PHARMACIES AND TORTURE….The LA Times ran an unusually sophomoric and pedantic op-ed today that ? after a bit of suitably manful struggle ? finally wheezed home by drawing an analogy between pharmacists who refuse to dispense contraceptives and soldiers who refuse to torture prisoners. Seriously, that was the analogy. A bright high school freshman would have been embarrassed. Read it yourself if you think I’m making this up.
Anyway, I thought of blogging about it this morning but just couldn’t work up the energy. Luckily, Jeanne did it for me. I agree with her in every particular: lots of jobs ? librarian, teacher, public defender, telephone operator ? legitimately require you to provide neutral services to the public even if your own opinions aren’t neutral. If you really can’t stand it, don’t take the job. But if you do take a job that requires you to serve the public as an honest broker, don’t pretend that your political views allow you to second guess medical decisions that should be the sole provenance of doctors and patients. If certain types of medicine are that repellent to you, the right way to demonstrate your moral conscience is simple: find another career.
