Health Care Is Not A Right"

[DrFaroohk]

This is something a friend of mine said:

"We must dispel this silly moral premise that medical care is a "right." It is not. There was no "right" to such care before doctors, hospitals, and pharmaceutical companies produced it. There is no "right" to anything that others must produce, because no one may claim a "right" to force others to provide it. Are we going to put guns to people's heads and force them to go to medical school to produce this "right"?"

Couldn't one argue the same thing about...well...anything? In the US, one of your rights is to have a lawyer if you're charged with a serious crime...should that be taken out as well since its being provided by someone else?

[lordlundar]

I get the strangest feeling that this same person is willing to defend the second amendment as a "right".

Sorry, no. There are three basic rights that everyone is entitled to: Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Anything else is optional. Ironically, health care is an aspect of life, so it's closer to a basic right than guns are.

[joe hx]

i view health care as more of a "responsibility" than a "right"

[Tanasi]

The right to life, liberty and pursuit of happiness is in the Declariation of Indepence not the Constitution. I don't think the DOI was ever radified by any Congress.
Healthcare isn't mentioned in the constitution therefore not a right.

[BroomJockey]

Healthcare isn't mentioned in the constitution therefore not a right.

There are rights beyond what's explicitly granted to a person by a piece of paper, you know. "Basic human rights." I'd put the right to live a healthy, full, as-normal-as-possible life above your right to accelerate a shiny piece of metal hurled on a small explosion in to the soft fleshy bits of another human being, but I'm funny that way. Yet because one piece of paper was written a couple hundred years ago, fuck everyone else, you want your gun, and everyone else can just fucking sew their own arm back on.

Fucked up country you've got there.

[AdminAssistant]

Fucked up country you've got there.

Not so much the country as quite a few of the people. I don't understand how people can argue that health care is not a right, but that we have the "right to bear arms". Honestly, I wonder how many of those people have even read the Constitution or know anything at all about American history. The real history, not the glorification of our Founding Fathers that so often takes place in American classrooms.

[DrFaroohk]

I do think people should pick a side and stick to it. If they're going to argue that what's written on a piece of paper is infallible and unquestionable, be it a law, a declaration, or a constitutional amendment, they should hold that same belief in all aspects.

[Tanasi]

There are rights beyond what's explicitly granted to a person by a piece of paper, you know. "Basic human rights." I'd put the right to live a healthy, full, as-normal-as-possible life above your right to accelerate a shiny piece of metal hurled on a small explosion in to the soft fleshy bits of another human being, but I'm funny that way. Yet because one piece of paper was written a couple hundred years ago, fuck everyone else, you want your gun, and everyone else can just fucking sew their own arm back on.

Fucked up country you've got there.

Fucked up or not it ours.
No, there are not rights beyond what's explicitly written within the constitution. That's part of the problem. The people that believe the constitution is a living breathing document are idiots, what they "read" there today possibly won't be there tomorrow because it won't be politically advantagous for them. Where is the right to privacy written in the constitution??? Some think it's implied under the 4th admendment other's the 9th, and yet other's say it just is.
Basic human rights are granted to each and every person where we differ is that I think it's that person's responibility to provide for themselves those rights. I think it's wrong to extort property from one to give to another yet the vast majority is fine with that practice. Where is my responsiblity to take care of anyone beyond my immediate family??? I certainly didn't take on anyone else to raise.

[daleduke17]

I get the strangest feeling that this same person is willing to defend the second amendment as a "right".

2nd Amendment of the US Constitution
the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

Looks like it IS a right to keep and bear arms.

[joe hx]

I don't understand how people can argue that health care is not a right, but that we have the "right to bear arms"

the right to bear arms is more along the idea that you have the right to defend yourself. i understand that, in seventeen-eighty-something when the constitution was written, that the American Revolution was still fresh in their minds, and people having arms was necessary. Also, as we advanced west, we had to defend ourselves from Native Americans.

today it is nice to know most Americans don't need guns because we don't need to defend ourselves like we used to

[daleduke17]

today it is nice to know most Americans don't need guns because we don't need to defend ourselves like we used to

Actually, most Americans do need guns to defend oneself. With all of the advancing crime (and decreasing police protection*) it is necessary to arm oneself. Too bad the "justice" system has pretty much made burglary a lucrative field for someone in case they get injured or killed while committing a crime.

* - mainly due to shrinking budgets and officers being forced to babysit the ignorant and stupid, or are getting called for negligible things like a barking dog.

[Rapscallion]

Got a couple of gun threads around here, folks. Can we keep this one on track, please?

Rapscallion

[BroomJockey]

Looks like it IS a right to keep and bear arms.

Missed the point completely. Rigidly defining rights by an old, relatively inflexible document was his point. If it's not delineated, it's not a right. Defend to the death whatever is written, but you've nothing else given to you. Why does having it written down make it a right? Why isn't the ability to access advanced medical assistance a right? Back then they barely knew what caused disease. You were just as likely to be diagnosed with distemper and an imbalance of the humours as a disease. Surgery was a joke, and people died of post-op infections on a regular basis. Why would the framers have ever even thought to have included the ability to access something that wasn't often much more useful than waiting at home under the blankets with a bowl of soup? The world's changed, your document hasn't. Hell, a business runs audits of its goals, needs, and abilities on nearly a yearly basis. The basic groundwork of your rights and needs hasn't been heavily revised in centuries. Amendments to add or subtract certain things as they arise isn't that great a method.

[lordlundar]

Missed the point completely. Rigidly defining rights by an old, relatively inflexible document was his point.

More of a "shake your head" bemusement that when it comes to possessing materials designed for the explicit purpose of taking a life, it's a right that was granted by god an is inflexible, but when it comes to SAVING a life, it's optional to a point of dollars. I like yours though Broom.

Looks like it IS a right to keep and bear arms.

I said BASIC HUMAN rights. You know, those which every person, regardless of nationality, will pursue. The right to bear arms is a government granted right which has been misinterpreted as a basic human right by gun nuts and does not exist beyond your borders.

[Pedersen]

Fucked up or not it ours.
No, there are not rights beyond what's explicitly written within the constitution.

Someone needs to read the US Constitution a little bit better, specifically the ninth amendment:

Amendment IX

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

In other words, the authors knew they had not listed every right that a person has, and made certain to codify that fact into the law.