Religious interventions and my thoughts on it

I have been debating on whether I wanted to make a post about this or not. A recent news story has inspired me to write something. This may be a long post.

A couple of weeks ago I had a discussion with one of my best friends about religion. Its a discussion we don't have all that often, and in general I don't discuss religion with too many friends of mine as a whole (theres one or two that I'll talk to about religion and some certain aspect that frustrates me). I'm not going to say too much on specifics what my friend and I talked about. The main theme of it was that on one aspect my friend believes in something that I don't agree with and I was trying to basically find out why

A couple things came from it. To a certain degree, it solidified my position on something that some religions (or denominations when it comes to Christianity) believe in. One of these is some of the beliefs as far as medical treatment. There have been many news stories lately in the news of some kid/teenager who died cause their parents decided to not get them treated. Instead, they prayed. One that has stuck through me is a girl who was around the age of I think 12, died from ketoacidosis (I believe) from diabetes. She was sick, her parents did not take her to the doctors for weeks and she ended up dying.

This type of thing is bullshit. We have come to a point in medical science that certain treatments are damn easy to administer. Getting a shot of insulin, while annoying (and if I had to do it I would be a bit pissy cause I'm not a fan of needles in general) is still far more preferable to dying. Her parents, make the decision for their daughter that instead of getting a simple fucking treatment, to let her die cause they wanted to pray and that would make things all better. Well guess what Sherlock, didn't work. And the sad thing is, most of the parents and people who run into this don't see what happened. They just say "I didn't pray hard enough" or "It was Gods will to take her life." No asshole, you murdered your kid.

A recent news story from South Africa http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=15&art_id=vn20090220054001117C891248

The story is about a 12 year old who's battle with leukemia requires that she get a blood transfusion. She (as well as her parents) did not want it (they are Jehovah's Witnesses who believe that blood is bad, Acts 21 verse 25 is generally what they cite to justify this). However, the doctors basically said that if she did not get it, she would die. A court overruled the parents and basically forced the kid to get it.

To a certain degree I'm still torn on this. However, theres a couple of things. One, the parents I'm sure has indoctrinated their kid to say that blood is bad, they will be offending God if they get it and its wrong. Now, if you throw out the appeal to emotion there, whats the evidence that its bad. Not a damn thing I can tell. And thats pretty much what the court looks like they used. "Lets look at the real evidence on why someone would basically commit suicide by non treatment. There is none? Ok, then she gets it."

I happen to agree with the courts decision in this case. The kid is not really old enough, more than likely, to understand all the facts on blood transfusions and medical science that says why getting a transfusion is far better than dying. She is just parroting what her parents beliefs are without understanding the reality of the consequences. However, this is where I am torn, and goes back to my original discussion with my friend.

What if she was 18 and an adult. Should she have the right to refuse treatment, after considering the medical science and understanding the beliefs of the religion she was basically born into and forced on that would more than likely lead to her death. I would have to say Yes, if she were an adult we would have to allow her the right to refuse treatment. A part of me says "Fuck no, if you are refusing a simple treatment just cause you have faith in that it will either work out or you will go to heaven if you end up dying, then you are missing something and should be forced into treatment cause you are wrong." But I have to allow people to have the freedom of this. I think they are wrong, but if we start forcing adults into treatment than you run into a bully system in that the majority wins. And I also thing that until you are an adult, if your parents are basically killing you for their religion, the government should intervene to save them from their parents.

I realize to a certain extent its a bit hypocritical to say that adults have the right to do what they want to themselves but not to their kids. But lets put it this way. If I look at the hypothetical of if when I was a young kid and I got hurt, and my parents didn't want me to get a transfusion and I knew then what I know now I would have been pissed. Its a bit different if you are making decisions yourself vs for your kids.

I know this has been confusing but ill sum it up. If you are an adult I think you should have the right to make decisions for yourself on medical treatment. But I think that when it comes to your kids, there are some decisions that you can make and that the courts should be able to overrule you on depending on your reasons. If that makes me a hypocrite, so be it. Also for those that want to make decisions for themselves on not getting treatment, I would argue that people should try to convince that your reasoning may be flawed.

On a personal note, this is the part that I would have so much of a hard time with. If my friend decided that she did not want to get treatment for something as simple as a shot or blood transfusion and then died, I would be devastated. I liken it to if your significant other decided on doing something that got them killed (such as a police officer) there may be those who while allowing them to do that sort of job would still be very upset if they were killed on duty, and may still try to convince them to take a desk job.

On a semi related note, the recent news about the anti-vaccination crowd is a bit similar. Not really, they are bat shit crazy and need to be stopped. Most of them aren't referring necessarily to a religious aspect, its just misinformation and lies that reinforce their belief that vaccinations for example cause autism. BZZT wrong. In that vein, I do think that their kids should be forced to get vaccinations. By not having them, they put many others at risk. There is a difference here in that if you don't get treatment for say diabetes or a transfusion, you are affecting yourself. You deciding not to vaccinate your kids cause of some kooky belief that it causes autism even though all credible studies show thats not the case and that if your kid gets infected they run the risk of killing or at least making other sick, you lose.

Ok. Im done for now. I'm going to in the probably not too distant future writing something else that came up in my discussion with my friend in that why do I have such an issue with religion (which some of that is contained in this post) and also what is it that I in fact do believe in.