Archive for Ethics

Gay Marriage

{ April 29, 2009 @ 3:55 am } · { Ethics, friends, Gay Rights, love, Random, relationships, Uncategorized }
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I had a thought the other day (yes it hurt) about marriage.

I’ve grown up thinking that finding that perfect guy and having a big white wedding was what it was all about, but I have come to the realization that, marriage may not be what I want after all.

(Not that I don’t want to get married.)

I have a lot of GLBTQ friends who don’t have the same right to get married as I do.

What makes me so much better than them that I am allowed to get married and they are not? Love is love no matter which two people it is between. Why should I be able to get married if my friends can’t?

(Of course I still want to get married because of the connection and commitment you get out of a marriage, but I really don’t agree with my homosexual friends not being able to get married.)

And to that I say, Way to go Iowa and California for passing gay marriages!

Randomness

{ March 25, 2009 @ 5:12 pm } · { Babies, Camp, college, Ethics, Job Hunt, News, nursing, Random, senior year, Uncategorized, Winter }
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Random Updates from the Past Week(ish)

  • Spring is finally here, at least in the time of year sense. We’ve had some warm beautiful days, and some cold crummy days, but hopefully more of those warm days will be coming again soon. It seems like it’s been raining since I got home on spring break, even though it’s really only been the past two days. It finally seems like its going to be nice out today (at least in sunshine, I’m not so sure about temperature).
  • On my way home from school on Saturday I stopped at the camp I’ll be working at for the summer to get a lay of the land and check out the procedures/protocols. I’m getting so excited for this summer. I am eager to share my faith through nursing with the staff and campers! I’ve also come to realize that I have a lot of stuff to get together before camp starts and not a whole lot of time to do it. I’ll be graduating on a Sunday and the following Tuesday I’m off to camp!
  • The job search (post summer camp) is not going well. I have yet to hear back from anywhere I’ve applied to. Keep your fingers crossed for me!!
  • Graduation is just around the corner! (SEVEN WEEKS to be exact.) Talk about coming up fast. Before spring break we had a meeting with the nursing department to discuss our pinning ceremony and preparing and taking the NCLEX exam (nursing boards). Once I’m done with school you’ll probably hear me grip about the NCLEX for awhile.

Random Stories from the News

  • More flooding? In Fargo, ND the river is rising and schools are closing in order for the students to help sandbagging efforts.
  • OCTUMOM: still in the news, go figure. What needs to happen to make sure these kids are safe? The most important thing is making sure the kids are getting the love and support they need – she now has 14 kids, how is she going to take care of 14 kids? Ethically we need to make sure these kids are going to be ok.
  • In Local news: the seven-year-old girl from my hometown who was pulled from Lake Winnebago after being submerged in ice water for 30 minutes was released from the hospital five weeks after the incident. It is reported that she has some problems with her short term memory and her finger dexterity, but she is doing well. Please keep her in your prayers.

Letters from the College Dorms

{ March 4, 2009 @ 2:18 am } · { Babies, Ethics, Gay Rights, heartbreak, Random, relationships, TV shows, Uncategorized }
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Dear Jason M from the Bachelor,

Love is an important thing and being with someone you love is important (I get that – really I do), but breaking up on national television is uncalled for. Just think of how different it would have been id you had talked privately with your fiance prior to the show. You never let her in or told her what you were feeling. Communication is key in any relationship. You were just recently on the other side of that situation, you knew how it felt, and yet you did it anyway – in front of thousands of people. I can’t wait to see what you do in “After the Rose Ceremony Part II”.

- Someone who believes in privacy

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To Straight People who think they are better,

Members of the GLBT community are human too. They deal with the same things in their relationships that you deal with in yours. Except they also deal with crap from people like you. Partner abuse, getting kicked out, etc., doesn’t just happen in straight relationships. Get on with your life and let them live theirs. How they live their life does not have a direct affect on how you live yours so get over it.

-I’m not gay but my friends are

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Dear People in Need of Emergency Assistance,

If you get a busy signal when calling 911 for an EMERGENCY, just hang up and try again. There is a chance the person calling is just calling about a Fast Food Emergency and will be off the line shortly. To some, your emergency is not as important as McDonald’s running out of McNuggets and  refusing to refund the money (even though they offered something else). Don’t worry, your call is important and will be answered after we deal with the idiot who is going to die if they don’t receive their McNuggets.

-A college student who cares

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Dear Future Parents of America,

Hold onto your hats, you could be the first generation to be able to have designer babies. We knew it was going to happen some day, well that day no longer seems all that far away. Currently, the US has no laws against it. But be careful – remember the Nazis and the Arian race. We could have a whole new Arian Race on our hands.

-A woman standing up for mother nature

A Child or a Build-a-Baby?

{ January 23, 2009 @ 8:49 pm } · { Babies, Ethics, health care, Random }
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With genetic testing coming to the forefront of medical technology physicians are beginning to see more ethical issues in their daily practice. The development of new technology is a marvelous thing, particularly in the medical world.

(Ok maybe I’m a little bias since I am going to be a nurse.)

But there is a slippery slope that can take technology into dangerous waters. (Particularly in the medical field, but anywhere really.)

What do we do once we’ve done the genetic tests? When do we say enough is enough, I don’t need to know the color of my babies eyes/hair?

With the way technology is moving we may one day have a world turning into Gattaca. (If you haven’t seen Gattaca it’s a pretty good movie, I’d recommend it.)

The day when parents can genetically engineer their children really isn’t all that far away. It’s up to us to decide if that is ok or not. Instead of having a baby, we’re going to be “building-a-baby”.

Letters from the College Dorms

{ January 15, 2009 @ 8:00 pm } · { Ethics, health care, Random, senior year, Uncategorized, Winter }
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Dear Drug Companies,

In my ethics class this week we saw a video called “The Constant Gardener.” It’s all about the horrors of you and your drugs invading Africa. African people are people and not cheep subjects for you to test your drugs on. Just because they have no other options for getting drugs to treat their medical problems does not give you the right to use them as test subjects. (Especially since you don’t fully inform them and therefore their consent is not actually “informed consent”.)

Oh, and withholding treatment for those who don’t want to be a part of your study is a surefire way to get subjects, but think about the ethics behind this. Do you have any morals?

-Someone who agrees research is important but only if it’s done ethically.

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Dear 2009,

I hope you come bearing great things. I do not want a repeat of last year, thank you very much. I would like to ask for a few things this year as we look into the future together:

1) My diploma

2) A ‘real’ job

3) An overall healthy year

4) More bookshelves

Of course, the bookshelves are optional, I can probably make do without them, but having more space really would be nice.

~A hopeful soul

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Dear Mother Nature

I’m a Midwesterner and as much as I love the cold weather and snow, don’t you think this is getting to be a bit much? We got nearly 4 feet of snow in the month of December alone. And now you’re throwing more at us along with -41 degree Fahrenheit temperatures (that’s with the wind chill of course). Are you trying to freeze us to death?

~ A very cold Midwestern

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Dear Luther College

The temperature on my walk to class today was 41 degrees F below zero with the windchill. When all the schools in the area (along with the community college in a neighboring town) are closing don’t you think it’s time to give in? I don’t really want to freeze on my walk to class. I know we’re suppose to be supperior to everyone else, but this is just ridiculous. (Bare skin can get frostbitten in the time it takes me to walk from my apartment to the union.) Even the professors think it’s crazy.

~A student who doesn’t want to end up in the hospital with frostbite

Everyday Ethics

{ January 13, 2009 @ 8:31 pm } · { college, Ethics, health care, Uncategorized }
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In health care of course you face ethical dilemmas everyday. It’s bound to happen. As a provider, I am administering medications, hanging fluids, and caring for multiple patients. There are situations where I need to decide which patient is going to get their medications first, who am I going to see first, where is my time going to be spent. (Especially since it can’t always be spent equally between patients.) What a patient needs to know (informed consent, near misses, etc.) can also be a dilemma.

These health care dilemmas can create moral discourse in the lives of nurses, physicians, patients, family members, and other staff members.

But what about the ethical dilemmas we face in everyday situations?

Ethical Dilemma of the Day

(this one pertains particularly to the academic world, students, teachers, etc.)

As all college students know (or should know) cheating and plagiarism are highly frowned upon.

You’re enrolled in a college English class. You have a paper due in 2 days on a book that was assigned a week ago, but you failed to read. A friend gives you the cliff notes she found online as well as the notes she took while she was reading the book. The cliff notes contain a lengthy section on symbolism (which just happens to be the topic you chose to write your paper on). You know that your professor is expecting an excellent, well thought out paper from you since all of your previous work has been outstanding. The grading rubric states that the paper is to be an original work of your own citing examples from the text, but it does not say you cannot use outside resources. As you’re writing your paper you decide parts of the cliff notes really pertain to areas of your paper.

Do you decide to (cited or not) use the cliff notes as a part of your paper? Why or why not?

If you knew you wouldn’t get caught would it change your answer?

The Missing Girls of India

{ January 8, 2009 @ 8:56 pm } · { classes, college, Ethics }
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In my Ethics class this semester, we watched a video called: The Missing Girls. It tells a story that many of us in the US would find appalling. India is currently having a large baby boom, if they children continue to be brought into the world at the rate they are going they will soon reach and pass China as far as population goes. However, it wont last forever.

Why?

The baby boom is not what you would consider a typical baby boom (if there is such a thing). Normally the ration of boys to girls is fairly equal (after all a fetus has a 50% chance of being a particular gender). However, in India there seems to be a surplus of boys being born. The number of girls that are born simply isn’t as high as it should be.

(So naturally you think it must be something in the water, right?)

These girls that should be here not only are no where to be found, but they were never born. Having a boy is much more respectible in India so when the parents find out the gender of their child, many (as you can tell) choose to abort the female fetuses.

This goes far beyond the issue of abortion. It goes much deeper in the sense that the people of India are commiting female fetocide. They are actively choosing the gender of the child they are going to have by aborting if it’s not the gender they want.

You may think, why not put laws in place to stop that from happening? Only problem with that, is that there are laws in place. Finding out the gender of the fetus has been made illegal, but that has not stopped it from happening.

Should India continue down this path, they will wind up digging their own grave. Fewer women being born means fewer women to give birth in the future which will result in a decrease in population.

It seems unthinkable to me that people would continue to put up with this.

What would you do? If you were in the position of the ultrasound tech and you knew that the couple would abort the fetus if it’s a female and you could tell the gender of the fetus was indeed female would you tell the couple?

Where do you stand?

{ January 7, 2009 @ 7:28 pm } · { college, Ethics, health care, Uncategorized }
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I’m back at school for my “January term” and am taking a class called Health Care Ethics. I’ve only been in class for three days and already I’m pretty sure my small group has labeled me the leader/loud mouth. (Not that I don’t deserve it.)

I can’t help it that I love ethics and am opinionated and really get the stuff we’re talking about.

(Although it’s a little weird since I’m not normally a talkative person when I’m in class.)

We’re not even getting into the heavy heated issues yet, we’re just learning about the different theories out there and how to apply them.

I’ll give you fair warning that over the course of the next few weeks I will probably write about the different things we’re talking about in class, in regards to personal experiences/my stance/etc. The things I write are my opinion and in no way meant to offend anyone. But I encourage you all to take a stance and let me know what your thoughts are!

*Remember in ethics there really is no right or wrong answer, if there was it wouldn’t be an issue*

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