Summations Only

Can we take it from this that you have stopped smoking....?

Well good for you Mr. Personal Responsibility.But we all get old if we don't die beforehand.And with age generally comes the need for medical care of some sort. Even the fittest and most personally responsible will get there eventually.So let's assume that we all take up jogging, stop eating cheesecake and start doing sit-ups thus leading to us all living to a ripe old age. At which point nature does what it does and we end up physically decrepit and/or mentally a bit the worse for wear.What's the best way of dealing with that inevitability in your view?

OK. At what age do we start just letting people die from physical ailments rather than seeking to medically treat them?At what point do we deem that "NATURE" has decided.....?

Well you have thus far passed the Oni test of the right to life.If you find one morning that you cannot sit-up for whatever reason nature has apparently spoken and it is time to give up the ghost.

There will always be those in society who need access to medical facilities. The very young, the disabled, those unlucky enough to suffer sickness and disease through no fault of their own, those who suffer injuries etc. etc. Shit happens. Accidents, disease, illness, birth complications etc. etc. etc. are just facts of human life and always have been. And no amount of sit-ups will protect you or anyone else from all of these things.Furthermore even those who are lucky enough to live most of their lives without any significant medical need will very probably eventually reach and age where they need some form of medical help. In some cases minor, simply to make the accumulation of minor ailments that old age results in less of an issue. In other cases significant medical assistance will be needed because age related deterioration results in painful and debilitating conditions that can take many years to reach the point of actual death.None of us really know who or when any of this will hit. It might be us. It might not. We just know on a fairly statistical basis that some people will need assistance more than others. That is what insurance is all about.Socialised healthcare is just a form of socialised medical insurance with the largest number of people sharing the risk as possible. At it’s best the priority is placed on providing care to those that need it most over things like profit that inevitably distract private providers.For all your talk of burgers and sit-ups that is the bigger picture. At least as I see it. On this basis we wouldn't bother with medical science period would we? Penicillin is not the work of the devil Oni.Curing kids of cancer, dealing with birth problems, treating people who suffer horrible injuries in accidents, fighting disease, treating infection or making older people's lives pain free and productive rather than leaving them to die in pain - These things are not abhorrant acts against nature.It is these acts of collective risk sharing and compassion for others that allow us to justifiably describe the societies we have created as "civilised"......Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

People who exercise fanatically and eat healthily still get sick, still have accidents and are not immune to things like birthing complications. Nor is someone like Stephen Hawking in the situation he is because of a lack of push-ups, too many burgers or an irresponsible approach to broccoli intake. Such a life..?A couple of posts ago you seemed to be suggesting that ANYONE faced with any medical condition should be left to nature’s fate. I am still very unclear who (If anyone?) you think nature-defying medical attention can be justifiably provided to.To who do you think nature-defying medical treatments can justifiably be given? Anyone at all? Don’t ALL medical treatments defy nature? Isn’t that kinda the point of them? How far can you take this whilst answering questions consistently before you are laughing too hard to type? Let’s find out..

He buffed up but lost his comedic mojo.Everyone know fat people are funny.......

Well I'll keep playin as long as you will. Denying medical attention to anyone who is ill or injured is only part of the way to achieve your goal. The other, and more effective approach, is eugenics.If only those with the traits you desire are even allowed to breed (or even live) then that is the safest surefire way to achieve your goal no? Have you personally ever required any medical attention for anything ever?

Or it is Oni behaving outrageously? His first few posts had me wondering if he had been so taken in by his love of Ron Paul that he had lost the plot. See Message 31 and downthread for my reasons for that suspicion.However after a few more posts it became increasingly obvious he was playing some sort of devils advocate. Then when he started on about fake breasts and athletes that never die it should have been clear to all that it was a wind-up.However - The question remains - Did Oni start out in any way serious or is the entire thing a gigantic pisstake. His advocacy of Ron Paul ( a man who makes intellectual consistency synonomous with lunacy) makes me think that there was some initial spark that might have caused his current slide into parodic nutjobbery.But I am both a conspiracy theorist and someone desperate for a disagreeable debate partner. So take no notice of me.But will the real Oni please stand up.....?

If natural selection is your goal why interfere medically at all? Why not just let nature take it's course in ALL cases? You are a stoner, a drinker, an ex-nicotine addict, substance abuser and one-time-fatty. Your job involves hanging out in unhealthy environments and you freely admit to past and present sexual promiscuity. Why should any genuinely fit, healthy and clean living individual contribute anything whatsoever to cover the health risks of your present lifestyle or the delayed health effects of any of your past misdemeanours?In fact isn’t the whole idea of insurance a socialist plot anyway? I mean collectively contributing to a pool of money on the basis that a few of you might need it!!! It’s communism!! Why not take some personal responsibility by A) Making sure you don’t get sick B) If you are so irresponsible as to get sick just pay the fucking bill!!! Why should anyone ever pay anything for treatment they haven’t actually received?The whole idea of insurance is a communist plot isn’t it? Did you? Really? Or when you say "paid" do you mean that you leeched from the collective insurance pool because you were too irresponsible to take care of yourself?Communist.

With Mod's plea for topicality in mind.....Can you explain why the US, lacking public nationalised healthcare, suffers from all of the obesity and self-inflicted health problems you keep citing whilst Scandanavian countries, with their generous and all-encompassing state healthcare programmes, do not?Are Americans fat unhealthy layabouts because they don't have nationalised health insurance in place?Would socialised healthcare improve on the problems you cite rather than exacerbate them?

The parody continues....But on a serious note - The easiest way for private insurers to reduce costs seems to be to find loopholes in coverage so that they don't have to payout even when people get ill. In a universal healthcare system this isn't an option. So prevention becomes a better way to reduce costs. The Scandanavian system seems very good on prevention. I see. Your answer to America's health problems isn't to provide a nationalised health service but is to instead provide a nationalised health-food and gym chain? Free salads, riveta and soy milk distributed to all and a chain of nationalised gyms free at the point of entryI like your thinking...... Or you could tax unhealthy food in the same sort of way we tax cigarettes. It might deter people. And if it doesn't at least the costs of any medical treatment they might need have been covered.

Complete law of the jungle then?Why have a police force or laws if they just stand in the way of natural selection? Why put out fires rather than find out who is physically able to escape for themselves? National infrastructure for things like energy or clean water? Surely this just deters people from building their own generators and gaining much needed exercise by collecting their own water from the local river - Right?The main asset that we humans have is our ability to think and act collectively. That we are not limited to mere individual physical attributes for survival in the way that so many other species are is the greatest gift natural selection has bestowed upon us as a species.By insisting upon an individualistic "survival of the fittest" approach it is you, not I, who is flying in the face of natural selection.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

Nah!! He's just fuckin with us big time. And why not?The more outraged impassioned responses he gets to his obviously lunatic comments the better.And when Buz starts agreeing wholeheartedly with, and even exceeding, the parody one has to wonder how far parody hast to go before it becomes unrealistic. Message 76

Yeah - Nature's law. Survival of the fittest. Isn't that what you advocating? Dude we also built hospitals and we also built McDonalds. So what is your point? "Build it and they will come..."? I have spoken to mother-nature and she wants universal healthcare.Listen to the penguins....