A report from the United States Fund for UNICEF, the United Nations Children's Fund, presents some very welcome news about already-born children's mortality. Since 1960, the global death rate of children under five has decreased by 60 percent.
In an email announcing the report, US Fund for UNICEF head Caryl Stern says this is reason to redouble systematic lifesaving efforts for the 25,000 children who are still lost worldwide every day. "These children are dying for reasons we can prevent. They do not have to die, but they do. I believe that number should be zero."
To support UNICEF's efforts "towards zero," please visit the US Fund's Donate by Program page.
In a post from January 23, 2008, this blog noted that both global child mortality and abortion rates were declining.
Could it be that measures which benefit already-born kids simultaneously benefit unborn children, and vice versa--contrary to the either/or, zero sum thinking of the US abortion debate and its exports?
And what if the approach of striving for zero preventable child deaths were applied more systematically to abortion and its root causes?
Incidentally, such an approach already meshes quite well with with global efforts to reduce maternal mortality.
Welcome & Thank You...
...for visiting the Blog of the Nonviolent Choice Directory.
These measures include post abortion healing; male responsibility; comprehensive sexual/reproductive health education; all voluntary pregnancy prevention methods, plus rape and incest prevention & treatment; and life-affirming ways to get through crisis pregnancy and beyond.
Along with responding to our current action alerts, and participating in our Blog, you are welcome to volunteer with us.
We feature commentary but most of all action alerts on the same positive, abortion-reducing measures we cover in the Directory.
These measures include post abortion healing; male responsibility; comprehensive sexual/reproductive health education; all voluntary pregnancy prevention methods, plus rape and incest prevention & treatment; and life-affirming ways to get through crisis pregnancy and beyond.
Along with responding to our current action alerts, and participating in our Blog, you are welcome to volunteer with us.
Showing posts with label People of Color. Show all posts
Showing posts with label People of Color. Show all posts
Saturday, September 27, 2008
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
What if Pregnant Teen Bristol Palin Were Black?
Young black women in Chicago address the racial double standard surrounding teen pregnancy. Global Girls, a group for promoting young black women's self-esteem, makes performance art out of this particularly painful more-than-a-bit of racism:
"Oh, let my black momma be the candidate for VP And the unwed teen be a nappy head girl like me Wonder how the headlines would have read then Another at-risk child about to begin and another year the party won’t win"
Writer Jessica Young muses whether right to lifers would be so quick to make a "poster child" of Bristol Palin if she were African American.
These are all excellent points, especially considering the dearth of people of color in the prolife movement as such. A single-issue focus on opposing abortion, detached from a comprehensive vision for affirming life after as well as before birth, apparently does not resonate with many people of color. Not that the prochoice movement resonates much, either, from what I can see.
And there is another matter I wonder about that I haven't heard anyone discuss yet (though maybe I'm not listening in the proper places). Through her father's side, Bristol Palin, and thus her unborn child, are part Yupik (a Native Alaskan group). I don't know how much or little, and I have no idea how she self-identifies. But technically, even by some definitions that come from within communities of color instead of being imposed on them, they are people of color. Yet they are perceived as white. Once again in America, the full, complex story of multiracial identity goes underground.
"Oh, let my black momma be the candidate for VP And the unwed teen be a nappy head girl like me Wonder how the headlines would have read then Another at-risk child about to begin and another year the party won’t win"
Writer Jessica Young muses whether right to lifers would be so quick to make a "poster child" of Bristol Palin if she were African American.
These are all excellent points, especially considering the dearth of people of color in the prolife movement as such. A single-issue focus on opposing abortion, detached from a comprehensive vision for affirming life after as well as before birth, apparently does not resonate with many people of color. Not that the prochoice movement resonates much, either, from what I can see.
And there is another matter I wonder about that I haven't heard anyone discuss yet (though maybe I'm not listening in the proper places). Through her father's side, Bristol Palin, and thus her unborn child, are part Yupik (a Native Alaskan group). I don't know how much or little, and I have no idea how she self-identifies. But technically, even by some definitions that come from within communities of color instead of being imposed on them, they are people of color. Yet they are perceived as white. Once again in America, the full, complex story of multiracial identity goes underground.
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Did Susan B. Anthony Have a Chip on Her Shoulder? Ask the Susan B. Anthony List
The Susan B. Anthony List is a US organization whose professed goal is to increase the ranks of prolife women politicians. It links itself to the prolife stance of early feminists, including its namesake, Susan B. Anthony.
However..among other problems...the organization's blog, suzyb.org, does not appear to be a place where cries for justice for anyone but the unborn and their conservative white female defenders are well-received. Indeed, on at least three different recent occasions, such expressions of valid anger were dismissed as gratuitous, ridiculous, mere products of a "chip on the shoulder."
--The blog effuses uncritically over Sarah Palin's profession of advocacy for the disabled. But when I questioned what that meant for the lives of disabled Americans generally, and pointed out that the ideology of "government waste" often amounted to treating us as disposable humans (hint, hint, like the unborn), I was told by a commenter, "Gee, Marysia, I think you need to knock that chip off your shoulder".
--The blog mocks National Organization for Women members for being "angry" and "spiteful" feminists and wearing it on their t shirts...no mention of what might be behind that purportedly gratuitous rage. You know, stuff like, oh, violence against women, and unequal pay for equal work.
--The blog exults in Michelle Obama's recent lack of public visibility in her husband's campaign. A commenter says outright what the post does not in so many words: "Voters have recognized that she is a woman with a 'black' chip on her shoulder, and her harshness was not going over well. I think they're hiding her!" Was this commenter perhaps the same Anonymous who told me to get the chip off my shoulder? Whether it was the same person or not...same diminishing and silencing technique applied to "troublemakers."
But such dismissive stereotyping of people who challenge the powers that be is nothing new. Indeed, it can be found in the very same herstory that the Susan B. Anthony List lays claim to in its very own choice of name.
As Lynn Sherr documents in her wonderfully eye-opening Failure Is Impossible: Susan B. Anthony in Her Own Words
, Susan B. Anthony was routinely dismissed as a "vinegar-visaged virago," "stiff," "cold," "aggressive," "constantly howling," "laboring under strong feelings of hatred towards men.” Yet, as Sherr points out abundantly, Anthony was actually "selfless, diplomatic, elegant, charming, generous, friendly, determined, polite, curious, open, amusing, self-possessed, and, once again, selfless."
I don't know if Anthony's era actually talked in so many words of chips on shoulder, but it's clear that they had the concept, and deployed it for the same minimizing purposes. The book behind Nonviolent Choice, ProLife Feminism Yesterday and Today, Second Expanded Edition, substantially documents the awfully familiar-sounding stereotypes levelled against early feminists in general...as well as Anthony's own stance against abortion.
I would like to ask the SBA List and its supporters: did Anthony and her peers have chips on their shoulders?
However..among other problems...the organization's blog, suzyb.org, does not appear to be a place where cries for justice for anyone but the unborn and their conservative white female defenders are well-received. Indeed, on at least three different recent occasions, such expressions of valid anger were dismissed as gratuitous, ridiculous, mere products of a "chip on the shoulder."
--The blog effuses uncritically over Sarah Palin's profession of advocacy for the disabled. But when I questioned what that meant for the lives of disabled Americans generally, and pointed out that the ideology of "government waste" often amounted to treating us as disposable humans (hint, hint, like the unborn), I was told by a commenter, "Gee, Marysia, I think you need to knock that chip off your shoulder".
--The blog mocks National Organization for Women members for being "angry" and "spiteful" feminists and wearing it on their t shirts...no mention of what might be behind that purportedly gratuitous rage. You know, stuff like, oh, violence against women, and unequal pay for equal work.
--The blog exults in Michelle Obama's recent lack of public visibility in her husband's campaign. A commenter says outright what the post does not in so many words: "Voters have recognized that she is a woman with a 'black' chip on her shoulder, and her harshness was not going over well. I think they're hiding her!" Was this commenter perhaps the same Anonymous who told me to get the chip off my shoulder? Whether it was the same person or not...same diminishing and silencing technique applied to "troublemakers."
But such dismissive stereotyping of people who challenge the powers that be is nothing new. Indeed, it can be found in the very same herstory that the Susan B. Anthony List lays claim to in its very own choice of name.
As Lynn Sherr documents in her wonderfully eye-opening Failure Is Impossible: Susan B. Anthony in Her Own Words
, Susan B. Anthony was routinely dismissed as a "vinegar-visaged virago," "stiff," "cold," "aggressive," "constantly howling," "laboring under strong feelings of hatred towards men.” Yet, as Sherr points out abundantly, Anthony was actually "selfless, diplomatic, elegant, charming, generous, friendly, determined, polite, curious, open, amusing, self-possessed, and, once again, selfless."I don't know if Anthony's era actually talked in so many words of chips on shoulder, but it's clear that they had the concept, and deployed it for the same minimizing purposes. The book behind Nonviolent Choice, ProLife Feminism Yesterday and Today, Second Expanded Edition
, substantially documents the awfully familiar-sounding stereotypes levelled against early feminists in general...as well as Anthony's own stance against abortion.I would like to ask the SBA List and its supporters: did Anthony and her peers have chips on their shoulders?
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
Wish the Earth a Happy Day--and Happy Ever After, Especially for Her Poor & People of Color
Please join the billion-plus humans celebrating Earth Today. The theme for this year's Earth Day is "Break the Addiction to Carbon."
This theme is principally targeted at the wealthiest, predominantly white Earth citizens--especially my fellow Americans, who amount to only 7% of the human population but singlehandedly produce 25% of total greenhouse gas emissions.
And as with most destructive things the wealthiest people do, it's poor people and people of color worldwide who suffer the brunt of the environmental damage--whether it's:
- The African American kids in my neighboorhood afflicted with lead poisoning.
- Subsistence farmers in India whose land and water are stolen out from under them by large corporations.
- Those starving and malnourished in the Sahel region of Africa because of desertification and global warming.
- Native Americans consigned to barren reservations with minimal to nonexistent economies that are sometimes threatened with chemical or nuclear waste dumps.
- Among, sadly, others.......
Environmentalism isn't all about the whitefolks. It does call for major-league individual and collective responsibility from whitefolks..At the same time, although it gets little attention, people of color and the global poor are taking tremendous action too, and no wonder, because it's in their dearest interests.
I won't say "kill two birds with one stone" because that's not a nonviolent, eco-friendly metaphor--but there are a couple of simple steps you can take to stand up for the environment, the global poor and people of color all in the same action step. - Go to the Nonviolent Choice Directory's resources on Eco-Friendly Living and click on Carbon Offsets from Native Energy . Calculate your CO2 emissions and purchase offsets--a little $USD goes a long way here. The proceeds go to develop wind energy projects for Native Americans and Alaska Natives. These projects create truly life-affirming economic prospects.
- Please, once again, endorse Pro Every Life, Pro Woman, Pro Reproductive Justice for All: A Manifesto. The full text (click on "letter") addresses the links among various injustices, including racism, economic imbalances of power, and environmental destruction, that threaten life and reproductive justice for all, born and unborn.
Thank you.
Monday, January 28, 2008
Adoption as an Alternative to Abortion
Cory Richards at RHRealityCheck.org insists: "Facilitating adoptions, especially of hard-to-place children, deserves our strong support. But it does nothing to affect the abortion rate. To assert that it does is either ill-informed or simply cynical, and it should stop." He concludes that "the only way to meaningfully achieve fewer abortions is to do better in helping women and their partners prevent unintended pregnancies in the first place."
Now, I fully agree on the importance of prevention in reducing abortions. But is it "the only way [italics mine] to meaningfully achieve this goal"? Might adoption actually play a part, too--in the real lives of women and babies in crisis pregnancies, not merely in the crowd-playing, manipulative rhetoric of politicians?
A new study from the prochoice Guttmacher Institute on women's motivations to abort raises that possibility. "Without being asked directly, several of the women indicated that adoption is not a realistic option for them. They reported that the thought of one’s child being out in the world without knowing if it was being taken care of or by whom would induce more guilt than having an abortion."
The story of Robin Ringleka-Kottke, one of the prochoice activists featured in the 2005 documentary "Speak Out: I Had an Abortion" also suggests the power of women's perceptions about and experiences of adoption to affect their pregnancy outcomes. As a young woman who wished to complete her education, she seriously considered adoption. That is, until the dubious "prolife" agency she had turned to for help found out that while she was white, her baby's father was black. At a Chicago Foundation for Women screening of the documentary, Ringleka-Kottke described the impact of this racist rebuff. “It was a huge blow. What occurred to me was there isn’t a shortage of children at all...I remember having a tremendous amount of hate for this thing growing inside me. I didn’t think racism extended anywhere outside the South.” She then had an abortion.
Whatever the inmost truths of her motives, or the motives of the women in the Guttmacher study, which only they can tell...am I wrong and misplaced to surmise that if they had seen and/or experienced adoption differently, they might have gone that route instead?
The women in the Guttmacher study expressed that they resorted to abortion out of concern that they could not properly mother these babies. Were they affected by the pernicious stereotype that birthmothers are uncaring and so adoption is an act of not caring? By the stuck-in-the-past but still unfortunately widespread view that adoption means the birthmother has no say over who raises her child and no contact ever after...when in fact a birthmother in the US generally chooses the adoptive family and the kinds and amounts of contact she has with them?
(In saying this I do not wish to minimize the considerable "leap of faith" involved in permanently relinquishing one's own flesh and blood over to others, even people one has chosen for the task. I only wish to point out that birthmothers today, especially when they are working through ethical, humane organizations, have far more say over their children's fates and far more opportunity to heal than they did under the horrific old shame-ridden practice of closed adoption.)
What was/is the disconnect here between these women and so many others like them, struggling with crisis pregnancies, and the positive realities within adoption today? (Assuming there was/is one. Having been a maternity services counselor...I would venture to speculate there was/is one.) How can it be bridged, and would bridging it not have a profound affect on their pregnancy outcomes? I for one think it would.
As for Robin Ringleka-Kottke's story--yes, there are many involved today in arranging adoptions who are only interested in placing white babies with upper-crusty Chreeshtain white families. And sometimes this is done in the unmerited name of "prolife," when prolife indeed means anything but racial discrimination! On the other hand, there are actually many ethical, nondiscriminatory agencies--some of them operating under the rubric of prolife--that readily find loving homes for babies of color, despite the fact (known to Americans of color but not so much to whites) that racism is omnipresent and brutally so throughout the United States.
But what was/is the disconnect between such agencies and women like Robin Ringleka-Kottke, facing the fear that no one will love and care for their racially "unwanted," deemed-inferior babies? How can it be bridged? And again, I feel fairly sure that bridging it will make for more adoptions, fewer abortions.
I also feel fairly sure that there are no easy answers for women's pregnancy dilemmas--having been through one of my own, and having borne witness to the dilemmas of so many other women, as a counselor, and also as a friend. There is no "only answer"--whether it is the "only answer" of prochoicers like Cory Richards or the "only answer" of prolifers who blithely intone "Adoption not Abortion." There are as many answers as there are women and babies and other humans affected by problem pregnancy.
And if abortion, an act of lifetaking, is not to be part of the vast repertoire of possible answers....that just makes it all the more vital to advocate voluntary pregnancy prevention, challenge white supremacy in the adoption field, and connect women in crisis with the positive realities that do exist today in that field--the rampant racism, misogyny, greed, and exploitation notwithstanding.
Now, I fully agree on the importance of prevention in reducing abortions. But is it "the only way [italics mine] to meaningfully achieve this goal"? Might adoption actually play a part, too--in the real lives of women and babies in crisis pregnancies, not merely in the crowd-playing, manipulative rhetoric of politicians?
A new study from the prochoice Guttmacher Institute on women's motivations to abort raises that possibility. "Without being asked directly, several of the women indicated that adoption is not a realistic option for them. They reported that the thought of one’s child being out in the world without knowing if it was being taken care of or by whom would induce more guilt than having an abortion."
The story of Robin Ringleka-Kottke, one of the prochoice activists featured in the 2005 documentary "Speak Out: I Had an Abortion" also suggests the power of women's perceptions about and experiences of adoption to affect their pregnancy outcomes. As a young woman who wished to complete her education, she seriously considered adoption. That is, until the dubious "prolife" agency she had turned to for help found out that while she was white, her baby's father was black. At a Chicago Foundation for Women screening of the documentary, Ringleka-Kottke described the impact of this racist rebuff. “It was a huge blow. What occurred to me was there isn’t a shortage of children at all...I remember having a tremendous amount of hate for this thing growing inside me. I didn’t think racism extended anywhere outside the South.” She then had an abortion.
Whatever the inmost truths of her motives, or the motives of the women in the Guttmacher study, which only they can tell...am I wrong and misplaced to surmise that if they had seen and/or experienced adoption differently, they might have gone that route instead?
The women in the Guttmacher study expressed that they resorted to abortion out of concern that they could not properly mother these babies. Were they affected by the pernicious stereotype that birthmothers are uncaring and so adoption is an act of not caring? By the stuck-in-the-past but still unfortunately widespread view that adoption means the birthmother has no say over who raises her child and no contact ever after...when in fact a birthmother in the US generally chooses the adoptive family and the kinds and amounts of contact she has with them?
(In saying this I do not wish to minimize the considerable "leap of faith" involved in permanently relinquishing one's own flesh and blood over to others, even people one has chosen for the task. I only wish to point out that birthmothers today, especially when they are working through ethical, humane organizations, have far more say over their children's fates and far more opportunity to heal than they did under the horrific old shame-ridden practice of closed adoption.)
What was/is the disconnect here between these women and so many others like them, struggling with crisis pregnancies, and the positive realities within adoption today? (Assuming there was/is one. Having been a maternity services counselor...I would venture to speculate there was/is one.) How can it be bridged, and would bridging it not have a profound affect on their pregnancy outcomes? I for one think it would.
As for Robin Ringleka-Kottke's story--yes, there are many involved today in arranging adoptions who are only interested in placing white babies with upper-crusty Chreeshtain white families. And sometimes this is done in the unmerited name of "prolife," when prolife indeed means anything but racial discrimination! On the other hand, there are actually many ethical, nondiscriminatory agencies--some of them operating under the rubric of prolife--that readily find loving homes for babies of color, despite the fact (known to Americans of color but not so much to whites) that racism is omnipresent and brutally so throughout the United States.
But what was/is the disconnect between such agencies and women like Robin Ringleka-Kottke, facing the fear that no one will love and care for their racially "unwanted," deemed-inferior babies? How can it be bridged? And again, I feel fairly sure that bridging it will make for more adoptions, fewer abortions.
I also feel fairly sure that there are no easy answers for women's pregnancy dilemmas--having been through one of my own, and having borne witness to the dilemmas of so many other women, as a counselor, and also as a friend. There is no "only answer"--whether it is the "only answer" of prochoicers like Cory Richards or the "only answer" of prolifers who blithely intone "Adoption not Abortion." There are as many answers as there are women and babies and other humans affected by problem pregnancy.
And if abortion, an act of lifetaking, is not to be part of the vast repertoire of possible answers....that just makes it all the more vital to advocate voluntary pregnancy prevention, challenge white supremacy in the adoption field, and connect women in crisis with the positive realities that do exist today in that field--the rampant racism, misogyny, greed, and exploitation notwithstanding.
Sunday, November 18, 2007
Alternatives to the Military
We have added some resources on alternatives to the military (http://www.nonviolentchoice.info/education.html#altmil if the link doesn't work) to our Education pages. These are mostly for people in the US, during this time of most unjust war, but some apply worldwide. (Note: If the above hyperlink does not work, please paste the URL into your browser: http://www.nonviolentchoice.info/education.html#altmil )
These resources can help if:
--you are wondering how to pay for your education or have a good career and take care of yourself and/or your family without enlisting in the military.
--you have ethical reasons for wanting to no longer keep military commitments you have made (for example, in the US military, you are concerned about your safety as a gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgendered person, or you are questioning the wisdom of the Iraq War).
--you have decided you are a conscientious objector and wonder what your next step is.
--you want to join in the global movement to defend the human right of refusal to kill in wartime.
--you are interested in a career as a peacemaker or nonviolence advocate.
Friday, July 20, 2007
Organ & Tissue Donation: How You Can Help (Part Three)
Part One explains the global need for organ/tissue donors.
Part Two gives a list of organ/tissue donor registries by country as well as sites on living donation.
Part Three is something I hadn't anticipated, though it's not entirely a surprise.
This week, this world lost the great African American poet, performer, and activist Sekou Sundiata. at the age of 58. He died from heart failure after being on dialysis about a year.
In January 1999, when his kidneys initially failed, a transplant saved his life. Because of another person's generosity, he was here on this planet another eight years, right where he needed to be.
Don't know yet whether he was medically a feasible candidate for a second transplant, which in some cases becomes possible and necessary. But if he was: he wasn't the first person, especially person of color, to die for lack of a matching organ/tissue.
Whatever the case may be: may our brother rest in peace, and may his life and voice continue to move us.
Part Two gives a list of organ/tissue donor registries by country as well as sites on living donation.
Part Three is something I hadn't anticipated, though it's not entirely a surprise.
This week, this world lost the great African American poet, performer, and activist Sekou Sundiata. at the age of 58. He died from heart failure after being on dialysis about a year.
In January 1999, when his kidneys initially failed, a transplant saved his life. Because of another person's generosity, he was here on this planet another eight years, right where he needed to be.
Don't know yet whether he was medically a feasible candidate for a second transplant, which in some cases becomes possible and necessary. But if he was: he wasn't the first person, especially person of color, to die for lack of a matching organ/tissue.
Whatever the case may be: may our brother rest in peace, and may his life and voice continue to move us.
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
Organ and Tissue Donation: How You Can Help (Part Two)
Part One of this message explains the global need for organ & tissue donation, and today's BlogCatalog "blogathon" on this matter of life and death for millions and their loved ones.
Unfortunately there is no one single website where any global citizen from anywhere can go sign up as an organ and/or tissue donor...let alone and ensure that his or her gifts will go to the people who need them the most.
Now there's an idea...but for now, I will list here the online national organ and tissue registries for every country I could find, and a couple of other relevant sites...Sorry I don't have more, either because I didn't find one yet, or because, alas, they don't exist (and need to!)
Please note the plea to people from all communities of color in the United States!
Unfortunately there is no one single website where any global citizen from anywhere can go sign up as an organ and/or tissue donor...let alone and ensure that his or her gifts will go to the people who need them the most.
Now there's an idea...but for now, I will list here the online national organ and tissue registries for every country I could find, and a couple of other relevant sites...Sorry I don't have more, either because I didn't find one yet, or because, alas, they don't exist (and need to!)
Please note the plea to people from all communities of color in the United States!
Thank you for caring!
How Do I Become A Living Donor?
Living Bank
Bone Marrow Donors Worldwide
Armenia
Australia
Canada
Germany
Great Britain
India
Israel
Malaysia
Norway
Saudi Arabia
South Africa
Taiwan & Beyond (Tzu Chi Foundation)
United States (OrganDonor.gov). To book a blood donation appointment in the US, please go to givelife.org . People of color in particular suffer and die needlessly because not enough people of color donate blood, other tissues, and organs. To learn more, please visit Help Us Save More Lives on the blood shortage, from MinorityNurse.com.
Umbilical Cord Blood Donation: Registries & Resources
Eurocord International Registry on Cord Blood Transplantation: FAQs
Hema-Quebec
National Marrow Donor Program: How to Donate Cord Blood (has online cord blood registry that works with banks across the US and in Australia, France, Germany, Mexio, Spain, and Switzerland)
NHS (National Health Service) Cord Blood Bank (serves England and Wales)
How Do I Become A Living Donor?
Living Bank
Bone Marrow Donors Worldwide
Armenia
Australia
Canada
Germany
Great Britain
India
Israel
Malaysia
Norway
Saudi Arabia
South Africa
Taiwan & Beyond (Tzu Chi Foundation)
United States (OrganDonor.gov). To book a blood donation appointment in the US, please go to givelife.org . People of color in particular suffer and die needlessly because not enough people of color donate blood, other tissues, and organs. To learn more, please visit Help Us Save More Lives on the blood shortage, from MinorityNurse.com.
Umbilical Cord Blood Donation: Registries & Resources
Eurocord International Registry on Cord Blood Transplantation: FAQs
Hema-Quebec
National Marrow Donor Program: How to Donate Cord Blood (has online cord blood registry that works with banks across the US and in Australia, France, Germany, Mexio, Spain, and Switzerland)
NHS (National Health Service) Cord Blood Bank (serves England and Wales)
Organ & Tissue Donation: How You Can Help (Part One)
Today BlogCatalog is having an organ donation awareness "blogathon."
And certainly that fits well with this blog's pro-every-life, pro-nonviolent choice (nonsectarian, interfaith, secular) mission here. Every year, millions of human beings, especially but not entirely in the Two-Thirds World, die preventable deaths for the sheer lack of organ and tissue donations--not because current medical knowledge can't save them. And when people die, there goes their right to nonviolent choice, away with their right to life. Even when and if they do survive with their life-threatening conditions...these conditions can keep them from making the sexual and reproductive choices they would really prefer to make.
For me, this issue gets pretty personal. Not only do I know people who live because of donations, and others who have died for lack of a match in time...Although I am doing relatively OK at this moment, I have lived a long time with serious, potentially degenerative medical problems that someday may threaten my life. I am at much heightened risks of kidney failure and leukemia, two otherwise fatal problems that can be successfully treated through kidney transplantation on the one hand, and bone marrow transplantation on the other.
Someday, dear readers (if any), one of you all may save my life! And even if you don't save mine, precisely, you might save the life of somebody else who also needs, wants, and deserves to live as full and as long a time as possible...but who is right now embroiled in the crisis that for me is still a hypothetical worst-case scenario.
Today almost every world religion praises organ and tissue donations as expressions of great love for one's fellow human beings. And if you're atheist or agnostic, well, I'm sure your ethics include love for your fellow human beings...and what more certain & tangible afterlife is there than the one(s) you could give through organ and tissue donation?
A special note to people of color: In the US, Great Britain, and some other countries, people of color are seriously underrepresented in the pool of available organ and tissue donors. On top of helping your fellow human beings, you can help to make justice and new life for your racial/ethnic community.
In my next post, I will list websites of places where people can go online and register as organ and tissue donors.
And certainly that fits well with this blog's pro-every-life, pro-nonviolent choice (nonsectarian, interfaith, secular) mission here. Every year, millions of human beings, especially but not entirely in the Two-Thirds World, die preventable deaths for the sheer lack of organ and tissue donations--not because current medical knowledge can't save them. And when people die, there goes their right to nonviolent choice, away with their right to life. Even when and if they do survive with their life-threatening conditions...these conditions can keep them from making the sexual and reproductive choices they would really prefer to make.
For me, this issue gets pretty personal. Not only do I know people who live because of donations, and others who have died for lack of a match in time...Although I am doing relatively OK at this moment, I have lived a long time with serious, potentially degenerative medical problems that someday may threaten my life. I am at much heightened risks of kidney failure and leukemia, two otherwise fatal problems that can be successfully treated through kidney transplantation on the one hand, and bone marrow transplantation on the other.
Someday, dear readers (if any), one of you all may save my life! And even if you don't save mine, precisely, you might save the life of somebody else who also needs, wants, and deserves to live as full and as long a time as possible...but who is right now embroiled in the crisis that for me is still a hypothetical worst-case scenario.
Today almost every world religion praises organ and tissue donations as expressions of great love for one's fellow human beings. And if you're atheist or agnostic, well, I'm sure your ethics include love for your fellow human beings...and what more certain & tangible afterlife is there than the one(s) you could give through organ and tissue donation?
A special note to people of color: In the US, Great Britain, and some other countries, people of color are seriously underrepresented in the pool of available organ and tissue donors. On top of helping your fellow human beings, you can help to make justice and new life for your racial/ethnic community.
In my next post, I will list websites of places where people can go online and register as organ and tissue donors.
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