I believe the Americans are stock piling the actual vaccination for the existing avian flu and the Canadian gov't is stock piling a mock vaccination that can be modified to attack strains of the virus that mutate. The news show then started to talk about how there really isnt enough medicine to go around to the people of these countries, so it might come down to the fact that we have to choose who gets the vaccinations and who doesnt? who are the people that will live through this terrible plague if it does hit Canada in full force and who are the ones that are going to be walking through the viral mine field hoping not to get sick and die?
"I decide who lives or dies" Now this comes back to haunt me. Some of the proposed plans that were brought forward was that the rich, powerful and prominant members of Canadian society (politicians, lawyers, doctors); or give them to the children under a certain age (perhaps 20 or 16) to guarantee the future of canadians since after a certain age we have pretty much outlived our lives; or make it a lottery and put all canadians into a hat and draw the names out and give the cure to those names. Each plan has a possible wrongful action or downside to it. With the doctors and politicians, why should they and their families have special treatment over the ditch diggers or lower educated of this country? does money and smarts buy you a way to health whereas being of a lower intelligence means you are expendible? We already know that money and power gets you better police protection. Anyone that doubts this, try living in a ghetto or run down part of a major metropolis and call for police help to a robbery and then live in a rich upscale suburb and call for a robbery..time how long it takes for the police to arrive...OR, how many people in the poor neighbourhoods go missing or are kidnapped but dont get police or national news coverage, but a millionaires son gets kidnapped in Vancouver and it becomes a 'police priority' and the whole force is out there to find the person. Then we should give it to the children so that there can be a future for the human race and all. Problem with this is who is going to help raise the children to know right from wrong? while I really do believe that there are some good minded children out there, the mass majority of the MTV/Britney Spears/Boy Band generation are the type of people that I really dont want working the fry machine in mcDonalds, let along being in charge of the new world order of Canada after the flu has killed maybe 1/3 of us off. So, the logical one would be the lottery. Problem is, what do you do when a 44 year old person with terminal cancer has been drawn to give the medicine to but the healthy child of 6 hasn't? isn't that a waste of medication to save the life of someone that is going to die of cancer in perhaps a couple years, or months, but let a healthy 6 year old die? but, then if we are questioning that, then how do we rate who is 'saveable' and who isn't? A person with cancer can get treatment and live, but a perfectly healthy person of 34 can have a sudden heart attack and die. Then again, in the lottery, what about convicted criminals? Canadians already have given them the right to vote and give them bribe/bonus rebate cheques during election time, so why not include them into the lottery? But, then is it fair that a person in prison for life is going to get the medicine while a law abiding citizen goes without? But if we dont include the prisoners, then havent we basically put them all on capital punishment since it was their crime that excluded them from the lottery so their crime has killed them. For a country that doesnt believe in the death penalty, that might be a hard pill to swallow. Then there is the problem that if we do not allow for criminals, at what point does their crimes make them ineligible for the medication? mass murder? rape? self defence? robbery? What crime is punishable by possible death and what crimes arent?
"I decide who lives or dies" Could you be the one, sitting on the hill, having to make these choices? Is there a possible way to save all the people happily? And, for those that do get the medication and have to watch the others die, can they really go through life knowing that having the medication themselves caused the death of another person because if they didnt get it, someone else that died would have and that other person would be alive today. Then what about the world? if Canada can treat everyone, do we turn our backs on those that are living in other countries that want to come to Canada for the medication? Who will be the one that gets to say "I decide who lives or dies" and where will you be when that decision is made?
http://www.cbc.ca/story/science/national/2005/02/23/bird-flu050223.html
http://canadaonline.about.com/cs/health/a/pandemicfluplan.htm
http://www.cbc.ca/story/science/national/2005/03/22/pandemic-antiviral050322.html
http://www.newstarget.com/006119.html
http://temagami.carleton.ca/jmc/cnews/28012005/n4.shtml
Anyways, back to the mind meander. 'I decide who lives or dies', those words often creep into my mind when I am thinking of things that happen in the world. Does anyone truely have the right to decide who lives or dies? Recently, while working at serving supper on the camp line, we had the news on in the background and I caught snippets of the conversation topic. The topic being the pandemic of flu that is coming, or at least is expected to come, to North America. Wasnt sure if they were talking avian flu or mad cow or perhaps a new strain of the common flu or influenza or something that would wipe out mankind. The main gist of the situation I gathered was that the doctor are really not expecting the best and there is a chance that this might be something in the lines of The Black Plaque that struck England in 1347A.D. that basically took out 1/3 of the total population. Granted the disease is different, but the outcome might very well be the same, mass deaths and major population decrease.
However, on the bright side the Canadian and American gov'ts are producing vaccinations to help stop this plague from going through the country and killing everyone. The articles I have read said that they have come up with a cure, or at least a vaccination for it, that could help us survive. I believe the Americans are stock piling the actual vaccination for the existing avian flu and the Canadian gov't is stock piling a mock vaccination that can be modified to attack strains of the virus that mutate. The news show then started to talk about how there really isnt enough medicine to go around to the people of these countries, so it might come down to the fact that we have to choose who gets the vaccinations and who doesnt? who are the people that will live through this terrible plague if it does hit Canada in full force and who are the ones that are going to be walking through the viral mine field hoping not to get sick and die?
"I decide who lives or dies" Now this comes back to haunt me. Some of the proposed plans that were brought forward was that the rich, powerful and prominant members of Canadian society (politicians, lawyers, doctors); or give them to the children under a certain age (perhaps 20 or 16) to guarantee the future of canadians since after a certain age we have pretty much outlived our lives; or make it a lottery and put all canadians into a hat and draw the names out and give the cure to those names. Each plan has a possible wrongful action or downside to it. With the doctors and politicians, why should they and their families have special treatment over the ditch diggers or lower educated of this country? does money and smarts buy you a way to health whereas being of a lower intelligence means you are expendible? We already know that money and power gets you better police protection. Anyone that doubts this, try living in a ghetto or run down part of a major metropolis and call for police help to a robbery and then live in a rich upscale suburb and call for a robbery..time how long it takes for the police to arrive...OR, how many people in the poor neighbourhoods go missing or are kidnapped but dont get police or national news coverage, but a millionaires son gets kidnapped in Vancouver and it becomes a 'police priority' and the whole force is out there to find the person. Then we should give it to the children so that there can be a future for the human race and all. Problem with this is who is going to help raise the children to know right from wrong? while I really do believe that there are some good minded children out there, the mass majority of the MTV/Britney Spears/Boy Band generation are the type of people that I really dont want working the fry machine in mcDonalds, let along being in charge of the new world order of Canada after the flu has killed maybe 1/3 of us off. So, the logical one would be the lottery. Problem is, what do you do when a 44 year old person with terminal cancer has been drawn to give the medicine to but the healthy child of 6 hasn't? isn't that a waste of medication to save the life of someone that is going to die of cancer in perhaps a couple years, or months, but let a healthy 6 year old die? but, then if we are questioning that, then how do we rate who is 'saveable' and who isn't? A person with cancer can get treatment and live, but a perfectly healthy person of 34 can have a sudden heart attack and die. Then again, in the lottery, what about convicted criminals? Canadians already have given them the right to vote and give them bribe/bonus rebate cheques during election time, so why not include them into the lottery? But, then is it fair that a person in prison for life is going to get the medicine while a law abiding citizen goes without? But if we dont include the prisoners, then havent we basically put them all on capital punishment since it was their crime that excluded them from the lottery so their crime has killed them. For a country that doesnt believe in the death penalty, that might be a hard pill to swallow. Then there is the problem that if we do not allow for criminals, at what point does their crimes make them ineligible for the medication? mass murder? rape? self defence? robbery? What crime is punishable by possible death and what crimes arent?
"I decide who lives or dies" Could you be the one, sitting on the hill, having to make these choices? Is there a possible way to save all the people happily? And, for those that do get the medication and have to watch the others die, can they really go through life knowing that having the medication themselves caused the death of another person because if they didnt get it, someone else that died would have and that other person would be alive today. Then what about the world? if Canada can treat everyone, do we turn our backs on those that are living in other countries that want to come to Canada for the medication? Who will be the one that gets to say "I decide who lives or dies" and where will you be when that decision is made?
http://www.cbc.ca/story/science/national/2005/02/23/bird-flu050223.html
http://canadaonline.about.com/cs/health/a/pandemicfluplan.htm
http://www.cbc.ca/story/science/national/2005/03/22/pandemic-antiviral050322.html
http://www.newstarget.com/006119.html
http://temagami.carleton.ca/jmc/cnews/28012005/n4.shtml
posted by Capt_Canuck at 7:45 AM
2 Comments:
Good quote, but the situation with "the flu" was just a PR stunt for some obscure pharma companies to make money. Rumsfeld had a lot of shares in the most relevant one.
So, it's more like "I decide where your money goes".
I was really only looking to substantiate who I thought was the actor who said that line in the Pretender episode. I didn't expect to find the line applied in so ominously. If you think about it as I do applying it to yourself or in a bigger sense is just creating paranoia and stress that serves no purpose unless perhaps you're in a position to change the situation. I don't know about you but I'm not. I have three nurses in my family who desperately try to avoid my coming into contact with any type of germ to the point that they tell me I shouldn't go outside, touch anything that anyone else has touched, never touch my mouth, nose ears, etc. etc. etc. Always keep those bottles of sterilizer at the doorway and to use it on my hands immediately upon coming in my front door. My point is that although I'm rather frail from past illnesses and just life's wear and tear I can't see living in fear of something like that. I just do the best I can to enjoy what time I have and to not disappear into the void that that kind of stress and fear could push me into. If you're a world leader, an economic force or an advisor to one you maybe have a littler control. Otherwise, like the rest of us you can only take precautions against what you know you might avoid. The best you can say is you'll decide to live or die. It's the only thing you have any immediate control over but thanks for the warning anyway.
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