NationStates Jolt Archive

I suppose there is another thread on this somewhere, but I can't get the search function to work.

On the Daily Show, there was a story about Illinois creating a law that pharmacists were required to fill prescriptions for the morning-after pill.

I am for a woman's right to her body, but I cannot fathom how a woman's right to her body can extend from her body over a pharmaceutical counter and encompass the pharmacist.

Maybe I am being obtuse, but I strongly oppose this. What are your thoughts.

I am conflicted. If I were a pharmacist I wouldn't want to fill it, but then if I was the one with the prescription I don't think I would want to drive all over town trying to find someone to fill my stupid script.

I don't know. I suppose it's unfair to legislate what a pharmacist has to fill if they are religiously against it or something......yeah.

well, it is their job....

well, it is their job....
so? It took me 3 weeks to find a urologist who would do a vasectomy for my husband, because they were all catholic and didn't believe in it, should they be forced to do vasectomies? I mean it's thier job........

A pharmacist's job is very simple: read the prescription that a doctor has deemed necessary, take the bottle or packet off the shelf, make sure it won't interact with other medications the patient is taking, stick it into a bag, and hand it to the patient.

Would you deem it ok if a pharmacist refused to fill a prescription for insulin on the basis that he didn't believe in it?

Particularly in the case of the morning-after pill -- time is of the essence, and it usually prescribed because a primary method of contraception has failed. To delay increases the chance of an unwanted pregnancy -- or an abortion.

so? It took me 3 weeks to find a urologist who would do a vasectomy for my husband, because they were all catholic and didn't believe in it, should they be forced to do vasectomies? I mean it's thier job........

Yes, I believe they should.

Yes, I would think it is ok.

A pharmacists job is whatever he wants his job to be.

The only argument for this would be in the licensing. The government issues licenses, so it would get first say in what the required job performances would be. But I don't really support that either.

pharmacists should be obliged to follow standard procedures.. I mean.. what would happen if the police and judges didn't really bother with the law because they didn't believe in it, and rather followed their own laws?

They should probably have some kind of plaque near the entrance to the store telling the customer not to bother looking for birth control pills at that location... that'd save time and frustration.

I think large companies (say, Albertsons or Rite-Aid) should be able to fire employees that won't sell their products, but a local family-owned place should be able to refuse service, sure.

A pharmacist's job is very simple: read the prescription that a doctor has deemed necessary, take the bottle or packet off the shelf, make sure it won't interact with other medications the patient is taking, stick it into a bag, and hand it to the patient.

Would you deem it ok if a pharmacist refused to fill a prescription for insulin on the basis that he didn't believe in it?

I had that problem once. I ran out of Humalog insulin while on vacation and the ONLY pharmacy on the island had some guy working who wouldn't give it to me on the basis that "If God wishes me to live, I'll live." It took a LOT of will power to not slap that man. Honestly, I do not see the difference between that refusal to give a person a prescription and the refusal to give a person any other prescription.

You can disagree with my views; that's fine. I'm just putting out my opinion on the matter.

(On a side note, why would a person like that decide to be a pharmacist?)

Yes, I would think it is ok.

A pharmacists job is whatever he wants his job to be.

The only argument for this would be in the licensing. The government issues licenses, so it would get first say in what the required job performances would be. But I don't really support that either.

If they're going to be responsibile for distributing controlled substances, then there needs to be some control over them.

(On a side note, why would a person like that decide to be a pharmacist?)

It pays pretty well.. sometimes 70k+ per year.. I know a vegetarian who drives a meat truck.. money motivates. :p

It pays pretty well.. sometimes 70k+ per year.. I know a vegetarian who drives a meat truck.. money motivates. :p

Thank you pointless greed and capitalism.

edit: bad wording. I meant pointless greed and pointless capitalism. I don't have a problem with capitlism in general.

I had that problem once. I ran out of Humalog insulin while on vacation and the ONLY pharmacy on the island had some guy working who wouldn't give it to me on the basis that "If God wishes me to live, I'll live." It took a LOT of will power to not slap that man. Honestly, I do not see the difference between that refusal to give a person a prescription and the refusal to give a person any other prescription.

Doesn't this amount, pretty much, to premeditated murder had (God forbid) you died?

I had that problem once. I ran out of Humalog insulin while on vacation and the ONLY pharmacy on the island had some guy working who wouldn't give it to me on the basis that "If God wishes me to live, I'll live." It took a LOT of will power to not slap that man. Honestly, I do not see the difference between that refusal to give a person a prescription and the refusal to give a person any other prescription.

You can disagree with my views; that's fine. I'm just putting out my opinion on the matter.

(On a side note, why would a person like that decide to be a pharmacist?)
You shouldn't have held back. You should have smacked him senseless, and then asked him if maybe the fact that humans had come up with a way for diabetics to live a normal life was God's will. Claiming to absolutely know God's will on anything is about the stupidest fucking copout on earth, not to mention more than a bit presumptuous.

I had that problem once. I ran out of Humalog insulin while on vacation and the ONLY pharmacy on the island had some guy working who wouldn't give it to me on the basis that "If God wishes me to live, I'll live." It took a LOT of will power to not slap that man. Honestly, I do not see the difference between that refusal to give a person a prescription and the refusal to give a person any other prescription.

You can disagree with my views; that's fine. I'm just putting out my opinion on the matter.

(On a side note, why would a person like that decide to be a pharmacist?)

I was going to disagree, then I read this. I would of broken his arms and legs and thrown him in a lake, and said "If god wishes you to live, you live."

You shouldn't have held back. You should have smacked him senseless, and then asked him if maybe the fact that humans had come up with a way for diabetics to live a normal life was God's will. Claiming to absolutely know God's will on anything is about the stupidest fucking copout on earth, not to mention more than a bit presumptuous.

Amen.

Doesn't this amount, pretty much, to premeditated murder had (God forbid) you died?

My first response to that was "of course not!" but now that I think about it...

Well, it would be highly unlikely, but in that case, the blame would fall at least partly on him, but legally there's more than likely some way to get out of it.

Although I doubt he knew it, I wasn't really in any danger of actually dying. A person can generally live a few months without insulin (if they try reeeeeally hard). <-- that would be one of those legal details..."wait and get it elsewhere" =Þ

Doesn't this amount, pretty much, to premeditated murder had (God forbid) you died?

Willful indifference, at the worst.

so? It took me 3 weeks to find a urologist who would do a vasectomy for my husband, because they were all catholic and didn't believe in it, should they be forced to do vasectomies? I mean it's their job........

Strawman.

The pharmicists job is to dispence medication and their use. At most they are supposed to countermand a doctor if the wrong pills were prescribed.

If the pharmacist want's to dispense morality, then he should be a cleric/priest/whatever.

Now the reason for such laws is because the "religious" types overstepped their "religious" rights by refusing to take care of the customer. They would not recommend somebody else and many would keep the prescription because their "ethics" said they had too.

I suppose there is another thread on this somewhere, but I can't get the search function to work.

On the Daily Show, there was a story about Illinois creating a law that pharmacists were required to fill prescriptions for the morning-after pill.

I am for a woman's right to her body, but I cannot fathom how a woman's right to her body can extend from her body over a pharmaceutical counter and encompass the pharmacist.

Maybe I am being obtuse, but I strongly oppose this. What are your thoughts.
There is another solution, but it would require kicking Congress in the ass. The FDA has long been on record recommending that the morning after pill be made available over the counter, but the numbnuts who claim to be opposed to abortion are also opposed to this measure. If it were allowed to happen, then none of those pharmacists would be bothered in the slightest--they'd have to worry more about selling Sudafed than the morning after pill.

But here's what it comes down to--if it's available over the counter, the anti-abortion people won't be able to punish women for having sex outside their prescribed boundaries. That's what this is really all about--controlling when women can safely have sex. And making the morning after pill OTC would have the added benefit of reducing abortions.

Willful indifference, at the worst.

I should think depraved indifference. I mean, this medication is necessary to life, for pity's sake.

There is another solution, but it would require kicking Congress in the ass. The FDA has long been on record recommending that the morning after pill be made available over the counter, but the numbnuts who claim to be opposed to abortion are also opposed to this measure. If it were allowed to happen, then none of those pharmacists would be bothered in the slightest--they'd have to worry more about selling Sudafed than the morning after pill.

But here's what it comes down to--if it's available over the counter, the anti-abortion people won't be able to punish women for having sex outside their prescribed boundaries. That's what this is really all about--controlling when women can safely have sex. And making the morning after pill OTC would have the added benefit of reducing abortions.

I agree with you there, it should be OTC, and disallowing it can only logically be percieved as punishing women for having sex.

Strawman.

The pharmicists job is to dispence medication and their use. At most they are supposed to countermand a doctor if the wrong pills were prescribed.

If the pharmacist want's to dispense morality, then he should be a cleric/priest/whatever.

One's job should not be determined by the government, nor should you be limited from a profession based on your morality.

I agree with you there, it should be OTC, and disallowing it can only logically be percieved as punishing women for having sex.
And that's a part of the reason I refuse to refer to anti-abortion people as being pro-life. They're not pro-life--they're pro-"live your life the way we tell you to, you evil sinners."

unsactioned sex acts.

he he he.

Sorry had to say it. I seen some one say it in another debate thought it was funny thought I'd repost it here.

I agree with you there, it should be OTC, and disallowing it can only logically be percieved as punishing women for having sex.

And if woman are punished for having sex, then guys will ultamitly be punshied. ;) . Wait a second, I'm still pissed about Moechae story :mad:

And that's a part of the reason I refuse to refer to anti-abortion people as being pro-life. They're not pro-life--they're pro-"live your life the way we tell you to, you evil sinners."

I also prefer to call them anti-abortion, but to be honest, there is a great deal of people who oppose abortion on the basis that they believe that a fetus constitutes human life and should be protected. I consider the argument to be illogical, but at least they have good intentions.

One's job should not be determined by the government, nor should you be limited from a profession based on your morality.
Here's why that's a problem. When you train to be a pharmacist, you know from the very beginning that your job is necessarily dependent on the choices of others--the only time you can interfere with a prescription is when there's a potentially dangerous conflict. If you know that going in, you effectively waive any right to object to the treatment a doctor prescribes. If you can't handle that, then you need to get out before you finish the training. I mean, if your last sentence were accurate, what would stop a pacifist from taking a job as an infantryman, but refusing to fire his weapon at another human being for religious reasons? You can't do that--if you know, up front, that something you believe in precludes you from a line of work, you need to find something else to do.

I also prefer to call them anti-abortion, but to be honest, there is a great deal of people who oppose abortion on the basis that they believe that a fetus constitutes human life and should be protected. I consider the argument to be illogical, but at least they have good intentions.
The problem is that their intentions affect my girlfriend's and my daughter's (eventually) health options. Nobody will ever force them to get an abortion (unless they work for one of Tom DeLay's buddies in the Marianas Islands, but that's another story), but they somehow feel they have the right to determine what might possibly happen inside my daughter's body? I don't play that way.

Strawman.

The pharmicists job is to dispence medication and their use. At most they are supposed to countermand a doctor if the wrong pills were prescribed.

If the pharmacist want's to dispense morality, then he should be a cleric/priest/whatever.

Now the reason for such laws is because the "religious" types overstepped their "religious" rights by refusing to take care of the customer. They would not recommend somebody else and many would keep the prescription because their "ethics" said they had too.
so isn't it a doctor's job to treat a patient? I am confused as to how exactly that is a strawman. help me out a little more please.

so isn't it a doctor's job to treat a patient? I am confused as to how exactly that is a strawman. help me out a little more please.
It is, but we tend, as a society, to cut doctors a little more slack because they're the ones treating the patient, especially when it comes to voluntary procedures like a vasectomy. Fortunately, I didn't have that sort of problem when I got mine. I'm not saying that the doctors are in the right--I'm just saying that the doctor to pharmacist comparison isn't a one-to-one analogy.

And that's a part of the reason I refuse to refer to anti-abortion people as being pro-life. They're not pro-life--they're pro-"live your life the way we tell you to, you evil sinners."

Hehe, I like that name for them (well, not ALL, but the ones I have issues with anway)! I might have to use it sometime in casual conversation. =P

It is, but we tend, as a society, to cut doctors a little more slack because they're the ones treating the patient, especially when it comes to voluntary procedures like a vasectomy. Fortunately, I didn't have that sort of problem when I got mine. I'm not saying that the doctors are in the right--I'm just saying that the doctor to pharmacist comparison isn't a one-to-one analogy.
okay, thank you for clarifying.

I would like to point out that an abortion is an elective procedure (most of the time) so why should a pharmacist be forced to fill the script if he doesn't want to?

(just for the sake of arguement)

Here's why that's a problem. When you train to be a pharmacist, you know from the very beginning that your job is necessarily dependent on the choices of others--the only time you can interfere with a prescription is when there's a potentially dangerous conflict. If you know that going in, you effectively waive any right to object to the treatment a doctor prescribes. If you can't handle that, then you need to get out before you finish the training. I mean, if your last sentence were accurate, what would stop a pacifist from taking a job as an infantryman, but refusing to fire his weapon at another human being for religious reasons? You can't do that--if you know, up front, that something you believe in precludes you from a line of work, you need to find something else to do.

I never said that a pharmacist couldn't be fired for not performing his job. I would imagine that any CVS pharmacist that denied the morning-after pill would be reprimanded or fired, and I wouldn't have a problem with that either.

A pharmacist's job is to read the prescription that the doctor has given, make sure everything is correct and in order, and fill it. If they want to preach morality they should have joined the clergy.

The problem is that their intentions affect my girlfriend's and my daughter's (eventually) health options. Nobody will ever force them to get an abortion (unless they work for one of Tom DeLay's buddies in the Marianas Islands, but that's another story), but they somehow feel they have the right to determine what might possibly happen inside my daughter's body? I don't play that way.

I understand that and agree with you, but if you look at it from their viewpoint, where abortion literally is murder, you can understand their objection.

I suppose there is another thread on this somewhere, but I can't get the search function to work.

On the Daily Show, there was a story about Illinois creating a law that pharmacists were required to fill prescriptions for the morning-after pill.

I am for a woman's right to her body, but I cannot fathom how a woman's right to her body can extend from her body over a pharmaceutical counter and encompass the pharmacist.

Maybe I am being obtuse, but I strongly oppose this. What are your thoughts.

Does the law require all pharmacies to stock Plan B? If not, then the law only extends to those pharmacists who make the choice to work for a pharmacy that stocks it. As such, they must do their job, or lose it.

If it does make such a requirement, it is a licensing thing. It is no different from Illinois deciding that all pharmacies must stock penicillin in order to get a pharmacy license - something well within their rights.

I would like to point out that an abortion is an elective procedure (most of the time) so why should a pharmacist be forced to fill the script if he doesn't want to?

The morning after pill is not an abortion. It is a high dose of hormones designed to keep a woman from getting pregnant at all.

okay, thank you for clarifying.

I would like to point out that an abortion is an elective procedure (most of the time) so why should a pharmacist be forced to fill the script if he doesn't want to?

(just for the sake of arguement)The morning after pill isn't an abortifacient, for starters. It's not the same as RU-486, or maybe they'd have an argument. At the very most, what the morning after pill does is keep a fertilized egg from implanting in the first place. Considering that only about 1 in 10 even get to that stage, it's not like the morning after pill is doing anything that isn't already likely to happen in nature. That's part of the reason that the whole "life begins at conception" argument is so stupid. Most conceptions never get to that first stage, much less to birth.

It is, but we tend, as a society, to cut doctors a little more slack because they're the ones treating the patient, especially when it comes to voluntary procedures like a vasectomy. Fortunately, I didn't have that sort of problem when I got mine. I'm not saying that the doctors are in the right--I'm just saying that the doctor to pharmacist comparison isn't a one-to-one analogy.

And note that a doctor cannot refuse emergency treatment on any basis - not even a basis of payment. An elective procedure? Surely. But if a guy came in and, for whatever reason, needed an emergency vasectomy (I can't think of any case where this would happen, but bear with me), and the doctor was in the ER, he could not refuse to do it unless he didn't know the procedure.

And yet, pharmacists want the right to refuse emergency medication on the basis of, "My religion says you can't have it."

The morning after pill isn't an abortifacient, for starters. It's not the same as RU-486, or maybe they'd have an argument. At the very most, what the morning after pill does is keep a fertilized egg from implanting in the first place. Considering that only about 1 in 10 even get to that stage, it's not like the morning after pill is doing anything that isn't already likely to happen in nature. That's part of the reason that the whole "life begins at conception" argument is so stupid. Most conceptions never get to that first stage, much less to birth.

Just to be pedantic, conception is actually when the fertilized egg implants. Fertilization is what happens when the sperm meets the egg. A lot of people say, "I believe life starts at conception," but they really mean fertilization.

Interestingly enough, pregnancy technically doesn't start until conception - implantation.

Does the law require all pharmacies to stock Plan B? If not, then the law only extends to those pharmacists who make the choice to work for a pharmacy that stocks it. As such, they must do their job, or lose it.

If it does make such a requirement, it is a licensing thing. It is no different from Illinois deciding that all pharmacies must stock penicillin in order to get a pharmacy license - something well within their rights.
good point


The morning after pill is not an abortion. It is a high dose of hormones designed to keep a woman from getting pregnant at all.
another good point, I withdraw my argument. ;)

Just to be pedantic, conception is actually when the fertilized egg implants. Fertilization is what happens when the sperm meets the egg. A lot of people say, "I believe life starts at conception," but they really mean fertilization.

Interestingly enough, pregnancy technically doesn't start until conception - implantation.You're absolutely right--I got the terms wrong, and they're important in this kind of discussion.

The morning after pill is not an abortion. It is a high dose of hormones designed to keep a woman from getting pregnant at all.

The Zygote is already formed when they take the morning after pill, the pill prevents implantion into the wall of the uterus. What people have a promblem with is that they beleive (may or may not be true) the Zygote is alive.


Edit: I should note that 3 in 4 time the zygote is conceived that this happens naturally.

okay, thank you for clarifying.

I would like to point out that an abortion is an elective procedure (most of the time) so why should a pharmacist be forced to fill the script if he doesn't want to?

(just for the sake of arguement)

You don't see the difference between surgery and prescribing a pill that prevents implantation of some cells?

Withdrawn.

I should note that 3 in 4 time the zygote is conceived that this happens naturally.
Quiet you, sex education is wrong in America.

One's job should not be determined by the government, nor should you be limited from a profession based on your morality.
The government is not determining people's job nor is anyone being limited from a profession based on their morality.

The government is determining that certain standards must be adhered to in order for certain privledges, nothing unusual about that. The privledge of driving for instance is contingent on one adhering to certain standards. People are welcome to choose whatever job they want and so long as they can abide by any standards that apply their morality is entirely besides the point. Mind you I would note that people have been fired on morality grounds for activities that occured in their own time and were unconnected to their work (a teacher fired for frequenting a swingers club is one instance that comes to mind).

Being a pharmacist (ie being legally allowed to dispense controlled and restricted drugs) is not a right it is a privledge. The difference is that proviso's can be attached to privledges. This is nothing new or unusual, nor is it anything contraversal in most instances. The fact is if you want to work in a certain role, you have to take the good with the bad, if you are not prepared to do that, then you are unsuited to the role and the role is unsuited to you and like anyone else in such a position you'll have to learn to deal with any disappointment this may cause you.

Really, about the only power they have is to refuse to fill a perscription. It's not like they can go against a doctor's orders and give you something that they think is more appropriate for your condition. Pharmacists can, and are expected to, refuse to fill perscriptions that could cause harmful drug interactions. Personally, I think if a pharmacist does not want to fill a perscription, they should inform the ordering physician. Then the physician can decide to send patients elsewhere.

Should a pharmacist lose their job over refusing to fill a perscription for Plan B? If directed to do so by their superiors and they refuse, it becomes simple insubordination.

It's not the pharmacist's job to judge whether you need a medication or not. That duty lies with your doctor. All a pharmacist should do is make sure you can fill your prescription for as long as you need it.

I never really saw how using these sort of things went against God's law, anyhow. If God didn't want you to prevent conception using a pill or contraceptives, then how come we are endowed with the intelligence and will to make and use these kinds of things?

The government is not determining people's job nor is anyone being limited from a profession based on their morality.

The government is determining that certain standards must be adhered to in order for certain privledges, nothing unusual about that. The privledge of driving for instance is contingent on one adhering to certain standards. People are welcome to choose whatever job they want and so long as they can abide by any standards that apply their morality is entirely besides the point. Mind you I would note that people have been fired on morality grounds for activities that occured in their own time and were unconnected to their work (a teacher fired for frequenting a swingers club is one instance that comes to mind).

Being a pharmacist (ie being legally allowed to dispense controlled and restricted drugs) is not a right it is a privledge. The difference is that proviso's can be attached to privledges. This is nothing new or unusual, nor is it anything contraversal in most instances. The fact is if you want to work in a certain role, you have to take the good with the bad, if you are not prepared to do that, then you are unsuited to the role and the role is unsuited to you and like anyone else in such a position you'll have to learn to deal with any disappointment this may cause you.

I am just saying that the pharmacist offers a service of his choosing to the public. He has the right to offer whatever service he wants to the public.

I am just saying that the pharmacist offers a service of his choosing to the public. He has the right to offer whatever service he wants to the public.
All I am saying is that you are wrong. People dont have the right to offer whatever service they want to the public. You cant offer the service of being a taxi cab if you have no driver's license, you cant offer the service of selling cannabis at all, you cant offer the service of operating in unhygenic conditions even if you have all the proper medical practising licenses. The fact is being a pharmacist is a privledge - it is not a right.

I think many of arguments here are from a point of view that has come from someone that has allowed themselves to get too emotionally attached to the pro-life pro-choice debate and we’ve forgotten what this debate is really about.

If you are the owner of the pharmacy, and the state license requirements does not stipulate that you must carry all (or have a means of obtaining ‘all’ possible prescriptions) to maintain your license, then you most certainly should have the right to stipulate the products and services you will provide in your own store.

Take this debate out of the realm of the reproduction and childbearing realm and I think perhaps the flaw in the logic that says otherwise will become self evident.

Let’s say you own a pharmacy in Oregon, you are asked to provide a lethal dose of a medication to cause the death of your client. You refuse on grounds that you don't want to assist in an assisted suicide, legal or not. You became a pharmacist to help people, not kill them, Should you have to close your shop just so you don’t have to fill the prescription? No, that wouldn't be right. Let the doctor fill his own lethal prescription if he can’t find a professional hang-man, or so you should be able to say to yourself.

Or, on a lesser note, lets say you are a pharmacy owner who is a holistic morality and health nut, anti-narcotics, no cigarettes in your store, no booze, no lottery tickets etc., and your shop is in California, and someone shows up at your counter with a prescription of a Marijuana remedy for 'stress relief'... Do you have to fill it, or can you send them on to the next shop?

At what point do you get to decide what your store offers? Should you have to clearly post, on your front door, your services? Yes, you should be forced to have clearly displayed public notices of services that you provide and do not offer so that there is no misunderstanding by the client before they enter.

On the other hand, if you work for a pharmacy, you offer what they offer, if you can't do it, you quit and move on.

The doctor’s office should have a list of available locations to fill their prescriptions, and public notices fill the rest of the gap. There is no reason we need to force a Jewish Deli to serve Ham sandwiches. If you want a ham sandwich, go to a non-Jewish deli.

All I am saying is that you are wrong. People dont have the right to offer whatever service they want to the public. You cant offer the service of being a taxi cab if you have no driver's license, you cant offer the service of selling cannabis at all, you cant offer the service of operating in unhygenic conditions even if you have all the proper medical practising licenses. The fact is being a pharmacist is a privledge - it is not a right.

1. You can offer taxi services by employing people who do drive.
2. You should be able to sell cannabis.
3. (Although I think that it is the consumer's responsibility and not the government's) You cannot perform medical services in unhygenic conditions because you are accepting duties whose obligations you cannot fulfill.

In the pharmacist's case:

1. He has no outside limitations that would bar him from dispensing medicine correctly.
2. He is not trying to peddle an illegal substance.
3. He (presumably) has all requirements to fulfill all obligations which he accepts.

And being a pharmacist is a right, but the government restricts that right from a large portion of the population.

In the pharmacist's case:

1. He has no outside limitations that would bar him from dispensing medicine correctly.
2. He is not trying to peddle an illegal substance.
3. He (presumably) has all requirements to fulfill all obligations which he accepts.

3. Wrong. Part of the obligation now, in Illinois at least, is apparently to fill a prescription for the morning after pill. Thus, if the pharmacist does not carry it or will not prescribe it, #3 is not met.

And being a pharmacist is a right, but the government restricts that right from a large portion of the population.

If it were a right, *anyone* could fill out a form or two and be a pharmacist. That isn't how it works. It is a right to try and meet the requirements to be a pharmacist - and, in Illinois, those requirements now include, "Willing to dispense Plan B.

There I was, wanting to make a great point using the Hippocratic Oath, and what do I read?

..."No Abortion".

Pffffft. Dumb oath.

1. You can offer taxi services by employing people who do drive.
2. You should be able to sell cannabis.
3. (Although I think that it is the consumer's responsibility and not the government's) You cannot perform medical services in unhygenic conditions because you are accepting duties whose obligations you cannot fulfill.
Pretending to be obtuse ill-becomes you, but have it your way, I rephrase my earlier point
"you cannot offer to provide the service of personally physically operating a taxi cab itself, as a motor vehical transportation device, if you do not have a driver's license"
Hopefully the above phrasing will avoid in further misunderstanding as to the meaning I intended to convey, although in all honesty I have difficulty believing you actually did fail to understand the rather obvious meaning intended.
Whether or not you should be allowed to sell canabis, doing so is not a legal right.
In offering to perform medical services in an unhygenic environment, the implied duties you refer to stem from the restriction placed on the offering of services - it is not inherent in the service or offer itself in the absence of government regulations.

In the pharmacist's case:

1. He has no outside limitations that would bar him from dispensing medicine correctly.
2. He is not trying to peddle an illegal substance.
3. He (presumably) has all requirements to fulfill all obligations which he accepts.

And being a pharmacist is a right, but the government restricts that right from a large portion of the population.
He or she doesnt have the requirements if local law requires that they do something they cannot (due to personal choice or otherwise) do, for instance dispense a particular product on presentation of a perscription.

Clearly being a pharmacist is not a right if the government restricts it. What law grants such a right? While a lot of people like to claim that everything and the kitchen sink is their right, in reality rights are granted by law, it might be true that there should be a particular right, but if 'right' means 'everything we ought to have a right to do' then the word quickly becomes meaningless.

I'm for it, if the pharmacist is a pro-life nut that doesn't give them the right to deny service. It'd be like a Doctor refusing to see a patient because they were "Unclean"

If they have a problem with it, then they shouldn't have picked that profession.

I think many of arguments here are from a point of view that has come from someone that has allowed themselves to get too emotionally attached to the pro-life pro-choice debate and we’ve forgotten what this debate is really about.

If you are the owner of the pharmacy, and the state license requirements does not stipulate that you must carry all (or have a means of obtaining ‘all’ possible prescriptions) to maintain your license, then you most certainly should have the right to stipulate the products and services you will provide in your own store.

Take this debate out of the realm of the reproduction and childbearing realm and I think perhaps the flaw in the logic that says otherwise will become self evident.

Let’s say you own a pharmacy in Oregon, you are asked to provide a lethal dose of a medication to cause the death of your client. You refuse on grounds that you don't want to assist in an assisted suicide, legal or not. You became a pharmacist to help people, not kill them, Should you have to close your shop just so you don’t have to fill the prescription? No, that wouldn't be right. Let the doctor fill his own lethal prescription if he can’t find a professional hang-man, or so you should be able to say to yourself.

Or, on a lesser note, lets say you are a pharmacy owner who is a holistic morality and health nut, anti-narcotics, no cigarettes in your store, no booze, no lottery tickets etc., and your shop is in California, and someone shows up at your counter with a prescription of a Marijuana remedy for 'stress relief'... Do you have to fill it, or can you send them on to the next shop?

At what point do you get to decide what your store offers? Should you have to clearly post, on your front door, your services? Yes, you should be forced to have clearly displayed public notices of services that you provide and do not offer so that there is no misunderstanding by the client before they enter.

On the other hand, if you work for a pharmacy, you offer what they offer, if you can't do it, you quit and move on.
The doctor’s office should have a list of available locations to fill their prescriptions, and public notices fill the rest of the gap. There is no reason we need to force a Jewish Deli to serve Ham sandwiches. If you want a ham sandwich, go to a non-Jewish deli.
Let's not kid ourselves about what this debate is about. You're talking here about the procedure for licensing and running pharmacies, but none of the alternative scenarios you suggest have sparked a wave of conscientious objection among pharmacists. The fact is that this has been adopted as a tactic by anti-choicers to get indirectly what they can't get directly, through the law or by winning over public opinion.

The problem is that these pharmacist-moralists are taking jobs in shops that cater to the general public and then trying to claim the right to refuse service to some customers under freedom of religion. In essence, they are lying to their employers about their willingness to do the job as described. And when they get fired for it, they sue, to make a public issue of it. Viz, recent cases involving Target and Walgreen's.

I would welcome separate pharmacies for the anti-choice crowd, so that neither of us would be bothering the other. But separate, specialist pharmacies would be a way for the pro-choice and anti-choice crowds to co-exist peacefully. That's not what these pharmacists want. They want, ultimately, to ban abortion, and most contraception, and to force their morals on society. I believe that's why they take jobs in companies where they know full well they'll be asked to do things they don't believe in. If they wanted peace, they would be starting their own businesses.

3. Wrong. Part of the obligation now, in Illinois at least, is apparently to fill a prescription for the morning after pill. Thus, if the pharmacist does not carry it or will not prescribe it, #3 is not met.

Explain why not carrying one prescription is ample justification to bar someone from being a pharmacist.

If it were a right, *anyone* could fill out a form or two and be a pharmacist. That isn't how it works. It is a right to try and meet the requirements to be a pharmacist - and, in Illinois, those requirements now include, "Willing to dispense Plan B.

Being guaranteed Plan B is a privelege, choosing how to allocate your labor is a right.

If they have a problem with it, then they shouldn't have picked that profession.

I would say that this pharmacist picked the profession long before this became a law, considering the law is a year old.

I saw that segment. It was brilliant. I love how it ended with the question of who gets to control a women’s body, the government or the pharmacists.

I am against making anyone perform any act against their will, unless they have first harmed another directly. Besides, any good pharmacist, or human being for that matter, wouldn’t let convictions they only believe in out of convenience to interfere with the art of profit.

snip[QUOTE]

All of these are restrictions inacted to protect the consumer from recieving poor service.

This legislation does not protect the consumer from poor service, it insures that the consumer will recieve service. It forces someone to provide a service or lose his/her livelihood.

[QUOTE]He or she doesnt have the requirements if local law requires that they do something they cannot (due to personal choice or otherwise) do, for instance dispense a particular product on presentation of a perscription.

You cannot just say "Its a law, so its justified".

Clearly being a pharmacist is not a right if the government restricts it. What law grants such a right? While a lot of people like to claim that everything and the kitchen sink is their right, in reality rights are granted by law, it might be true that there should be a particular right, but if 'right' means 'everything we ought to have a right to do' then the word quickly becomes meaningless.

Rights aren't granted by government. In the absense of government anyone can be a pharmacist, but government restricts the right.

I say that a right is anything that we can do without interference from others, and it bears a great deal of meaning to me.

All of these are restrictions inacted to protect the consumer from recieving poor service.
I suspect people refused the contents of their perscriptions by pharmacists would consider they had recieved very poor service!
More to the point these restrictions were enacted to promote the health and protect the well being of society. Clearly the law makers you refer to believe that the law you refer to does likewise.

This legislation does not protect the consumer from poor service, it insures that the consumer will recieve service. It forces someone to provide a service or lose his/her livelihood.
It forces people to abide by a standard that is considered necessary by the law makers for the maintanance of health or promotion of well being of the society - just like all other legally binding standards.

You cannot just say "Its a law, so its justified".
I have not stated that the fact that something is law justifies it.

Rights aren't granted by government. In the absense of government anyone can be a pharmacist, but government restricts the right.
The source of rights is context dependent. In the case of a nation that has a government that legislates and enforces law, then government/law is indeed the source of rights.

I say that a right is anything that we can do without interference from others, and it bears a great deal of meaning to me.
Your say doesnt necessary change the fabric of reality. Evidently your defination would probably be deficient according to most people's understanding. If we apply your definition we find that children dont have the right to be clothed or fed because not clothing or not feeding a child is not an interference with the child. Most people would not agree that a child in the US has no right to be fed, and in fact the law grants children (in the US) such a right.

I suspect people refused the contents of their perscriptions by pharmacists would consider they had recieved very poor service!

They would most likely get very sick.

More to the point these restrictions were enacted to promote the health and protect the well being of society. Clearly the law makers you refer to believe that the law you refer to does likewise.

They are not meant to protect the well being of society, they are meant protect the well-being of the individual. However, all of them are restrictions that make sure the person providing the service is qualified to provide the service. This legislation makes no judgement on the qualification of the service provider, it only forces them to perform a specific service.

It forces people to abide by a standard that is considered necessary by the law makers for the maintanance of health or promotion of well being of the society - just like all other legally binding standards.

I know that, but my comment was stating that the standard was unjust.

The source of rights is context dependent. In the case of a nation that has a government that legislates and enforces law, then government/law is indeed the source of rights.

What is the source of rights outside the context of government?

Your say doesnt necessary change the fabric of reality. Evidently your defination would probably be deficient according to most people's understanding. If we apply your definition we find that children dont have the right to be clothed or fed because not clothing or not feeding a child is not an interference with the child. Most people would not agree that a child in the US has no right to be fed, and in fact the law grants children (in the US) such a right.

That is a privelege not a right.

If a pharmacist could refuse to provide a woman with a morning after pill this would amount to an effective denial of her right. She would have a right but no ability to excercise it. It is fine to say that she can go down the street and get it somwhere else if she lives in a city, but what if she lives in a small town and there is only one pharmacy?

I would say that this pharmacist picked the profession long before this became a law, considering the law is a year old.

No. I'm saying they shouldn't have the right to refuse a perscription from a doctor in the first place. They knew what they were getting into when they chose the profession. There is nothing inherently wrong with his beliefs, but I am sure there are similar occupations in the pharmaceutical/biotech industries suited to his skills in which he will not have to make decisions that violate his moral compass. Perhaps it was a poor career decision on his part, but nevertheless, he shouldn't force his morals upon others, because that is what it comes down to.

I would be extremely frustrated if someone withheld medication that a doctor deemed I require for their own "moral" reasons. However, a better solution to all this would be making the pill available over the counter.

No. I'm saying they shouldn't have the right to refuse a perscription from a doctor in the first place. They knew what they were getting into when they chose the profession. There is nothing inherently wrong with his beliefs, but I am sure there are similar occupations in the pharmaceutical/biotech industries suited to his skills in which he will not have to make decisions that violate his moral compass. Perhaps it was a poor career decision on his part, but nevertheless, he shouldn't force his morals upon others, because that is what it comes down to.

I would be extremely frustrated if someone withheld medication that a doctor deemed I require for their own "moral" reasons. However, a better solution to all this would be making the pill available over the counter.


Speaking of forcing beliefs on people, you sound as if you would have no problem forcing your beliefs on religious people who want to become pharmicists. "Do you believe that the morning after pill is immoral, but want to be a pharmacist anyway? Too bad, I say you can't."

And don't even say "they can just have a career in a related field" because you seem to have a problem with pharmicists telling you to "get your prescription filled elsewhere."

It's wrong when they do it, but hey, it's ok for you.

It's not the pharmacist's job to judge whether you need a medication or not. That duty lies with your doctor. All a pharmacist should do is make sure you can fill your prescription for as long as you need it.

I never really saw how using these sort of things went against God's law, anyhow. If God didn't want you to prevent conception using a pill or contraceptives, then how come we are endowed with the intelligence and will to make and use these kinds of things?

God gave us the intelligence to make hydrogen bombs, so I guess he wants us to blow each other up.

Speaking of forcing beliefs on people, you sound as if you would have no problem forcing your beliefs on religious people who want to become pharmicists. "Do you believe that the morning after pill is immoral, but want to be a pharmacist anyway? Too bad, I say you can't."

And don't even say "they can just have a career in a related field" because you seem to have a problem with pharmicists telling you to "get your prescription filled elsewhere."

It's wrong when they do it, but hey, it's ok for you.

Yes, that's exactly right. Have a cookie. *gives a contraceptive pill*

Oh, that's not a cookie.

Anyway, I never said they can't become pharmacists in the first place - but they need to accept that their job involves filling out perscriptions handed to them by a doctor. Otherwise, they shouldn't be pharmacists. What about if they refused to serve someone because they're black? Should they have that right too? Just asking.

I had that problem once. I ran out of Humalog insulin while on vacation and the ONLY pharmacy on the island had some guy working who wouldn't give it to me on the basis that "If God wishes me to live, I'll live." It took a LOT of will power to not slap that man.
Oh my God - that's insane! Why on earth is he working in a pharmacy?? I mean, is there anything in ways of medication he'd actually dispense? With that mindset, this sounds more like an evil parody of a pharmacist, not like an actual one.

The mind is boggled.

Speaking of forcing beliefs on people, you sound as if you would have no problem forcing your beliefs on religious people who want to become pharmicists. "Do you believe that the morning after pill is immoral, but want to be a pharmacist anyway? Too bad, I say you can't."

And don't even say "they can just have a career in a related field" because you seem to have a problem with pharmicists telling you to "get your prescription filled elsewhere."

It's wrong when they do it, but hey, it's ok for you.

Finally! Someone with sense! They discriminated against me at work just like Kanabia is! They were all "But you applied for this job! You knew you'd have to serve people this!" But no, I told them "I'm a vegetarian! Eating meat is WRONG and EVIL!" Refusing to serve people burgers is my CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHT and everyone who thinks otherwise is just a bigoted fascist.

Even after I offered to give people directions to another resteraunt, they still hassled me about it at work and threatened to fire me, can you believe?

Just goes to show you what fascists they are at McDonalds. Not that that stopped me applying to work there, of course. I have every right to pick a job that clashes with my morals and then bitch and moan about actually having to do the job. Right?

There I was, wanting to make a great point using the Hippocratic Oath, and what do I read?

..."No Abortion".

Pffffft. Dumb oath.

Oh yeah, that happened to me the last time this topic was up for discussion. What a disappointment.

Okay, I've finally read through the whole thread. Two questions:

- Would making it available over the counter really solve all problems?
I see two main problems with this:

1) Availability.
While over-the-counter sounds great in theory, and surely will pose no problems for anybody living in the city or (sub)urban areas, I think the situation in rural areas & small towns wouldn't exactly improve. The local mom & pop store will, if so inclined (which e.g. in the bible belt would be in most cases) simply not stock it - their shop, their decision.
The larger chains (and those would actually be the more relevant ones for people living in really rural areas, seeing how the local mom & pop stores have gone out of business years ago for lack of customer base, making the situation even more dire by putting the nearest place to shop for anything a mere, say, 30 miles away) could decide if they'd stock it or not and thus decide for their thousands of stores all over the country. While some will undoubtedly decide to stock it, I think we all know what Wal Mart, the Evil King of Retail, will do. And Wal Mart is big, specifically in more rural areas.

2) Lack of anonymity.
Let's say you're in a small town and your local drug store stocks the morning-after pill. Great, right? Well, not so sure, considering you're likely going to stand in the check-out line right in front of Sherry from the PTA and the cashier will be Mabel from the church group...
Most people find it slightly embarrassing to buy condoms (let alone in front of people they know), so the morning-after pill is bound to be even worse - always considering we're talking specifically about a rather religious, mostly rural environment.
At the pharmacy at least the pharmacist is the only one who knows what people buy, and he can't tell anybody (correct me if I'm wrong on that last part; though I sure hope I'm not.)



Second, unrelated, question:
- Where do Americans buy condoms? Drug store, pharmacy, ...? Does e.g. Wal Mart stock condoms? Have there been the same kind of refusals regarding selling condoms?

Okay, I've finally read through the whole thread. Two questions:

- Would making it available over the counter really solve all problems?
I see two main problems with this:

1) Availability.
While over-the-counter sounds great in theory, and surely will pose no problems for anybody living in the city or (sub)urban areas, I think the situation in rural areas & small towns wouldn't exactly improve. The local mom & pop store will, if so inclined (which e.g. in the bible belt would be in most cases) simply not stock it - their shop, their decision.
The larger chains (and those would actually be the more relevant ones for people living in really rural areas, seeing how the local mom & pop stores have gone out of business years ago for lack of customer base, making the situation even more dire by putting the nearest place to shop for anything a mere, say, 30 miles away) could decide if they'd stock it or not and thus decide for their thousands of stores all over the country. While some will undoubtedly decide to stock it, I think we all know what Wal Mart, the Evil King of Retail, will do. And Wal Mart is big, specifically in more rural areas.
It wouldn't solve the problem completely, but it would cut a lot of these sorts of issues out of the mix, and if it were an otc drug, you wouldn't be limited to drug stores. You could sell it at grocery stores, gas stations--pretty much anywhere that sells aspirin.

2) Lack of anonymity.
Let's say you're in a small town and your local drug store stocks the morning-after pill. Great, right? Well, not so sure, considering you're likely going to stand in the check-out line right in front of Sherry from the PTA and the cashier will be Mabel from the church group...
Most people find it slightly embarrassing to buy condoms (let alone in front of people they know), so the morning-after pill is bound to be even worse - always considering we're talking specifically about a rather religious, mostly rural environment.
At the pharmacy at least the pharmacist is the only one who knows what people buy, and he can't tell anybody (correct me if I'm wrong on that last part; though I sure hope I'm not.)You'll be dealing with the same social pressures that come with buying condoms or other forms of birth control. Yeah, it might make some people uncomfortable, and those people may well end up pregnant or the father of children as a result. That's part of taking responsibility for your actions.

Second, unrelated, question:
- Where do Americans buy condoms? Drug store, pharmacy, ...? Does e.g. Wal Mart stock condoms? Have there been the same kind of refusals regarding selling condoms?
To my knowledge, there hasn't been a widespread issue dealing with condoms--in part, because the agenda is different. The people who want to control who has sex and when don't care about controlling when men have sex--they care about controlling when women have sex, and they want to make sure that women are always ready to receive their precious seed and that nothing gets in the way of that process.

nor should you be limited from a profession based on your morality.

You most definitely should. Medicine is about medicine under ethics, not morality. Refusing/impeding treatment due to one's own morality ("I won't help that person, he's black" or "I won't help that woman, she's not Christian" or "I'll stop you from having an abortion because I think it is immoral and I should wield power over your body!") is highly unethical.

The easy answer to all of this is to make the pill OTC it is that easy. Then people can choose for themselves.

The easy answer to all of this is to make the pill OTC it is that easy. Then people can choose for themselves.

Exactly.

but if you make it that easy then people will start using it as a form of contriceptives when it is more important to plan ahead and use condums

but if you make it that easy then people will start using it as a form of contriceptives when it is more important to plan ahead and use condums
If they were to use it as a contraceptive, then they'd be stupid to do so. Occasionally the morning after pill can cause some minor side effects, it's more expensive than other contraceptives, and most importantly, it doesn't protect against disease.

but if you make it that easy then people will start using it as a form of contriceptives when it is more important to plan ahead and use condums
Well, I had to use it once and I have never been as sick in my life.

So, yes, I think there is a risk that some stupid people think "Hey, that's cool!", but I also think that'll pass really fast.
For one, the pill doesn't protect against STD.
Also, that pill is going to be a lot more expensive than condoms.
Then, there is only a very short time window during which you can take it, so it's not like you can be lazy about buying condoms and say "Eh, I'll just get that pill next time I drive into town.".
Finally, even if s.o. went the seemingly "easy" way of having unprotected sex and just buying the pill afterwards, my first three points + potentially physically feeling like shit for a day should make that the first and last time.

not to sidestep the issue but doctors who prescribe the morning after pill should keep it in their office so they can give it right to the patient. she can take it in the office or (since i hear it makes you rather sick) go right home and take it. no need to waste time waiting an hour at walgreens to get it filled.

not to sidestep the issue but doctors who prescribe the morning after pill should keep it in their office so they can give it right to the patient. she can take it in the office or (since i hear it makes you rather sick) go right home and take it. no need to waste time waiting an hour at walgreens to get it filled.
Thing is, it's not the kind of drug that really has to be administered after an office visit. It's the kind of thing that a patient can call her Ob/Gyn's office, tell them what she needs, and the doctor can call the prescription in for her. And the quick research I did on it says that the side effects are rare and minor.

Edit: Obviously, whereyouthinkyougoing had a different experience.

Thing is, it's not the kind of drug that really has to be administered after an office visit. It's the kind of thing that a patient can call her Ob/Gyn's office, tell them what she needs, and the doctor can call the prescription in for her. And the quick research I did on it says that the side effects are rare and minor.

Edit: Obviously, whereyouthinkyougoing had a different experience.
Well, yeah, but feeling sick isn't really a serious side effect or anything, so you're still right. As long as you can curl up in bed and not have to, say, go to work, you'll be alright.

I think the best way to dispense it (IF those problems with pharmacists keep cropping up that is, i.e. this will hopefully never be necessary outside the US) would be a mix between over-the-counter and (to take care of the concerns I voiced upthread regarding over-the-counter) simply handing it out at the doctor's office, like Ashmoria said. Though I doubt the latter would be feasible, considering how doctors are probably not allowed to dispense medication in their offices, and how they would need to bill you for it somehow, etc. etc. etc.

not to sidestep the issue but doctors who prescribe the morning after pill should keep it in their office so they can give it right to the patient. she can take it in the office or (since i hear it makes you rather sick) go right home and take it. no need to waste time waiting an hour at walgreens to get it filled.

I don't wish to burst your bubble here, but it overlooks the reason that pharmacies exist in the first place: doctors do not have the time or the space to organize and inventory thousands of medications. One could require a doctor to keep morning after pills in their office for people that need them, and a couple months later, one could require them to keep insulin for diabetics, methadone for recovering heroin addicts, depakote for people experiencing seizures, and by the time everything was said and done, they would have to set up a pharmacy just to deal with all the medications.

I don't wish to burst your bubble here, but it overlooks the reason that pharmacies exist in the first place: doctors do not have the time or the space to organize and inventory thousands of medications. One could require a doctor to keep morning after pills in their office for people that need them, and a couple months later, one could require them to keep insulin for diabetics, methadone for recovering heroin addicts, depakote for people experiencing seizures, and by the time everything was said and done, they would have to set up a pharmacy just to deal with all the medications.
oh i didnt mean that they should be required to dispense it themselves. just that obgyns SHOULD keep it in their office. it hadnt occured to me that it might be prescribed over the phone without an office visit. perhaps the doctor would know what pharmacy keeps it in stock and will only call a prescription into one of those. doctors keep lots of drugs in their offices. this should be one.

it really should be over the counter. maybe when the new congress comes in and we elect a democrat as president they roadblocks to rational drug policy will be removed.

Well, yeah, but feeling sick isn't really a serious side effect or anything, so you're still right. As long as you can curl up in bed and not have to, say, go to work, you'll be alright.

I think the best way to dispense it (IF those problems with pharmacists keep cropping up that is, i.e. this will hopefully never be necessary outside the US) would be a mix between over-the-counter and (to take care of the concerns I voiced upthread regarding over-the-counter) simply handing it out at the doctor's office, like Ashmoria said. Though I doubt the latter would be feasible, considering how doctors are probably not allowed to dispense medication in their offices, and how they would need to bill you for it somehow, etc. etc. etc.
Most doctors keep samples of drugs in their offices, at the very least, for patients who don't have insurance for instance. But I think they're restricted from being able to sell the drugs straight out of their office--conflict of interest issues. You'd get doctors prescribing the most profitable drugs, etc.

oh i didnt mean that they should be required to dispense it themselves. just that obgyns SHOULD keep it in their office. it hadnt occured to me that it might be prescribed over the phone without an office visit. perhaps the doctor would know what pharmacy keeps it in stock and will only call a prescription into one of those. doctors keep lots of drugs in their offices. this should be one.

it really should be over the counter. maybe when the new congress comes in and we elect a democrat as president they roadblocks to rational drug policy will be removed.

Yes, I agree, OTC would be best. Morning after pills are not like antibiotics. It's very simple to determine if one should take a morning after pill. Just answer two questions:

1. Did you have unprotected sex last night?
2. Do you want to avoid becoming pregnant with child?

I read through the site and looked at the contraindications and there doesn't seem to be anything preexisting conditions that would preclude taking it.

If it's not available OTC, maybe they can make it available by mail-order. Fed-Ex is pretty fast nowadays.

Yes, I agree, OTC would be best. Morning after pills are not like antibiotics. It's very simple to determine if one should take a morning after pill. Just answer two questions:

1. Did you have unprotected sex last night?
2. Do you want to avoid becoming pregnant with child?

I read through the site and looked at the contraindications and there doesn't seem to be anything preexisting conditions that would preclude taking it.

If it's not available OTC, maybe they can make it available by mail-order. Fed-Ex is pretty fast nowadays.
Like I said earlier in the thread, the only thing keeping it from being available OTC is Congress. Too many members of Congress are beholden to the religious right in this country, and they claim--contrary to every piece of scientific evidence available--that a fertilized zygote is life, and therefore the morning after pill is an abortion. That's ludicrous, but far too many members of Congress are too fucking scared of this minority of people (and they are a minority--65% of people polled want to keep Roe the law of the land and this isn't anywhere close to an actual abortion) to stand up to them and say "this will actually reduce the number of abortions more effectively than any ban will" and make it an OTC product.

Explain why not carrying one prescription is ample justification to bar someone from being a pharmacist.



Being guaranteed Plan B is a privelege, choosing how to allocate your labor is a right.
You have this backwards on several points.

1. Pharmacists do not carry prescriptions. Let's get our terms right. Prescriptions are orders for medications issued by doctors. Pharmacies/drugstores carry medicines. Pharmacists are trained and licensed professionals who dispense medicines. Their primary function is safety -- they make sure that the prescribed medicine doesn't conflict with other medicines (especially important when a patient is seeing more than one doctor), and they make sure that the prescriptions are not forgeries.

Because pharmacists are involved with the safe use of restricted chemical substances, their licenses are controlled by both federal and local governments, which DO have the power to decide who gets to be a pharmacist and how they must do their jobs. This is because it is the job of government to maintain safety standards to the public -- which includes standards of medicines used by individual members of the public.

2. Because it is the government's job to issue pharmacist licenses and to set standards for issuing such licenses, the state has the power to set whatever standards it sees fit. If a state requires all pharmacies/drugstores to carry Drug X or lose their license to run an actual pharmacy -- i.e. employ licensed pharmacists and dispense controlled drugs -- then tough shit on any owner of such a business who doesn't like Drug X. Their only option is to relocate to another state or to seek an exception to that rule for businesses that cater exclusively to customers who object to Drug X. Obviously, segregating themselves that way would limit their business base, but what's more important to them -- principle or profit? They can't have both.

The same applies to the pharmacists themselves. If the standard to get the license is that they must comply with rules mandating which drugs they must dispense, then they have no right to take the license and then refuse to dispense the mandated drugs. This is not negotiable.

3. Whether one approves of it or not, Plan B is a prescribed medication which a doctor deems necessary to the patient. This is medicine, health care, access to which is generally considered a civil and/or human right. Things which promote one's health, the continuation of one's physical life, and the continuation of one's personal sovereignty/liberty are NOT privileges. They are rights. For a third party to interrupt the doctor/patient relationship and deny the patient access to prescribed medicine because of their own, self-interested agenda is a violation of the patient's rights.

4. No one has ever suffered nor will ever suffer significantly as a result of not becoming a pharmacist. Pharmacy is a profession that a person has to choose to enter, spend a lot of time and some money to get trained in, apply for a license for, and then look for a job in. It is a controlled and restricted profession that involves a public trust, and as such it is a privilege to be granted a license to do it. Proof that it is a privilege and not a right is that a pharmacist license can be revoked by the authority that granted it.

A person who can't complete the training or get approved for a license or find a job at a drugstore, can always find another way to make a living and try again to become a pharmacist later.

But a woman who is barred from emergency contraception (Plan B) has her options taken away from her. She is now forced to either undergo a pregnancy or an abortion, both of which carry higher risks and greater costs.

Maybe pharmacists who refuse to prescribe the morning after pill should be forced to contribute a percentage of their salaries to cover the costs to insurance companies within their state for abortions and births, and to contribute to a statewide child support fund. Since they're so eager to see these kids get born, let them help pay for their upkeep.

In order to become a pharmacists you have to be licensed. In order to open a pharmacy you have to be licensed as well. When you agree to get yoru license you agree to certain rules. One of those rules is that you have to make any perscription or OTC drug currently ok'd by the FDA available to anyone who wants it provided they either have a prescription or if the drug does not require it. Your morals are not at issue. If you do not believe in giving people the morning after pill, which by the way is different than thr abortion pill, then don't sign the licensing agreement. Of course, this means you cannot be a pharmacist, but that's the breaks. This is entirely different than getting yoru medical license, of course. I wouldn't want to live in a country where podiatrists were forced by their license agreement to perform open heart surgery if someone asks.

It's wrong when they do it, but hey, it's ok for you.
A pharmacist is invested with special GOVERNMENT power. It is not his own power to use as he pleases to punish people who believe in non-pharmacist approved lifestyles. How people wish to live their lives is not for him to decide. It is certainly not for him to refuse his end of the statutory bargain in the interests of forcing his unwelcome religious beliefs on other people. If that responsability is too much for a person, or they're too petty to let other people live their lives with the aid of expert medical advice, then being a pharmasist is too much for them. They don't have to live up to their obligations as a pharmacist, but if they can't, they can't be a pharmacist.

It's wrong when they do it, and because it's so wrong, they're not capable of being pharmacists. They've violated the public trust improperly invested in them by a bureaucracy. All anyone one calling for the heads of these ass-clowns is doing, is insisting that the improperly invested trust be revoked upon violation. Just like what happens in every other aspect of life.

but if you make it that easy then people will start using it as a form of contriceptives when it is more important to plan ahead and use condums


After a round or two of the side effects(because of the high dose of hormones), most people would look into other methods pretty quickly.

so? It took me 3 weeks to find a urologist who would do a vasectomy for my husband, because they were all catholic and didn't believe in it, should they be forced to do vasectomies? I mean it's thier job........
they should. do your job. dont let your beliefs inferfere with your business of doing things for other people. if doing vasectomies is against what you believe, dont go into a profession where vasectomies are part of your job. if youre against the morning after pill, which by the way, isnt an abortion, from what i understand it tells your body 'hey, youre already pregnant' so that if by chance your unprotected egg gets close with an unprotected sperm, its like, 'hold up, we have to leave, the oven's already full', so you dont get pregnant, then dont become a pharmacist where part of the job is filling peoples perscriptions, whether theyre the morning after pill or epilepsy medicine.
i understand the morning after pill could be viewed as being not careful, but what if they were using a condom and it broke? they were being careful but they want to be extra careful now because their first line of careful was not as reliable as they thought it would have been.

Do pharmacists take any sort of oath similar to the Hypocratic?

If so, any pharmacist who refuses to administer the medicine that a doctor has ordered for the patient should have their license revoked and possibly serve jail time for criminal negligence.

well, it is their job....

I totally agree with Dinaverg. They knew what they were doing when they were in college for years getting their degrees. Filling prescriptions is *what you do* as a pharmacist. I'm vegetarian, but when I worked at McDonald's, could I refuse people their burgers? Hell no! Similarly, it's not a pharmacist's job to get moral on people. It's their job to fill orders. Period. If they don't like it, they should do something else.

Do pharmacists take any sort of oath similar to the Hypocratic?

If so, any pharmacist who refuses to administer the medicine that a doctor has ordered for the patient should have their license revoked and possibly serve jail time for criminal negligence.
I don't know about an oath, but it is my understanding that pharmacists' responsibilities and obligations are laid out very clearly in the licenses they apply for, which can be revoked if the pharmacist violates any of their requirements. Also, because prescription meds are controlled substances, it is possible for a violation of a pharmacist's license to also be a criminal offense. Likewise because medicines may affect a human being's health/life. So, if a pharmacist knowingly fills forged prescriptions, that pharmacist may be charged with illegal drug trafficking. Similarly, if a pharmacist withholds medication for a non-approved reason (approved = contraindication; non-approved = because my pastor said so), and the patient suffers injury or death as a result, that pharmacist could be facing civil damages and/or a manslaughter charge.

It's right here:

"VI. A pharmacist respects the values and abilities of colleagues and other health professionals.

When appropriate, a pharmacist asks for the consultation of colleagues or other health professionals or refers the patient. A pharmacist acknowledges that colleagues and other health professionals may differ in the beliefs and values they apply to the care of the patient."

http://www.aphanet.org/AM/Template.cfm?Section=Pharmacy_Practice_Resources&Template=/CM/HTMLDisplay.cfm&ContentID=2903

The holes in this are pretty big, I admit, and I'm not sure how binding these oaths are legally. But I'd think a pharmicist acknowledging that his beliefs are different from other health professionals would make him realize that he's not going to agree with every prescription he fills. Sadly, Common Sense isn't always law.

In the meantime, show your support for this:
http://www.iwhc.org/resources/congress/alpha.cfm

It will make all the stupidness go away.

You have this backwards on several points.

1. Pharmacists do not carry prescriptions. Let's get our terms right. Prescriptions are orders for medications issued by doctors. Pharmacies/drugstores carry medicines. Pharmacists are trained and licensed professionals who dispense medicines. Their primary function is safety -- they make sure that the prescribed medicine doesn't conflict with other medicines (especially important when a patient is seeing more than one doctor), and they make sure that the prescriptions are not forgeries.

Because pharmacists are involved with the safe use of restricted chemical substances, their licenses are controlled by both federal and local governments, which DO have the power to decide who gets to be a pharmacist and how they must do their jobs. This is because it is the job of government to maintain safety standards to the public -- which includes standards of medicines used by individual members of the public.

Yes, I should have said "fulfill prescriptions." These licenses should be there to insure that the pharmacists are trained well and fully qualified to safely dispense medication. It should not be to control what they are forced to stock and sell.

2. Because it is the government's job to issue pharmacist licenses and to set standards for issuing such licenses, the state has the power to set whatever standards it sees fit. If a state requires all pharmacies/drugstores to carry Drug X or lose their license to run an actual pharmacy -- i.e. employ licensed pharmacists and dispense controlled drugs -- then tough shit on any owner of such a business who doesn't like Drug X. Their only option is to relocate to another state or to seek an exception to that rule for businesses that cater exclusively to customers who object to Drug X. Obviously, segregating themselves that way would limit their business base, but what's more important to them -- principle or profit? They can't have both.

They should not be forced to choose between their livelihood, home, and morality.

3. Whether one approves of it or not, Plan B is a prescribed medication which a doctor deems necessary to the patient. This is medicine, health care, access to which is generally considered a civil and/or human right. Things which promote one's health, the continuation of one's physical life, and the continuation of one's personal sovereignty/liberty are NOT privileges. They are rights. For a third party to interrupt the doctor/patient relationship and deny the patient access to prescribed medicine because of their own, self-interested agenda is a violation of the patient's rights.

It is a privelege because it is not a universal application of rights. By guaranteeing that someone can receive Plan B, others must be denied the right to run their business as they choose.

4. No one has ever suffered nor will ever suffer significantly as a result of not becoming a pharmacist. Pharmacy is a profession that a person has to choose to enter, spend a lot of time and some money to get trained in, apply for a license for, and then look for a job in. It is a controlled and restricted profession that involves a public trust, and as such it is a privilege to be granted a license to do it. Proof that it is a privilege and not a right is that a pharmacist license can be revoked by the authority that granted it.

If government made no laws relating to pharmaceutical sales, would there be no right to be a pharmacist? In the absense of government, does one require a license to be a pharmacist?

The fact of the matter is that the government restricts a great deal of the population from being pharmacists, it doesn't grant people the benefit of being a pharmacist.

A person who can't complete the training or get approved for a license or find a job at a drugstore, can always find another way to make a living and try again to become a pharmacist later.

This is not about someone who isn't qualified, it is about someone who is forced to give up their livelihood because of moral convictions.

But a woman who is barred from emergency contraception (Plan B) has her options taken away from her. She is now forced to either undergo a pregnancy or an abortion, both of which carry higher risks and greater costs.

And the government is taking the options away from the pharmacist, by the threat of violence.

Maybe pharmacists who refuse to prescribe the morning after pill should be forced to contribute a percentage of their salaries to cover the costs to insurance companies within their state for abortions and births, and to contribute to a statewide child support fund. Since they're so eager to see these kids get born, let them help pay for their upkeep.

This is not a question of whether they are right, it is a question of whether they should be limited from professions because of their morals.

I suppose there is another thread on this somewhere, but I can't get the search function to work.

On the Daily Show, there was a story about Illinois creating a law that pharmacists were required to fill prescriptions for the morning-after pill.

I am for a woman's right to her body, but I cannot fathom how a woman's right to her body can extend from her body over a pharmaceutical counter and encompass the pharmacist.

Maybe I am being obtuse, but I strongly oppose this. What are your thoughts.

Are you also against the Civil Rights Act of 1964?

Yes, I should have said "fulfill prescriptions." These licenses should be there to insure that the pharmacists are trained well and fully qualified to safely dispense medication. It should not be to control what they are forced to stock and sell.

They should not be forced to choose between their livelihood, home, and morality.

It is a privelege because it is not a universal application of rights. By guaranteeing that someone can receive Plan B, others must be denied the right to run their business as they choose.


If government made no laws relating to pharmaceutical sales, would there be no right to be a pharmacist? In the absense of government, does one require a license to be a pharmacist?

The fact of the matter is that the government restricts a great deal of the population from being pharmacists, it doesn't grant people the benefit of being a pharmacist.

This is not about someone who isn't qualified, it is about someone who is forced to give up their livelihood because of moral convictions.

And the government is taking the options away from the pharmacist, by the threat of violence.

This is not a question of whether they are right, it is a question of whether they should be limited from professions because of their morals.

If someone is unwiling to fulfill the basic purpose of their profession -- fill prescriptions -- then they have chosen not to be pharmacists.

May a phamacist refuse to fulfill a prescription for a black person because they have a moral objection to serving blacks?

Are you also against the Civil Rights Act of 1964?

Which part?

so? It took me 3 weeks to find a urologist who would do a vasectomy for my husband, because they were all catholic and didn't believe in it, should they be forced to do vasectomies? I mean it's thier job........

Why would people get a job in which they would need to do something they did not want to do?

If someone is unwiling to fulfill the basic purpose of their profession -- fill prescriptions -- then they have chosen not to be pharmacists.

This pharmacist is perfectly qualified to fill prescriptions.

May a phamacist refuse to fulfill a prescription for a black person because they have a moral objection to serving blacks?

I feel a private business should be allowed to freely choose who they do business with. With that said, there is huge difference between not serving someone because of a prejudice against their race, and not serving someone because you are afraid you are facilitating murder.

Which part?
The Cat-Tribe's point is that the Civil Rights Act of 1964 basically closed the discrimination loophole, and the religious right is trying to reopen it with this bullshit. The law says you can't discriminate against people based on religion, creed, sex or race (and ought to include sexual orientation, but it doesn't)--it doesn't say, "unless your church says it's okay to do so," because then anyone who wanted to discriminate would still have an out. These so-called "christians" are looking for that out, for that ability to discriminate, and by extension, impose their belief systems on anyone they feel isn't living up to their personal code of conduct.

Which part?

The part making discrimination in public accomodations/businesses illegal.

This pharmacist is perfectly qualified to fill prescriptions.

I can be "fully qualified" to practice law, but not allowed to practice law unless I agree to abide by the applicable rules -- including rules of ethics.

Your pharmacist won't do the job as defined. Tough shit.


I feel a private business should be allowed to freely choose who they do business with. With that said, there is huge difference between not serving someone because of a prejudice against their race, and not serving someone because you are afraid you are facilitating murder.

And the difference is that you say so? What about the individual belief of the pharmacist that may think the former is worse than the latter?

But, to the extent you didn't duck the question, you are admitting that you think public businesses -- even those licensed by the state -- can discriminate. That takes us to the segregation days.

Public businesses are the recipients of public benefits of nterstate commmerce and as such have a reciprocal duty to serve non-discriminately.

The Cat-Tribe's point is that the Civil Rights Act of 1964 basically closed the discrimination loophole, and the religious right is trying to reopen it with this bullshit. The law says you can't discriminate against people based on religion, creed, sex or race (and ought to include sexual orientation, but it doesn't)--it doesn't say, "unless your church says it's okay to do so," because then anyone who wanted to discriminate would still have an out. These so-called "christians" are looking for that out, for that ability to discriminate, and by extension, impose their belief systems on anyone they feel isn't living up to their personal code of conduct.

This man is not discriminating against women, he is choosing to not provide something that he feels facilitates murder.

The part making discrimination in public accomodations/businesses illegal.

The government has a responsibility to all people, private individuals do not.

This man is not discriminating against women, he is choosing to not provide something that he feels facilitates murder.

According to his point of view. Not according to mine. Why does his view trump that of the majority?

This man is not discriminating against women, he is choosing to not provide something that he feels facilitates murder.
Yeah he is. He's discriminating against any woman who doesn't share his personal religious beliefs about birth control. You can try to spin it however you like, but when your actions affect another and violate their ability to, in this case, make their own reproductive choices, you are discriminating against them and are imposing your personal religious beliefs on them.

EDIT: Let me add this piece--just because the pharmacist may personally feel it facilitates murder doesn't make it so. The drug is considered safe for that usage by the federal government. It violates no statute concerning the death of another human being. Therefore, in the eyes of the law, which are the only eyes that count in this case, it is not murder, no matter how strongly the pharmacist feels about it. He has no case.

The government has a responsibility to all people, private individuals do not.

Public businesses are not wholly private enterprises. If they participate in interstate commerce, they are operating in the public sphere.

I'd have to agree with VO2. The government shouldn't force that on businesses; if a company wants to put that stipulation in to their company policy, all the more power to them.

However, if a pharmacy doesn't want their pharmacists to disperse that medication as part of company policy, they should have every right to not sell it in their stores. If they were to make a law, it should stipulate that the requirement only applies to places that already willingly sell the medication; they shouldn't force companies that don't want to to sell it. If they force companies to carry medication they feel is morally wrong, it seems like they are violating the right to religious freedom.

Ultimately, it should be the decision of the companies and not the government.

Public businesses are not wholly private enterprises. If they participate in interstate commerce, they are operating in the public sphere.
And in this case, we're not even talking about having to deal with federal law--this is a state that's making this choice.

I'd have to agree with VO2. The government shouldn't force that on businesses; if a company wants to put that stipulation in to their company policy, all the more power to them.

However, if a pharmacy doesn't want their pharmacists to disperse that medication as part of company policy, they should have every right to not sell it in their stores. If they were to make a law, it should stipulate that the requirement only applies to places that already willingly sell the medication; they shouldn't force companies that don't want to to sell it. If they force companies to carry medication they feel is morally wrong, it seems like they are violating the right to religious freedom.

Ultimately, it should be the decision of the companies and not the government.

So the same should be true if the company feels it is morally wrong to serve blacks or Jews?

Don't businesses receive all sorts of benefits from government in exchange for having to abide by such laws?

I wonder:

If a pharmacist accepts the written prescription, refuses to fill it not because of drug interactions but moral reasons, refuses to refer the patient, and refuses to return the doctor's written order so that the patient can go elsewhere, would this not, in fact, be theft?

The problem I have with refusal on moral reasons is that the pharmacist is not responsible for the doctor's decision and the patient's choice; unless there is a drug interaction possible s/he has no business actively interfering in the right of the patient to get basic healthcare.

In cases where Plan B is indicated, time is of the essence. Delaying a patient's access to healthcare indicated by her doctor is, in fact, doing harm -- emotionally and possibly physically. Realizing that you need this prescription is stressful enough -- being jerked around because someone else feels that you've made your bed and should lie in it is horrendous.

Public businesses are not wholly private enterprises. If they participate in interstate commerce, they are operating in the public sphere.

They are private until the public comes to them.

According to his point of view. Not according to mine. Why does his view trump that of the majority?

Because the majority is not qualified to speak for or determine the correct morality of the individual.

They are private until the public comes to them.



Because the majority is not qualified to speak for or determine the correct morality of the individual.

Yet you are saying that he has the right to determine the morality of others.

If it is against your religious belief to distribute certain medications, then you have a simple choice: do not become a pharmacist.

If it were against my religious belief to extinguish fire (the holiest of holy sacred elements to my people)... do you think I would become a fire-fighter?

If you take the job, do the job.

so? It took me 3 weeks to find a urologist who would do a vasectomy for my husband, because they were all catholic and didn't believe in it, should they be forced to do vasectomies? I mean it's thier job........

Yes, they should. See above.

No one forced them to become urologists, and it's not as if they should have been surprised at the sort of things a urologist is expected to do. They have every right to refuse a procedure because they think it is dangerous, or not in the best medical interests of the patient, but their professional rights (and responsibilities) end there.

Yeah he is. He's discriminating against any woman who doesn't share his personal religious beliefs about birth control. You can try to spin it however you like, but when your actions affect another and violate their ability to, in this case, make their own reproductive choices, you are discriminating against them and are imposing your personal religious beliefs on them.

He will not dispense this to anyone, no matter what their gender, race, religion, or moral beliefs.

And you can spin it anyway you like, but when you force a private individual to act against his own morality, you are enforcing your morals on him.

EDIT: Let me add this piece--just because the pharmacist may personally feel it facilitates murder doesn't make it so. The drug is considered safe for that usage by the federal government. It violates no statute concerning the death of another human being. Therefore, in the eyes of the law, which are the only eyes that count in this case, it is not murder, no matter how strongly the pharmacist feels about it. He has no case.

You are advocating forced agreement with the state. Because the state says that Plan B is not murder, the pharmacist has no right to disagree.

He will not dispense this to anyone, no matter what their gender, race, religion, or moral beliefs.

And you can spin it anyway you like, but when you force a private individual to act against his own morality, you are enforcing your morals on him.



You are advocating forced agreement with the state. Because the state says that Plan B is not murder, the pharmacist has no right to disagree.

Meh.

Almost all laws can be said to force agreement with the state. That dog won't hunt.

It pays pretty well.. sometimes 70k+ per year.. I know a vegetarian who drives a meat truck.. money motivates. :p

Sure. But if you're going to sell out, you need to understand that you are selling out. You don't get to say, "I'll take the money, but I won't do the job."

It would be like your vegetarian friend deciding that he/she will ship any meat except for pork.

Yet you are saying that he has the right to determine the morality of others.

He does nothing to determine the morality of others. He does not force them to proceed with the pregnancy, he does not force them to accept that Plan B is immoral, he does not stop them from going somewhere else.

This is a situation where someone goes to the pharmacist asking him to accept their morality, and he should be well within his rights to refuse to accept it.

He will not dispense this to anyone, no matter what their gender, race, religion, or moral beliefs.

And you can spin it anyway you like, but when you force a private individual to act against his own morality, you are enforcing your morals on him.



You are advocating forced agreement with the state. Because the state says that Plan B is not murder, the pharmacist has no right to disagree.
I'm starting to think you're being deliberately obtuse on this, so I'll be as blunt as I can be.

The pharmacist's religious beliefs are trumped by the patient's right to get the medication prescribed her by the doctor. And while the pharmacist may disagree with the state as to the definition of murder, he has no right to impose his personal definition on anyone else--period, end of story. The only definition that matters is the legal one, because only the law can convict someone of a crime and impose punishment.

One's job should not be determined by the government, nor should you be limited from a profession based on your morality.

Fine. Again, my religious beliefs prohibit my extinguishing fires. Indeed, I believe that it is immoral to interfere with the wrath of the fire god in any way. If someone dies in a fire, it is because old Scorchy wanted them to. Therefore, I cannot morally rescue anyone from a fire, either.

But, I guess I should be able to hold down a job as a firefighter, cashing my checks but doing... nothing...

More realistically, some religious nuts believe that all modern medicine is immoral. Should they nevertheless make it through medical school, should states license them as doctors? They could still make a pretty decent living providing routine check-ups while prescribing orange juice and bed rest....

Meh.

Almost all laws can be said to force agreement with the state. That dog won't hunt.

So when euthenasia is made legal with consent, all doctors should automatically accept that euthanasia not murder and morally acceptable?

When a government endorses a state religion, all other religions should accept that the government has made the right decision on what is the correct religion to worship?

'How dare the government make a moral decision over you!? Your'e supposed to be making a moral decision over the woman!!'

I never said that a pharmacist couldn't be fired for not performing his job. I would imagine that any CVS pharmacist that denied the morning-after pill would be reprimanded or fired, and I wouldn't have a problem with that either.

Ah, but you also have independent pharmacists... and I say, if they refuse medication for moral/religious reasons, they should lose their licenses. (Also, sometimes even corporate pharmacies refuse the morning after pill... Isn't there a case right now where Wal-Mart's in some state refuse it, and they've been sued? Am I hallucinating?)

I'm starting to think you're being deliberately obtuse on this, so I'll be as blunt as I can be.

The pharmacist's religious beliefs are trumped by the patient's right to get the medication prescribed her by the doctor. And while the pharmacist may disagree with the state as to the definition of murder, he has no right to impose his personal definition on anyone else--period, end of story. The only definition that matters is the legal one, because only the law can convict someone of a crime and impose punishment.

Explain to me how someone could actually impose his definition of morality by not interacting. Am I violating your right to free speech by ignoring you?

And can someone not apply more stringent restrictions to their own behavior than government applies?

So when euthenasia is made legal with consent, all doctors should automatically accept that euthanasia not murder and morally acceptable?

When a government endorses a state religion, all other religions should accept that the government has made the right decision on what is the correct religion to worship?

Useless hyperbole. You know the second scenario violates the First Amendment, so it is a non sequitor.

Again, almost all laws may be said to impose the majority's morals on individuals.

What if I have a moral objection to driving on the right side of the road? How dare you impose your view upon me?

[1.] Yes, I should have said "fulfill prescriptions." These licenses should be there to insure that the pharmacists are trained well and fully qualified to safely dispense medication. It should not be to control what they are forced to stock and sell.



[2.] They should not be forced to choose between their livelihood, home, and morality.



[3.] It is a privelege because it is not a universal application of rights. By guaranteeing that someone can receive Plan B, others must be denied the right to run their business as they choose.



[4.] If government made no laws relating to pharmaceutical sales, would there be no right to be a pharmacist? In the absense of government, does one require a license to be a pharmacist?

The fact of the matter is that the government restricts a great deal of the population from being pharmacists, it doesn't grant people the benefit of being a pharmacist.



[5.] This is not about someone who isn't qualified, it is about someone who is forced to give up their livelihood because of moral convictions.



[6.] And the government is taking the options away from the pharmacist, by the threat of violence.



[7.] This is not a question of whether they are right, it is a question of whether they should be limited from professions because of their morals.
1. Wrong. Pharmacies and pharmacists are licensed by public authorities. Those public authorities have the right to set whatever standards they see fit for giving out those licenses. If the state demands that a licensee do something in order to get/keep the license, then the licensee must do that something or else seek to get a license and work in a state with different requirments.

And what about moralist-pharmacists who do not own their own businesses but work for larger companies like CVS or Walgreen's (probably the majority of American pharmacists)? In that case, the company decides what they will stock. Does the pharmacist-employee have the right to refuse to dispense medicines against the policies of their employer? If they do that, does the employer not have a right to fire them for refusing to do their job?

2. Wrong again. The fact that pharmacist is a licensed profession means that pharmacists must accept certain obligations whether they like them or not. If they can't do that, then they can't be licensed to be a pharmacist.

3. You are arguing that access to health care and medicine is not more important to an individual's life than making business decisions? Are you actually trying elevate being a pharmacist at Walgreen's to the same level of human/civil right as getting adequate health care and maintaining personal sovereignty in the control over one's own body? If you can't be a pharmacist, you can get another job. But if I can't get my properly prescribed morning after pill within the required time, I am FORCED to have an abortion -- and all just because you think you have a right to get your way at my expense?

4. Please don't waste our time with fantasy scenarios. This is happening in the US. The US does have government (for what it's worth), and government does control licensing of pharmacists. Would you like to know why? It's because, in days of yore, anybody could claim to make medicines, many did, and many others died as a result -- of poisoning. In fact, in the days of way-yore, there was not much functional difference between an "apothecary" and a professional poisoner. People would go to the same person for both services.

5. A person who refuses to do a job is, by definition, not doing that job. A pharmacist who is required to dispense all properly prescribed medications but refuses to do so, is not functioning as a pharmacist and, therefore, has already given up his job. He will realize that as soon as he no longer has enough customers to keep him in business, if he owns his own shop, or as soon as his employer fires him. The revocation of his license would be little more than the completion of the process he himself started.

6. Who brought violence into this?

7. No, it's a question of whether they have a right to impose their morals on other people. You ask if the pharmacist should be forced to go against his morals. I ask if society should be denied medical services because of a pharmacist's personal beliefs. The pharmacist, by applying for and receiving a license from a public authority, is agreeing to abide by the requirements of the society represented by that authority. He does not get to pick and choose which of those requirements he feels like fulfilling. If society's morals don't coincide with his, that's just tough luck for him. If he can't compromise on his moral issues, then he must give up the job.

Fine. Again, my religious beliefs prohibit my extinguishing fires. Indeed, I believe that it is immoral to interfere with the wrath of the fire god in any way. If someone dies in a fire, it is because old Scorchy wanted them to. Therefore, I cannot morally rescue anyone from a fire, either.

This pharmacist is not opposed to medicine, he is opposed to the morning-after pill. If his job were to specifically supply the morning-after pill, I think he would be unqualified, but he probably wouldn't want the job anyway.

But, I guess I should be able to hold down a job as a firefighter, cashing my checks but doing... nothing...

He is not cashing any checks for supplying the morning-after pill.

More realistically, some religious nuts believe that all modern medicine is immoral. Should they nevertheless make it through medical school, should states license them as doctors? They could still make a pretty decent living providing routine check-ups while prescribing orange juice and bed rest....

No they wouldn't, unless they found a large group of people who agreed with their moral objections.

I am just saying that the pharmacist offers a service of his choosing to the public. He has the right to offer whatever service he wants to the public.

Sure, he can offer. But the public, in the form of public licenses, has every right to decide the terms under which we accept the offer. We have every right to say, "All right, you can sell medications, but you have to abide by certain rules." If those rules, e.g. the requirement that you stock certain common drugs and refuse a sale only for medical reasons, are not acceptable, then you can find some other "service of your choosing" to offer to the public. We're not buying your religious beliefs, we're buying your drugs.

Explain to me how someone could actually impose his definition of morality by not interacting. Am I violating your right to free speech by ignoring you?

And can someone not apply more stringent restrictions to their own behavior than government applies?
Let's see here. Your doctor gives you a prescription. You give it to the pharmacist. The pharmacist refuses to fill your prescription for bullshit personal reasons, and you're in a position where this pharmacist is the only game in town. His refusal has now acted as an imposition on your ability to get your medicine.

And your second question is bullshit because it doesn't imply. Nobody is asking this guy to be less stringent in his personal beliefs--but his personal beliefs mean exactly the square-root of jack-fuck-all as far as the question of murder is concerned. The only definition of murder that matters here is the state's, because the state is the only one who can define murder so that it is a crime. The pharmacist, by refusing to fill the prescription is imposing his more stringent personal definition of murder on the patient, and that is not allowable.

Now you've been smacked around on this topic multiple times and you keep reiterating the same, tired arguments. You're bordering on trollhood.

Useless hyperbole. You know the second scenario violates the First Amendment, so it is a non sequitor.

Yes because all nations have First Amendments prohibiting endorsement of religion, and our constitution cannot be amended. The Eighteenth Amendment stops me from from purchasing alcohol, correct?

And you honestly think that the legalisation of euthanasia is hyperbole?

Sure, he can offer. But the public, in the form of public licenses, has every right to decide the terms under which we accept the offer. We have every right to say, "All right, you can sell medications, but you have to abide by certain rules." If those rules, e.g. the requirement that you stock certain common drugs and refuse a sale only for medical reasons, are not acceptable, then you can find some other "service of your choosing" to offer to the public. We're not buying your religious beliefs, we're buying your drugs.

Exactically!

If you are the owner of the pharmacy, and the state license requirements does not stipulate that you must carry all (or have a means of obtaining ‘all’ possible prescriptions) to maintain your license, then you most certainly should have the right to stipulate the products and services you will provide in your own store.

True, but most states do have requirements that pharmacies stock "common" prescriptions, which makes for legal ambiguity, but has essentially been interpreted by the courts to mean that if it treats a common condition, or physicians have a reasonable expectation to believe that pharmacies should carry it, then pharmacies must, in fact, carry it.

Generally speaking, it seems that these criteria apply to the morning-after pill.

Ironically, it is relatively easy for pharmacists to "get away with" refusing prescriptions of all kinds, because the law is equally ambiguous in terms of the pharmacist's right to make a medical determination. Contrary to popular belief, pharmacists are not only allowed to refuse a prescription for drug-interaction concerns, but also if they believe that a customer is not healthy enough to withstand a medication's side-effects (maybe she looks 'pale' or 'too thin'). Pharmacists rarely invoke this right (perhaps some of them do not even realize they have it), but it would be easy enough for them to claim that they are refusing the morning-after pill, in individual instances, for medical reasons. It always surprises me that they would prefer to be controversial.

Yes because all nations have First Amendments prohibiting endorsement of religion, and our constitution cannot be amended. The Eighteenth Amendment stops me from from purchasing alcohol, correct?

And you honestly think that the legalisation of euthanasia is hyperbole?

Come now, have you really gotten this desperate in the argument?

How about sticking to the topic at hand? Or answering any of my examples?

Can I drive on whichever side of the road I choose?

Can I refuse to provide medicine to blacks and Jews?

I would say that this pharmacist picked the profession long before this became a law, considering the law is a year old.

It does not change the fact that they understood themselves to be bound by legal requirements (in ways that many other professions are not). If the law changes, they do have a choice: obey the law, or find a new job.

The government has a responsibility to all people, private individuals do not.
A pharmacist, by accepting a license from a public authority, is not an entirely private person anymore -- the same way a doctor, lawyer, judge or cop is not a private citizen when at work. Cops don't get to pick what laws they will enforce. A cop may believe pot should be legal, but it isn't, so he must arrest the dealer. A lawyer may feel that his client is a scumbag but he is bound by professional ethics and his license to defend his client's interests, and he must do that or lose his license to practice law. Same with the pharmacist. By taking a license, he agrees to serve the public interest, regardless of whether it disagrees with his morals.

So when euthenasia is made legal with consent, all doctors should automatically accept that euthanasia not murder and morally acceptable?

If euthanasia were made legal and my doctor prescribed me pills in order to carry it out, I'd fully expect the pharmacist to fill out the prescription.

I think the law is fair. It might go aginst their own beliefs, but with any jobs their are negitive and positive factors. Its not their job to push their on other people anyways. They can be aginst it, but its their duty. What if a doctor refused to admit a black man to his hospital becasue he was a racist. If they dont want to compremise their convictions then they are in the wrong feild.

True, but most states do have requirements that pharmacies stock "common" prescriptions, which makes for legal ambiguity, but has essentially been interpreted by the courts to mean that if it treats a common condition, or physicians have a reasonable expectation to believe that pharmacies should carry it, then pharmacies must, in fact, carry it.

Generally speaking, it seems that these criteria apply to the morning-after pill.

Ironically, it is relatively easy for pharmacists to "get away with" refusing prescriptions of all kinds, because the law is equally ambiguous in terms of the pharmacist's right to make a medical determination. Contrary to popular belief, pharmacists are not only allowed to refuse a prescription for drug-interaction concerns, but also if they believe that a customer is not healthy enough to withstand a medication's side-effects (maybe she looks 'pale' or 'too thin'). Pharmacists rarely invoke this right (perhaps some of them do not even realize they have it), but it would be easy enough for them to claim that they are refusing the morning-after pill, in individual instances, for medical reasons. It always surprises me that they would prefer to be controversial.
They prefer to be controversial because controversy is the point of the exercise for them. In real terms, this is just another front in the campaign against women's reproductive rights. That's why all the controversial cases are about pharmacists taking jobs with major companies, then refusing to do their jobs, getting fired and suing the companies. If they really just wanted to live their own lives in peace, they would be trying to open fundamentalist-only pharmacy companies of their own so they would never have this problem.

1. Wrong. Pharmacies and pharmacists are licensed by public authorities. Those public authorities have the right to set whatever standards they see fit for giving out those licenses. If the state demands that a licensee do something in order to get/keep the license, then the licensee must do that something or else seek to get a license and work in a state with different requirments.

And what about moralist-pharmacists who do not own their own businesses but work for larger companies like CVS or Walgreen's (probably the majority of American pharmacists)? In that case, the company decides what they will stock. Does the pharmacist-employee have the right to refuse to dispense medicines against the policies of their employer? If they do that, does the employer not have a right to fire them for refusing to do their job?

My post assumed that public authorities have the right to issue licenses that carry requirements. My contention is whether they are justified in issueing this requirement.

The employer can fire the pharmacist for much the same reason that the pharmacist can choose not to serve the medication.

2. Wrong again. The fact that pharmacist is a licensed profession means that pharmacists must accept certain obligations whether they like them or not. If they can't do that, then they can't be licensed to be a pharmacist.

Once again, I am not questioning the licensing, I am question whether it goes too far.

3. You are arguing that access to health care and medicine is not more important to an individual's life than making business decisions? Are you actually trying elevate being a pharmacist at Walgreen's to the same level of human/civil right as getting adequate health care and maintaining personal sovereignty in the control over one's own body? If you can't be a pharmacist, you can get another job. But if I can't get my properly prescribed morning after pill within the required time, I am FORCED to have an abortion -- and all just because you think you have a right to get your way at my expense?

The pharmacist deserves the same soveriegnty as the customer. The pharmacist is not forcing you to have an abortion, biology and your decision to not have the child is forcing you to have an abortion. The pharmacist simply chose not to help.

4. Please don't waste our time with fantasy scenarios. This is happening in the US. The US does have government (for what it's worth), and government does control licensing of pharmacists. Would you like to know why? It's because, in days of yore, anybody could claim to make medicines, many did, and many others died as a result -- of poisoning. In fact, in the days of way-yore, there was not much functional difference between an "apothecary" and a professional poisoner. People would go to the same person for both services.

Please don't dodge the question. You said that being a pharmacist was a privilege not a right. So tell me, can you be a pharmacist in the absense of government?

Actually, nevermind, you admitted that people could be pharmacists without government intervention (with dire consequenses), so obviously being a pharmacist is not a privilege granted by government.

5. A person who refuses to do a job is, by definition, not doing that job. A pharmacist who is required to dispense all properly prescribed medications but refuses to do so, is not functioning as a pharmacist and, therefore, has already given up his job. He will realize that as soon as he no longer has enough customers to keep him in business, if he owns his own shop, or as soon as his employer fires him. The revocation of his license would be little more than the completion of the process he himself started.

The pharmacist never accepted payment or responsibility for handling this prescription, therefore he is not required to do the job.

6. Who brought violence into this?

The government, upon anyone who operates as a pharmacist without their consent.

7. No, it's a question of whether they have a right to impose their morals on other people. You ask if the pharmacist should be forced to go against his morals. I ask if society should be denied medical services because of a pharmacist's personal beliefs.

Is the pharmacist forcing the customer to go through with the pregnancy or not use the Plan B pill?

The pharmacist, by applying for and receiving a license from a public authority, is agreeing to abide by the requirements of the society represented by that authority. He does not get to pick and choose which of those requirements he feels like fulfilling. If society's morals don't coincide with his, that's just tough luck for him. If he can't compromise on his moral issues, then he must give up the job.

And it is societies duty not impose unjustly upon him.

I don't know why I have to keep saying it, but I do not question whether he should have requirements. I am questioning whether this is a justified requirement.

Don't businesses receive all sorts of benefits from government in exchange for having to abide by such laws?

Yeah. So, if a company recieves these benefits, they aren't allowed to restrict the sale of these drugs to people as long as they continue to recieve those benefits.

A pharmacist's job is very simple: read the prescription that a doctor has deemed necessary, take the bottle or packet off the shelf, make sure it won't interact with other medications the patient is taking, stick it into a bag, and hand it to the patient.

Would you deem it ok if a pharmacist refused to fill a prescription for insulin on the basis that he didn't believe in it?

Particularly in the case of the morning-after pill -- time is of the essence, and it usually prescribed because a primary method of contraception has failed. To delay increases the chance of an unwanted pregnancy -- or an abortion.
I would absolutely deem it OK. If you must depend on someone else to supply something, you have no right to demand it. If the market won't support his actions, he'll go out of business soon enough. If people want it, someone will supply it, but we shouldn't be able to force anyone to, even a pharmacist!

not to sidestep the issue but doctors who prescribe the morning after pill should keep it in their office so they can give it right to the patient. she can take it in the office or (since i hear it makes you rather sick) go right home and take it. no need to waste time waiting an hour at walgreens to get it filled.

Should physicians also keep every other medication in their offices to prescribe as necessary? Should they be required to have the expertise and qualifications of the pharmacist on top of all their other training?

Believe it or not, pharmacy and medicine have developed into separate and distinct disciplines for good reason, and states continue to license them as such for the protection of consumers.

A pharmacist's job is very simple: read the prescription that a doctor has deemed necessary, take the bottle or packet off the shelf, make sure it won't interact with other medications the patient is taking, stick it into a bag, and hand it to the patient.

Would you deem it ok if a pharmacist refused to fill a prescription for insulin on the basis that he didn't believe in it?

Particularly in the case of the morning-after pill -- time is of the essence, and it usually prescribed because a primary method of contraception has failed. To delay increases the chance of an unwanted pregnancy -- or an abortion.I would absolutely deem it OK. If you must depend on someone else to supply something, you have no right to demand it. If the market won't support his actions, he'll go out of business soon enough. If people want it, someone will supply it, but we shouldn't be able to force anyone to, even a pharmacist!

Thank you for demonstrating the absurdity of your position.

Come now, have you really gotten this desperate in the argument?

How about sticking to the topic at hand? Or answering any of my examples?

You said that laws are often forced agreement with the state. Because the state says that Plan B is not murder, the pharmacist has no basis for disagreement (actually Nazz said it but you interjected). I then countered and asked if, were euthanasia to be deemed to not be murder, should all doctors be forced to accept the government's opinion? If you say yes, your logic holds steady, but you are stating that doctors should be forced to carry out euthanasia, if you say no your logic is contradictory. It is a valid test of you logical deduction of this issue.

Can I drive on whichever side of the road I choose?

You build and maintain your own roads, and you can drive right down the middle.

Can I refuse to provide medicine to blacks and Jews?

I feel a private business should be allowed to freely choose who they do business with.

If government made no laws relating to pharmaceutical sales, would there be no right to be a pharmacist? In the absense of government, does one require a license to be a pharmacist?

In the absence of government regulation, private licensing associations would almost certainly appear anyway. There are two main reasons that licensing has developed: 1) consumer protection; and 2) professional insulation.

1) Consumer protection: when consumers have to figure out for themselves whether a "doctor" or a "pharmacist" is really qualified to do the job, they run into all sorts of dangers from quacks and frauds. The market may be able to weed out some of them, but it is a lot more straightforward when governments and/or professional associations establish standards for who can call her/himself "doctor" or "pharmacist."

2) Professional insulation: legitimate doctors and pharmacists spend years in school, and most of them pay a lot of money for their degrees. On top of that, they generally have to keep themselves up to date with new procedures and medications, and maintain standards of conduct. For all this effort, they do not want to compete with every whackjob who wants to call her/himself "doctor" or "pharmacist," or who refuses to maintain the dignity of the profession: these losers make the rest of them look bad.

So, without government, would anyone be free to call themselves a "pharmacist"? Probably... but it wouldn't do them any good if they refused to abide by the requirements for licensing, anyway.

You said that laws are often forced agreement with the state. Because the state says that Plan B is not murder, the pharmacist has no basis for disagreement (actually Nazz said it but you interjected). I then countered and asked if, were euthanasia to be deemed to not be murder, should all doctors be forced to accept the government's opinion? If you say yes, your logic holds steady, but you are stating that doctors should be forced to carry out euthanasia, if you say no your logic is contradictory. It is a valid test of you logical deduction of this issue.

If euthanasia were made legal and my doctor prescribed me pills in order to carry it out, I'd fully expect the pharmacist to fill out the prescription.

You build and maintain your own roads, and you can drive right down the middle.

Do pharmacist build and maintain their own roads, electrical supply, police protection, etc.? No. They are not fully cut off from society and cannot act as if they were.

As for your belief that the pharmacist can also refuse to serve blacks and Jews because of his moral beliefs, you may be consistent, but you are sickening. Apparently we fought the Civil Rights battle for nothing.

Why would people get a job in which they would need to do something they did not want to do?

Exactly. That they have managed to become a professional pharmacist at all suggests that they are intelligent and motivated individuals. I am confident they can find something else to do that does not conflict with their morals.

A pacifist may believably want to be a police officer. He or she may even believe that patrolling the streets to discourage violence, helping people in need, or performing other police roles actually contributes to her/his moral belief in non-violence.

But when he/she reflects that if a fight breaks out or especially if an innocent person is attacked, he/she would be required as an officer of the law to protect people using violent coercion, he/she probably decides that being a police officer is not the right job for her/him.

Moreover, if the state determines that an officer who refuses to jump into the fray (or otherwise follow orders) because of her/his moral beliefs is not performing the job, we would not be likely to see this as an infringement of her/his rights.

Let's see here. Your doctor gives you a prescription. You give it to the pharmacist. The pharmacist refuses to fill your prescription for bullshit personal reasons, and you're in a position where this pharmacist is the only game in town. His refusal has now acted as an imposition on your ability to get your medicine.

"Bullshit personal reasons"? I am not a spiritual man in the least, but calling religious definitions of human life "bullshit personal reasons" shows a lack of respect for religious views.

How does not helping cause someone to impose on another? I cannot understand how refusal to oblige = imposition, while forced fulfillment of unwanted duties = tough shit.

And your second question is bullshit because it doesn't imply. Nobody is asking this guy to be less stringent in his personal beliefs--but his personal beliefs mean exactly the square-root of jack-fuck-all as far as the question of murder is concerned.

The legal definition of murder determines who is punished for murder, but it does not make universal definitions for all of society to follow. Should people not be allowed to think that the death penalty constitutes murder and protest accordingly?

The pharmacist, by refusing to fill the prescription is imposing his more stringent personal definition of murder on the patient, and that is not allowable.

Now you've been smacked around on this topic multiple times and you keep reiterating the same, tired arguments. You're bordering on trollhood.

Smacked around because there are 10 people who agree with you, and Vetalia who agrees with me. Mass agreement does not make one correct, especially considering the size of the sample.

I have only repeated the same things because everyone continues to make the same two points.

1. Government is allowed to impose restrictions upon pharmacists. (I never have denied this, and this argument is beside the point.)

2. The pharmacist is imposing for not accepting the customer's morality. Society is not imposing for forcing the pharmacist to accept the customer's morality.

He does nothing to determine the morality of others. He does not force them to proceed with the pregnancy, he does not force them to accept that Plan B is immoral, he does not stop them from going somewhere else.

Maybe... but what if you live in a very religious area, and all the pharmacies refuse to stock your prescription? Or even most, so that you must drive halfway across the state to get the medicine you need?

As the Supreme Court put it in deciding early discrimination cases, considering the "aggregate" of businesses "similarly situated," the government may regulate each individual business to avoid the generalized effect.

Think of Southern businesses telling blacks, "why should we have to serve you, when you can go elsewhere?" Where would that be, exactly... across the Mason-Dixon line?

So when euthenasia is made legal with consent, all doctors should automatically accept that euthanasia not murder and morally acceptable?

No, but they should do their job, or quit their job, depending on how strongly they hold their belief.

In the absence of government regulation, private licensing associations would almost certainly appear anyway. There are two main reasons that licensing has developed: 1) consumer protection; and 2) professional insulation.

1) Consumer protection: when consumers have to figure out for themselves whether a "doctor" or a "pharmacist" is really qualified to do the job, they run into all sorts of dangers from quacks and frauds. The market may be able to weed out some of them, but it is a lot more straightforward when governments and/or professional associations establish standards for who can call her/himself "doctor" or "pharmacist."

2) Professional insulation: legitimate doctors and pharmacists spend years in school, and most of them pay a lot of money for their degrees. On top of that, they generally have to keep themselves up to date with new procedures and medications, and maintain standards of conduct. For all this effort, they do not want to compete with every whackjob who wants to call her/himself "doctor" or "pharmacist," or who refuses to maintain the dignity of the profession: these losers make the rest of them look bad.

So, without government, would anyone be free to call themselves a "pharmacist"? Probably... but it wouldn't do them any good if they refused to abide by the requirements for licensing, anyway.

Completely agreed.

However, I was addressing his statement that the ability to be a pharmacist is a privelege granted by government. I stated that anyone has the right to be a pharmacist, but government restricts the right. I made my comments about government intervention to show that government is not at all necessary to become a pharmacist.

Completely agreed.

However, I was addressing his statement that the ability to be a pharmacist is a privelege granted by government. I stated that anyone has the right to be a pharmacist, but government restricts the right. I made my comments about government intervention to show that government is not at all necessary to become a pharmacist.

Meh.

So, I have a "right" to be a lawyer? Someone has a right to be a cop?

[1] My post assumed that public authorities have the right to issue licenses that carry requirements. My contention is whether they are justified in issueing this requirement.

The employer can fire the pharmacist for much the same reason that the pharmacist can choose not to serve the medication.



[2] Once again, I am not questioning the licensing, I am question whether it goes too far.



[3] The pharmacist deserves the same soveriegnty as the customer. The pharmacist is not forcing you to have an abortion, biology and your decision to not have the child is forcing you to have an abortion. The pharmacist simply chose not to help.



[4] Please don't dodge the question. You said that being a pharmacist was a privilege not a right. So tell me, can you be a pharmacist in the absense of government?

Actually, nevermind, you admitted that people could be pharmacists without government intervention (with dire consequenses), so obviously being a pharmacist is not a privilege granted by government.



[5] The pharmacist never accepted payment or responsibility for handling this prescription, therefore he is not required to do the job.



[6] The government, upon anyone who operates as a pharmacist without their consent.



[7] Is the pharmacist forcing the customer to go through with the pregnancy or not use the Plan B pill?



[8] And it is societies duty not impose unjustly upon him.

I don't know why I have to keep saying it, but I do not question whether he should have requirements. I am questioning whether this is a justified requirement.
1. And I stated clearly that the licensing authority is justified in setting any standard it deems necessary to fulfill the public interest it is responsible for.

2. By questioning whether the licensing requirement goes too far or is not justified, you are questioning the licensing. What you want a license to be is a piece of paper granting the pharmacist permission to do whatever he wants and define his job anyway he likes. Why would any state do that? What would be in it for them? Why would they have to issue licenses at all?

3. What the pharmacist stands to lose or suffer is in no way comparable to what the patient stands to lose or suffer. I'm sorry, but to say that the ability to define one's job description is equal in value/importance to the ability to control one's own body and medical care is simply ridiculous. And again, you are wrong. By refusing to fulfill a proper prescription for the morning after pill, the pharmacist would be forcing me to either have a baby or an abortion. If he had filled the prescription, neither would happen. (And re-read the thread, please; it has already been explained that Plan B is a form of contraceptive, not an abortifacient.) Quite frankly, your tone in that remark implies a certain hostility towards the woman seeking the prescription as well as a cold-blooded disregard for her welfare.

4. I didn't dodge the question at all. You cannot be a pharmacist in the US without being licensed by a governmental authority. The end. The given governmental authority dictates what it wants pharmacists to do. Your ability to be a pharmacist is entirely dependent on your obedience to those requirements. It is a privilege granted by the state and can be revoked by the state.

Let's take that same question from another angle -- from the retail end, the end where the actual doing of the job comes in. You have no right to take my money. You can open as many pharmacies as you like. You cannot force me to be your customer. So, if nobody uses your shop and you go out of business, have your rights been violated? No, they have not. Getting a license is a privilege granted by the state. Running a business is a privilege granted by the marketplace. Neither is a right.

5. Speciousness is a sign of a weak argument. The pharmacist gets paid to fill prescriptions. He does not get paid prescription by prescription. Any time he refuses to fill a prescription, he'd better have a damned good reason for it -- by which I mean one that falls within his proper job description and license requirements. Not because he didn't feel like doing it.

6. Nonsense. Are you now claiming the right to break the law without any consequence at all, and are you equating due process of law with violence? I assume you mean it in the sense of oppression. American pharmacists are not an oppressed group. Histrionics are another sign of a weak argument.

7. Yes, that is exactly what the pharmacist is doing. The Plan B pill has a very limited time frame in which it may be taken. By delaying the patient's access to it, the pharmacist is forcing the patient to either go through with an unwanted pregnancy or abort it.

8. The imposition is not unjust. There is nothing in the licensing that would prevent a pharmacist from following his religion or other beliefs. He is only barred from using those beliefs as an excuse to refuse to do the job as required by the license.

You are arguing that pharmacists should have the right to impose their religious beliefs on others. That's not the way things work in the USA. You may follow any beliefs you like. You may not impose those beliefs on me.

If euthanasia were made legal and my doctor prescribed me pills in order to carry it out, I'd fully expect the pharmacist to fill out the prescription.

I gathered that, but this is addressing the Nazz's statement that because the government defines murder, the pharmacist has no basis for setting different personal standards for what constitutes murder.

Do pharmacist build and maintain their own roads, electrical supply, police protection, etc.? No. They are not fully cut off from society and cannot act as if they were.

They pay taxes to maintain those things. They imply no duty of personal servitude towards another individual.

As for your belief that the pharmacist can also refuse to serve blacks and Jews because of his moral beliefs, you may be consistent, but you are sickening. Apparently we fought the Civil Rights battle for nothing.

No one has no moral obligation to serve anyone until he or she accepts it.

Do I believe all people should be treated equally regardless of race, of course. Do I think servitude should be assumed in the pursuit of equality, no.

You said that laws are often forced agreement with the state. Because the state says that Plan B is not murder, the pharmacist has no basis for disagreement (actually Nazz said it but you interjected).

Sure he can disagree. But he is faced with the following problem:

1. He is licensed according to laws that require him, in his professional practice, to abide by legal decisions about what medications he should dispense.

2. He believes that one of these legal decisions is wrong.

Now, he has three choices:

1. He can do what he is told, but protest as loudly as he chooses that the law should change. (This is Kant's version of free speech, by the way. Do your duty, as long as you are free to complain about it.)

2. He can refuse to do what he is told, knowing that he will face sanctions for his refusal. He may lose his license, or face other penalties. This is civil disobedience... perhaps his actions will convince people, perhaps not. But he should not be surprised when the state does exactly what it said it would do, according to the licensing requirements to which he agreed when he took his license.

3. He can quit.

In no case is he forced to agree with the state. He is merely forced to abide by the law or face the consequences, which is the same "force" applied to everyone. What he does with that is up to him.

I then countered and asked if, were euthanasia to be deemed to not be murder, should all doctors be forced to accept the government's opinion?

No, but they would be required to perform their jobs, or face sanctions. They could also resign in protest. But what they could not say is, "the law does not apply to me, because I disagree with it."

Meh.

So, I have a "right" to be a lawyer? Someone has a right to be a cop?

Those are rights that are contingent upon the existence of government, because they do not exist without government. However, your right to be a lawyer is only determined by your natural ability until government places restrictions on it.

Sure, he can offer. But the public, in the form of public licenses, has every right to decide the terms under which we accept the offer. We have every right to say, "All right, you can sell medications, but you have to abide by certain rules." If those rules, e.g. the requirement that you stock certain common drugs and refuse a sale only for medical reasons, are not acceptable, then you can find some other "service of your choosing" to offer to the public. We're not buying your religious beliefs, we're buying your drugs.

Worth repeating.

Neutral laws and regulations regarding public services are not "servitude."

You are not forced to open a public business doing interstate commerce, but if you do, you are subject to certain laws.

Just as you are not forced to drive on public highways, but, if you do, you are subject to certain laws.

Those are rights that are contingent upon the existence of government, because they do not exist without government. However, your right to be a lawyer is only determined by your natural ability until government places restrictions on it.

OK, then one must also have a "right" to be a doctor.

where these natural rights to professional positions come from, I don't know.

But you've already granted the rights are subject to government regulation. Just as I may be forced to defend a client I don't agree with, a pharmacist may have to fill a prescription he/she disagrees with.

Maybe... but what if you live in a very religious area, and all the pharmacies refuse to stock your prescription? Or even most, so that you must drive halfway across the state to get the medicine you need?

You are pretty well fucked, just like the pharmacist who cannot do what he loves and is trained to do because he lives in a secular society and won't compromise his belief in the human spirit.

The difference between the two, the customer is fucked by free individual choice not backed by violence, the pharmacist is fucked by a government who backs up its choice with violence.

Worth repeating.

Neutral laws and regulations regarding public services are not "servitude."

You are not forced to open a public business doing interstate commerce, but if you do, you are subject to certain laws.

Just as you are not forced to drive on public highways, but, if you do, you are subject to certain laws.

And for the umpteenth time:

I do not question the justification for regulatory laws placed upon business. I only question whether this specific one consitutes enforced servitude.

How does not helping cause someone to impose on another?

Now now, be consistent. If an emergency room refuses treatment to a black person, certainly you agree that they have "imposed" upon him?

Refusal to oblige does equate to imposition, when you have been licensed on the condition that you "oblige" equally and fairly, according to the law. When the law gives people the reasonable expectation that you should provide a service, which you refuse to provide, then you certainly have imposed upon them.

"Forced fulfillment of unwanted duties" is a ridiculous phrase that reflects your refusal to recognize reality. First of all, most any job requires people to do things that they would not otherwise do. (I doubt cleaning toilets is a "wanted duty" by many people in the world.) Second, performing a public service licensed by the state explicitly entails requirements that individuals would likely not want to do otherwise... e.g., at a minimum, tedious record-keeping--an "unwanted duty" to be sure, for someone who just wants to practice their profession.

Every profession demands compliance with "unwanted duties." No one is forced to practice their profession, however. If their duties become so odious to them that they can no longer perform them in good conscience, they are free to object (as they always were), and they are free to quit (as they always were).

If people were compelled to enter certain professions, and then compelled to abide by rules objectionable to their faith, there would be a problem. But that is not the case.

Should people not be allowed to think that the death penalty constitutes murder and protest accordingly?

Precisely. But they also might think twice about taking the job of prison warden, which will predictably require them to take part in an execution.

And for the umpteenth time:

I do not question the justification for regulatory laws placed upon business. I only question whether this specific one consitutes enforced servitude.

You have yet to explain why this law or anti-discrimination laws are "enforced servitude," but other regulatory laws are not.

By what neutral criteria is a law "servitude"?

Completely agreed.

However, I was addressing his statement that the ability to be a pharmacist is a privelege granted by government. I stated that anyone has the right to be a pharmacist, but government restricts the right. I made my comments about government intervention to show that government is not at all necessary to become a pharmacist.

Soooo... You are saying that a private licensing association would be within its rights to revoke the license of an individual who refuses to prescribe medication that the licensing agency requires... but the government may not similarly revoke licenses?

Completely agreed.

However, I was addressing his statement that the ability to be a pharmacist is a privelege granted by government. I stated that anyone has the right to be a pharmacist, but government restricts the right. I made my comments about government intervention to show that government is not at all necessary to become a pharmacist.
And he was pointing out that licensing is required for one to be a pharmacist, whether it comes from a government or a private authority. In the US, such licenses are granted by governmental authorities at present.

But let's indulge your little fantasy for a moment: Let's say you didn't need a license to be a pharmacist. Let's say there was no requirement to prove that you had been properly trained or knew how to do the job. And there was no competent authority to assure the public that you were trained and knew how to do the job. You just hung out your shingle and the customers came in with their prescriptions. How many of them do you think you would have to kill with your incompetence before customers stopped coming to you? Do you really think that pharmaceutical companies would allow you to sell their products if they had no assurance that you knew what you were doing and that they wouldn't get sued because of a potential screw-up by you? Do you really think that insurance programs would allow you to participate in prescription benefit plans without similar assurances?

Without licensing, you would not succeed in being a pharmacist for very long, and your failure would be just that -- your failure -- not a violation of your rights. Licensing merely saves you from being humiliated or from committing manslaughter.

And once again for the record, in the US, licenses are granted by the government. That's just the current system.

I gathered that, but this is addressing the Nazz's statement that because the government defines murder, the pharmacist has no basis for setting different personal standards for what constitutes murder.

They may set different personal standards. They may not set different professional standards. If their personal standards conflict with the profession's standards, then they have every right to remove their person from the profession.

I gathered that, but this is addressing the Nazz's statement that because the government defines murder, the pharmacist has no basis for setting different personal standards for what constitutes murder.

Hey, I said what you quoted. A pharmacist can have any personal opinion he wants about murder. He can even try to change an FDA ruling. But he shouldn't have the right to pass judgement on me for the medications prescribed to me by my doctor.

What right does a pharmacist have to question any prescription I bring to him other than a conflict with other medications or a question as to the authenticity of my prescription?

A pharmacy is not a Blockbuster. Just because Blockbuster can decide that they won't carry a movie doesn't mean that pharmacies should be treated the same way. A pharmacist needs to swallow his religion, fill out the prescription and if he has a problem with it, write to his congressman like the rest of us.

<snip>Smacked around because there are 10 people who agree with you, and Vetalia who agrees with me. Mass agreement does not make one correct, especially considering the size of the sample.<snip>
The fact that you are finding no other support suggests nothing to you?

You are pretty well fucked, just like the pharmacist who cannot do what he loves and is trained to do because he lives in a secular society and won't compromise his belief in the human spirit.

You talk about getting to do what you love and you are trained to do as if there were no "costs" involved. I love to teach, and I love to do research. In order to actually practice my profession as a university instructor and scholar, however, I have to do many things that I do not love: I have to attend boring meetings, for instance... and I have to assign grades, a practice about which I am at best morally ambivalent.

Now, if those costs were so high that they outweighed my desire to do what I love, I would quit and find something else to do--something with greater "net" rewards after all costs are considered.

Fortunately for me, I am willing to accept some compromises in order to do what I want... that is, after all, the nature of the social world. Rarely does it reflect precisely what we want it to.

The customer, who is "fucked" when no one will prescribe her medication, on the other hand, is merely attempting to exercise a right over her own body and the determination of her own medical and personal needs. The state, historically, has chosen to defend basic rights to personal determination, to which end it has required certain professionals to accomodate these rights.

The pharmacist is NOT "fucked", however. He is perfectly free to decide whether the benefits of practicing his profession still outweigh the costs. One should not be forced to make the same considerations about basic human rights.

<snip>But let's indulge your little fantasy for a moment: Let's say you didn't need a license to be a pharmacist. Let's say there was no requirement to prove that you had been properly trained or knew how to do the job. And there was no competent authority to assure the public that you were trained and knew how to do the job. You just hung out your shingle and the customers came in with their prescriptions. How many of them do you think you would have to kill with your incompetence before customers stopped coming to you? Do you really think that pharmaceutical companies would allow you to sell their products if they had no assurance that you knew what you were doing and that they wouldn't get sued because of a potential screw-up by you? Do you really think that insurance programs would allow you to participate in prescription benefit plans without similar assurances?

Without licensing, you would not succeed in being a pharmacist for very long, and your failure would be just that -- your failure -- not a violation of your rights. Licensing merely saves you from being humiliated or from committing manslaughter.<snip>
Adding to my own point:

Public licenses are a relatively new phenomenon. Private professional organizations that attest to the public as to the quality and expertise of their members are far older -- dating from the days of guilds. Such organizations are designed to represent the interests of the profession as a group and to promote the profession by encouraging the public to use its services. The organizations set the standards for quality within the profession and in order to be a member, you must meet those standards. The public can rely on your status as a member as a sign that you are competent, whether or not you have a legally binding license.

For instance, you don't need a license to be a literary agent, but literary agents are represented by a professional organization that imposes ethical standards. You don't have to join the organization to be an agent, but writers are more likely to do business with an agent who is a member.

Likewise, since the public wants assurance that their pharmacist isn't going to poison them, they will be seek proof as to a given pharmacist's competence and qualifications. Pharmacists themselves will create a professional organization (in fact, I believe they do actually have one) and the public will likely do their business with that group's members. And the whole point of that group will be to provide proof and assurance that the public will get what they want from member-pharmacists.

So there you are -- no license required, no laws restricting, but still in the same position as you are now. If the public wants pharmacists to fill prescriptions, they will only go to pharmacists that will fill prescriptions. Does that violate your rights? If you don't want to be forced to support my morals by filling a Plan B prescription, should I be forced to support your morals by giving my business to you anyway? I don't think so.

By questioning whether the licensing requirement goes too far or is not justified, you are questioning the licensing. What you want a license to be is a piece of paper granting the pharmacist permission to do whatever he wants and define his job anyway he likes. Why would any state do that? What would be in it for them? Why would they have to issue licenses at all?

What I want is for the license to insure that the pharmacist, upon accepting responsibility, is fully capable and responsible enough to handle the duty. I don't believe that a license should require someone to accept a responsibility.

3. What the pharmacist stands to lose or suffer is in no way comparable to what the patient stands to lose or suffer. I'm sorry, but to say that the ability to define one's job description is equal in value/importance to the ability to control one's own body and medical care is simply ridiculous. And again, you are wrong. By refusing to fulfill a proper prescription for the morning after pill, the pharmacist would be forcing me to either have a baby or an abortion. If he had filled the prescription, neither would happen. (And re-read the thread, please; it has already been explained that Plan B is a form of contraceptive, not an abortifacient.) Quite frankly, your tone in that remark implies a certain hostility towards the woman seeking the prescription as well as a cold-blooded disregard for her welfare.

I support full term abortion as a woman's right not to give herself up for another person. I also support the pharmacist's right not to give up himself for another person.

And yes, losing your life's work, being restricted from doing what you love, and being forced into economic hardship is nothing compared to finding another pharmacist or having an abortion.



People can only become pharmacists through government intervention, as it is a privelege provided by government, correct? So by that logic, this pharmacist could not become a pharmacist if government did not issue and enforce licenses? He has a store, he knows how to run it, the government doesn't stop him, yet he cannot become a pharmacist, correct?

[QUOTE]Let's take that same question from another angle -- from the retail end, the end where the actual doing of the job comes in. You have no right to take my money. You can open as many pharmacies as you like. You cannot force me to be your customer. So, if nobody uses your shop and you go out of business, have your rights been violated? No, they have not.

Just like I should not be forced to sell you something if I don't want to. You don't have to buy anything, I don't have to sell anything, it goes both ways. If no contract or transaction occurs, no rights have been violated.

Getting a license is a privilege granted by the state. Running a business is a privilege granted by the marketplace. Neither is a right.

Licensing serves to restrict unqualified people from becoming a pharmacist.

The business existed even if it never got a market.

5. Speciousness is a sign of a weak argument. The pharmacist gets paid to fill prescriptions. He does not get paid prescription by prescription. Any time he refuses to fill a prescription, he'd better have a damned good reason for it -- by which I mean one that falls within his proper job description and license requirements. Not because he didn't feel like doing it.

Whoever owns the business does get paid prescription by prescription. If you own a business, chances are you don't receive and hourly wage. If the pharmacist owns the pharmacy, he should be able to refuse service, if an employee refuses service, the owner can fire him or condone it.

6. Nonsense. Are you now claiming the right to break the law without any consequence at all, and are you equating due process of law with violence? I assume you mean it in the sense of oppression. American pharmacists are not an oppressed group. Histrionics are another sign of a weak argument.

You asked who introduced violence into the equation, and I said the government. That is unquestionable in this situation.

I support violence when it is justified, but I don't support violence that backs what I consider to be unjust law. Also, I do not consider pharmacists to be oppressed as a whole, but I consider this to be very oppressive to pharmacists who do not want to stock the morning-after pill. No minority is to small to be defended.

8. The imposition is not unjust. There is nothing in the licensing that would prevent a pharmacist from following his religion or other beliefs. He is only barred from using those beliefs as an excuse to refuse to do the job as required by the license.

They create a ultimatum where he must either act in complete opposition to his beliefs or lose his livelihood, that is an imposition.

You are arguing that pharmacists should have the right to impose their religious beliefs on others. That's not the way things work in the USA. You may follow any beliefs you like. You may not impose those beliefs on me.

Sweet Jesus, does no one comprehend that the customer is asking the pharmacist to act in opposition to his religious beliefs? I gotta figure you guys know the meaning of imposition, so I don't know what is going on.

I gathered that, but this is addressing the Nazz's statement that because the government defines murder, the pharmacist has no basis for setting different personal standards for what constitutes murder.

I've already answered this, but I'll do so again because you obviously missed it. A pharmacist may have whatever personal definition fo rmurder he damn well pleases. What he cannot do, however, is impose that definition on a customer by refusing to fill a legal prescription, because his definition matters only to him. It has no greater meaning. His responsibility as a pharmacist is greater than his personal feelings on the matter.

Sweet Jesus, does no one comprehend that the customer is asking the pharmacist to act in opposition to his religious beliefs? I gotta figure you guys know the meaning of imposition, so I don't know what is going on.
We all comprehend it--what we're saying is that it doesn't fucking matter. The customer's decision trumps the pharmacist's beliefs. Period. End of story. What don't you fucking get about that?

...

How do you go on like this for so long? If his job is against his belief, he either temporarily goes without the belief, or he goes without the job. It's not servitude, slaves can't quit.

Now now, be consistent. If an emergency room refuses treatment to a black person, certainly you agree that they have "imposed" upon him?

It depends on many factors.

Refusal to oblige does equate to imposition, when you have been licensed on the condition that you "oblige" equally and fairly, according to the law. When the law gives people the reasonable expectation that you should provide a service, which you refuse to provide, then you certainly have imposed upon them.

My objection is with the law that creates that expectation in the first place.

I do not believe that the customer imposes for asking, I do not believe the pharmacist imposes for refusing. I believe the state imposes by forcing the pharmacist to accept the duty.

"Forced fulfillment of unwanted duties" is a ridiculous phrase that reflects your refusal to recognize reality. First of all, most any job requires people to do things that they would not otherwise do. (I doubt cleaning toilets is a "wanted duty" by many people in the world.) Second, performing a public service licensed by the state explicitly entails requirements that individuals would likely not want to do otherwise... e.g., at a minimum, tedious record-keeping--an "unwanted duty" to be sure, for someone who just wants to practice their profession.

Actually it was not a good phrase, as it was far to general.

If a pharmacist who is employed by a pharmacy does not want to fulfill the duties set forward by his/her employer, then they should be fired.

However, the relationship between government and private individual should not be maintained in the same way as that of employer and employee.

As for your example of record-keeping, I have no problem with that, as it is regulation to insure that the pharmacist is capably handling the service responsibilities he accepts. A pharmacist should be required to be responsible in handling the medicines he chooses to sell.

Every profession demands compliance with "unwanted duties." No one is forced to practice their profession, however. If their duties become so odious to them that they can no longer perform them in good conscience, they are free to object (as they always were), and they are free to quit (as they always were).

And my contention is that the government should not force anyone to quit based on moral objections when they are qualified to perform a job.

If people were compelled to enter certain professions, and then compelled to abide by rules objectionable to their faith, there would be a problem. But that is not the case.

Precisely. But they also might think twice about taking the job of prison warden, which will predictably require them to take part in an execution.

OK, we have established that legal definitions are not binding upon the opinions of the people. (You are not the one who challenged that)

What don't you fucking get about that?

Why everyone supports government enforcement of one-sided contracts.

Why the beliefs of the pharmacist are subservient to the beliefs of the customer.

And my contention is that the government should not force anyone to quit based on moral objections when they are qualified to perform a job.

If people were compelled to enter certain professions, and then compelled to abide by rules objectionable to their faith, there would be a problem. But that is not the case.


Part of being qualified for a job is actually having the ability to perform it, if their beliefs stop them from performing, they cannot perform, and aren't qualified.

How do you go on like this for so long? If his job is against his belief, he either temporarily goes without the belief, or he goes without the job. It's not servitude, slaves can't quit.

Servitude does not equal slavery, but it bears a strong resemblence when it is not freely accepted.

Why everyone supports government enforcement of one-sided contracts.

Why the beliefs of the pharmacist are subservient to the beliefs of the customer.

Because the beliefs of the pharmacist are against his job, and the beliefs of the customer are alligned with it.

Servitude does not equal slavery, but it bears a strong resemblence when it is not freely accepted.

accepted by who? Pharmacists accept the job and all it entails (you know...DOING it.) when they...you know....get an interview and get the job, and don't quit subsequently?

Soooo... You are saying that a private licensing association would be within its rights to revoke the license of an individual who refuses to prescribe medication that the licensing agency requires... but the government may not similarly revoke licenses?

As long as they voluntarily use them for quality verification.

accepted by who? Pharmacists accept the job and all it entails (you know...DOING it.) when they...you know....get an interview and get the job, and don't quit subsequently?

Totally. They go to school for YEARS, preparing themselves for the job. They know what they're getting into. They should either do their jobs or move to some less-demanding career *roll eyes*

Why everyone supports government enforcement of one-sided contracts.

Why the beliefs of the pharmacist are subservient to the beliefs of the customer.
Why not the beliefs of anyone about anything anywhere? If a clerk works at CVS and decides that he won't cell cigarettes to customers because they cause cancer, he should be allowed to refuse sales? CVS shouldn't be allowed to fire him? After all: In I Corinthians 6:19-20, the Apostle Paul wrote to Christians, "Know you not that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit which is in you, which you have of God, and you are not your own? For you were bought with a price: Therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit which are God's".

(Please keep the answer in context of the example without going into whether or not the clerk has his own private business. CVS. Cigarettes. Clerks refusal to sell.)

Because the beliefs of the pharmacist are against his job, and the beliefs of the customer are alligned with it.

accepted by who? Pharmacists accept the job and all it entails (you know...DOING it.) when they...you know....get an interview and get the job, and don't quit subsequently?

The private business owner determines what contracts he accepts for himself.

Once he/she accepts the responsibilities of the contract, I do not mind regulations enforcing reasonable requirements that are necessary to execute the contract, but as soon as individuals are forced into contracts, the regulation loses my support.

If an employed pharmacist refuses to fill a prescription, he is at the mercy of his employer.

My objection is with the law that creates that expectation in the first place.

I know that, which is why I'm asking you to be consistent. Suddenly you were trying to make a much more metaphysical claim that "refusal" should never be considered an "imposition."

I believe the state imposes by forcing the pharmacist to accept the duty.

Right. But the state imposes thousands of impositions on regulated professions. The question is why this imposition is wrong, but the others are okay... and you have failed to justify that distinction, thus far preferring to sling about general terms like "servitude" to the state.

A pharmacist should be required to be responsible in handling the medicines he chooses to sell.

But not responsible to sell medications required for the public health?

Look, the government could handle this problem another way. It is perfectly within the powers of government to simply sell pharmaceuticals themselves, in which case they would only be setting rules that apply to their own employees. Medicines are products that are necessary for the public health, and so it might be perfectly reasonable for the government to choose to do so.

Our government and our society, however, choose to entrust private individuals and businesses with the distribution of medicines, both because we inherently value free enterprise, and because we believe that this system will be most cost-effective. But when we entrust this very public purpose to individuals, we set a very simple requirement: they must serve the purpose for which they have been granted the public trust. This means supplying medications that the public deems appropriate.

In the early days of our nation, the public nature of corporate charters was much more explicit: indeed, the terms of a charter were frequently written so that if the business failed to serve the public purpose, the charter would be revoked. Since then, we have decided that in most cases it is more expedient to draw more general charters... but in the case of businesses that directly affect the publid interest, we choose to retain the old ethic of public charters in the form of public licenses.

If people were compelled to enter certain professions, and then compelled to abide by rules objectionable to their faith, there would be a problem. But that is not the case.

That's right. It's not the case. So there is no problem.

[1] What I want is for the license to insure that the pharmacist, upon accepting responsibility, is fully capable and responsible enough to handle the duty. I don't believe that a license should require someone to accept a responsibility.

[2] I support full term abortion as a woman's right not to give herself up for another person. I also support the pharmacist's right not to give up himself for another person.

[3] And yes, losing your life's work, being restricted from doing what you love, and being forced into economic hardship is nothing compared to finding another pharmacist or having an abortion.

[4]People can only become pharmacists through government intervention, as it is a privelege provided by government, correct? So by that logic, this pharmacist could not become a pharmacist if government did not issue and enforce licenses? He has a store, he knows how to run it, the government doesn't stop him, yet he cannot become a pharmacist, correct?

[5] Just like I should not be forced to sell you something if I don't want to. You don't have to buy anything, I don't have to sell anything, it goes both ways. If no contract or transaction occurs, no rights have been violated.

[6] Licensing serves to restrict unqualified people from becoming a pharmacist.

[7] The business existed even if it never got a market.

[8] Whoever owns the business does get paid prescription by prescription. If you own a business, chances are you don't receive and hourly wage. If the pharmacist owns the pharmacy, he should be able to refuse service, if an employee refuses service, the owner can fire him or condone it.

[9] You asked who introduced violence into the equation, and I said the government. That is unquestionable in this situation.

I support violence when it is justified, but I don't support violence that backs what I consider to be unjust law. Also, I do not consider pharmacists to be oppressed as a whole, but I consider this to be very oppressive to pharmacists who do not want to stock the morning-after pill. No minority is to small to be defended.

[10] They create a ultimatum where he must either act in complete opposition to his beliefs or lose his livelihood, that is an imposition.

[11] Sweet Jesus, does no one comprehend that the customer is asking the pharmacist to act in opposition to his religious beliefs? I gotta figure you guys know the meaning of imposition, so I don't know what is going on.
1. You wish the pharmacist to accept responsibility but not have to carry it out? So you're agreeing with my statement you want a license to be a carte blanche permit to do whatever you want -- like refuse to fulfill a responsibility but say you didn't, or dictate the terms of your job but still claim you're doing what society wants.

2. You are conveniently ignoring the fact that Plan B does not cause abortions. It is a contraceptive. Your objection to abortion has nothing to do with it -- except to the extent that it is merely a front for a desire to dictate the moral lives of others by passing judgment on their sex lives. By refusing to dispense Plan B, you would be refusing to dispense birth control. There are pharmacists who do that too (and try to hide it behind the abortion argument). I take it you agree with them.

3. HAHAHA! After arguing so hard against being force to accept others' pro-choice morality because abortion is so against your beliefs, you now dismiss abortion as nothing but a minor inconvenience? Then why are you so worked up about it? You've tripped over yourself here. I repeat, this argument is ridiculous.

4. Correct. He cannot be a pharmacist in the US without government intervention. Deal with it. If he opens a drugstore, he can only sell over the counter drugs. He cannot run a pharmacy and fill prescriptions. Deal with that too. No pharmaceutical company or insurance agency will work with him if he does not have that license. Another thing for you to deal with. No license, no 'scrips. Period.

5. You refuse to accept the fact that, by taking the license you choose to give up any right you might have had to refuse service to customers. You have cut off that option to yourself by taking a public license with such restrictions attached.

6. That's right and -- once again -- a person who cannot fulfill the requirements of the job, for whatever reason, is not qualified to do the job.

7. It didn't exist for long. But if you're arguing for the right to fail, go right ahead. I won't stop you.

8. And once again -- with feeling -- A) tough shit; the license requires what the license requires; and B) this controversy is not erupting among privately owned small businesses. The vast majority of American pharmacists work for large corporate chains. They are bound both by their license and by the requirements of their employer, who you agree has the right to fire them. So tell me, how is it a violation of their rights to require them to fill prescriptions but not a violation of their rights to fire them for not doing so?

9. This argument is more specious and nonsensical than I can express. I demand that you give me evidence that any violence has ever been perpetrated against a pharmacist because of their beliefs. I demand evidence of oppression of pharmacists. Show me the bombed out drugstores with burning NARAL signs in front of them. Show me evidence of pharmacists jailed and abused for their beliefs or at least some grainy long-distance photos of pharmacists languishing at Gitmo. Get a grip, already. Stripping you of permission to do a job that you did badly or refused to do at all is not -- repeat NOT -- a violation of your rights. Stopping you from violating my rights (by blocking my access to medical care) is not -- repeat NOT -- a violation of your rights, because you have no right to violate someone else's rights.

10. Well, life's a bitch, ain't it? Sometimes, you don't get to do what you want the way you want to. Boo-freaking-hoo.

11. And glorious Isis, why don't you get that nobody is forcing you to do something that violates your beliefs. There is no law forcing you to be a pharmacist. But we are not going to allow you to force your beliefs on us. if you really believe that you should have a right to run a private business that refuses to cater to women -- or blacks or Jews -- then petition your government to amend their requirements to allow privately owned businesses to do that and go ahead and run your own glat-fundamentalist shop. But until you get that change in the law, you must follow the laws that exist now or else not be a pharmacist.

Why the beliefs of the pharmacist are subservient to the beliefs of the customer.

They are not. They are subservient to the law, to the extent he chooses to practice a profession regulated by the law. If he disagrees so strongly that he cannot perform his job, then he should leave.

Obedience to the law does not impose any restrictions on one's personal beliefs.

If you want to challenge the law, you need to tell me why it is not a good law... the argument that it "makes people do things they disagree with" would apply to every law. Therefore, if you want to preserve law at all, you need to come up with a better argument.

Give it up guys--VO2 isn't going to be convinced and we're making the same arguments over and over again to no avail.

Give it up guys--VO2 isn't going to be convinced and we're making the same arguments over and over again to no avail.

Yes. Clearly some of us just like to "hear ourselves talk." :)

Yes. Clearly some of us just like to "hear ourselves talk." :)

(Read: Raise our post counts)

I've already answered this, but I'll do so again because you obviously missed it. A pharmacist may have whatever personal definition fo rmurder he damn well pleases. What he cannot do, however, is impose that definition on a customer by refusing to fill a legal prescription, because his definition matters only to him. It has no greater meaning. His responsibility as a pharmacist is greater than his personal feelings on the matter.

And his decision whether he should enter into a contract where he serves someone should only matter to him.

Why not the beliefs of anyone about anything anywhere? If a clerk works at CVS and decides that he won't cell cigarettes to customers because they cause cancer, he should be allowed to refuse sales? CVS shouldn't be allowed to fire him? After all: In I Corinthians 6:19-20, the Apostle Paul wrote to Christians, "Know you not that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit which is in you, which you have of God, and you are not your own? For you were bought with a price: Therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit which are God's".

(Please keep the answer in context of the example without going into whether or not the clerk has his own private business. CVS. Cigarettes. Clerks refusal to sell.)

Yes, CVS can fire him. He has an agreement with CVS, they pay him, he dispenses their medicine.

And his decision whether he should enter into a contract where he serves someone should only matter to him.

How is that?

I don't get what the hell the problem is -- the morning after pill is just a very strong dose of the same hormones in birth control pills. If the pharmacist dispenses birth control on a regular basis(as many pharmacists do), then he has no damn argument. No, sir,you cannot bitch about having to dispense a higher dosage of essentially the same drug. That's like bitching when someone comes in with a prescription for 10mg of Valium rather than 5mg, and refusing to fill it. Get over yourself, Mr Bitchy Pharmacist.

They are not. They are subservient to the law, to the extent he chooses to practice a profession regulated by the law. If he disagrees so strongly that he cannot perform his job, then he should leave.

Obedience to the law does not impose any restrictions on one's personal beliefs.

It is the law that forces them to be subservient to the customer.

If you want to challenge the law, you need to tell me why it is not a good law... the argument that it "makes people do things they disagree with" would apply to every law. Therefore, if you want to preserve law at all, you need to come up with a better argument.

It benefits one individual over another. The pharmacist has his liberty taken away, as he is forced to accept contracts that he would not normally accept freely.

It has been obvious to me that this has been a capitalist/socialist debate for 10-15 pages now, but I am the only one really treating it as such because I can't relate to practicalities.

Yes, CVS can fire him. He has an agreement with CVS, they pay him, he dispenses their medicine.

Similarly, the government may revoke a pharmacist's license. He has an agreement with them.

Yes, CVS can fire him. He has an agreement with CVS, they pay him, he dispenses their medicine.
Now I'm just glad to find you reasonable.

It is the law that forces them to be subservient to the customer.



It benefits one individual over another. The pharmacist has his liberty taken away, as he is forced to accept contracts that he would not normally accept freely.

It has been obvious to me that this has been a capitalist/socialist debate for 10-15 pages now, but I am the only one really treating it as such because I can't relate to practicalities.

He DID accept it freely, when he became a pharmacist.

It is the law that forces them to be subservient to the customer.

You're talking in circles. Laws force us to do all kinds of things, including being "subservient" to people who agree with the law when we don't.

It benefits one individual over another. The pharmacist has his liberty taken away, as he is forced to accept contracts that he would not normally accept freely.

Most laws benefit some individuals over others. Liberties conflict with other liberties, and the role of government is to strike a balance in which the most important liberties take precedence over lesser freedoms. You have yet to explain how the pharmacist, who is perfectly free not to be a pharmacist, has been "forced" to do anything that he does not choose, freely, to do.

I know that, which is why I'm asking you to be consistent. Suddenly you were trying to make a much more metaphysical claim that "refusal" should never be considered an "imposition."

Alright, refusal where obligation is implicitly expected by society can be considered imposition. But only because of government interference that I am arguing against.

Right. But the state imposes thousands of impositions on regulated professions. The question is why this imposition is wrong, but the others are okay... and you have failed to justify that distinction, thus far preferring to sling about general terms like "servitude" to the state.

Not servitude to the state, servitude to another individual. The pharmacist is treated as a mean, at the expense of his own ends. No person should ever be treated that way. Now, of course, it is (I guess) impossible to avoid this.

But not responsible to sell medications required for the public health?

You have been in discussions with me before, and if you should take anything away from this one, it is that I don't believe the individual has any obligations towards the public that he doesn't accept willingly. Once again something nearly impossible to relate practically to this situation.

Look, the government could handle this problem another way. It is perfectly within the powers of government to simply sell pharmaceuticals themselves, in which case they would only be setting rules that apply to their own employees. Medicines are products that are necessary for the public health, and so it might be perfectly reasonable for the government to choose to do so.

I have no problem with this, as long as they are offered in a competitive market, and not offered as a market setter.

Our government and our society, however, choose to entrust private individuals and businesses with the distribution of medicines, both because we inherently value free enterprise, and because we believe that this system will be most cost-effective. But when we entrust this very public purpose to individuals, we set a very simple requirement: they must serve the purpose for which they have been granted the public trust. This means supplying medications that the public deems appropriate.

And the public, by the natural factors of the market will derive this situation, eventually.

That's right. It's not the case. So there is no problem.

But this pharmacist was following a career that he found desirable and was forced to abide by laws that he found objectionable.

Similarly, the government may revoke a pharmacist's license. He has an agreement with them.

He has a lesser of two evils agreement. He can abide by their rules or not be a pharmacist.

With CVS he can abide by their rules, find someone who will let him dispense medicine as he sees fit, or he can begin his own practice.

But this pharmacist was following a career that he found desirable and was forced to abide by laws that he found objectionable.

If his desire for the job out weighs the objections, fill the prescription, if it doesn't, quit. I desire videogames, but I'm forced to abide by the law I find objectionable of paying for stuff as opposed to simply shoplifting.

I don't get what the hell the problem is -- the morning after pill is just a very strong dose of the same hormones in birth control pills. If the pharmacist dispenses birth control on a regular basis(as many pharmacists do), then he has no damn argument. No, sir,you cannot bitch about having to dispense a higher dosage of essentially the same drug. That's like bitching when someone comes in with a prescription for 10mg of Valium rather than 5mg, and refusing to fill it. Get over yourself, Mr Bitchy Pharmacist.

Now I do agree with that.

He DID accept it freely, when he became a pharmacist.

If I put you in a room and say "You can either never leave this room, or I can kill you," will you be making a free decision?

If I put you in a room and say "You can either never leave this room, or I can kill you," will you be making a free decision?

ah yes, he'll die if he isn't a pharmacist.

If I put you in a room and say "You can either never leave this room, or I can kill you," will you be making a free decision?

That's not the same thing at all. That'd be more like the government forcing you into being a pharmacist and then telling you that you can either do it exactly as they want you to, or you'd never have another job.

You're talking in circles. Laws force us to do all kinds of things, including being "subservient" to people who agree with the law when we don't.

If any law uses one person as a means to another's end, it is unjust. The question then becomes whether result of taking away the law creates an even worse situation. I would say that the ramifications of having this law outweigh the ramifications of removing it.

You have yet to explain how the pharmacist, who is perfectly free not to be a pharmacist, has been "forced" to do anything that he does not choose, freely, to do.

Unnatural ultimatums do not constitute freedom of choice.

Not servitude to the state, servitude to another individual. The pharmacist is treated as a mean, at the expense of his own ends. No person should ever be treated that way. Now, of course, it is (I guess) impossible to avoid this.

You are correct, it is impossible.

Some professions and jobs may bear no inherent public trust: most basic retail, for instance. Here, justice demands the free operation of the market: people buy when they want to buy, sell when they want to sell.

But other professions bear an inherent public purpose--whether they are performed well or not directly affects the public well-being or public health.

Pharmacists practice such a profession. Now, there are essentially two ways the government can deal with this dilemma. They may decide that the trust is so important that private persons should not practice it at all: generally, we think of police in this way. Governments run police departments because the public safety requires that they be held to the most exacting standards. And yes, police are treated as "means," in your sense, insofar as they must obey commands and uphold laws with which they may not necessarily agree. They are free, of course, to choose another profession.

An alternative to the government monopoly is the regulated free enterprise: private entrepreneurs are licensed to provide a service, subject to public oversight. Essentially the same situation occurs, however: these people are free to choose less restricted professions.

I don't believe the individual has any obligations towards the public that he doesn't accept willingly.

Be a pharmacist, or don't be a pharmacist. He can make whatever choice he wants.

And the public, by the natural factors of the market will derive this situation, eventually.

Excuse me for disagreeing, but "eventually" is not good enough when it comes to matters of health.

But this pharmacist was following a career that he found desirable and was forced to abide by laws that he found objectionable.

In what way is this different than any other profession you can think of???

We all pursue careers we find desirable. We all have to abide by laws we find objectionable. If our desire for the career outweighs our distaste for the laws, we continue in that profession. If our distaste for the legal requirements of the profession outweigh our desire for the career, we do something else.

Seriously, name a career--any career--in which someone does not have to obey laws with which he or she may disagree. Hell, janitors no doubt have to obey health codes that they may consider too strict.

Why do you think pharmacists are special in this regard?

That's not the same thing at all. That'd be more like the government forcing you into being a pharmacist and then telling you that you can either do it exactly as they want you to, or you'd never have another job.

I was trying to show how a "Do it our way or don't do it at all", does not constitute a freely entered decision.

Now I do agree with that.


So why are some pharmacists bitching? From what I've read, the pharmacists who had issues with emergency contraception are the same ones who previously dispensed birth control pills.

One question:

Should the owners of a restaurant be forced to sell meat products, because otherwise they're forcing their vegetarian beliefs upon non-vegetarians?

I was trying to show how a "Do it our way or don't do it at all", does not constitute a freely entered decision.

Sure it does. What you're looking for is "Do it." While guns are pointed at you.

One question:

Should the owners of a restaurant be forced to sell meat products, because otherwise they're forcing their vegetarian beliefs upon non-vegetarians?

Owners? No, but waiters have to serve it.

One question:

Should the owners of a restaurant be forced to sell meat products, because otherwise they're forcing their vegetarian beliefs upon non-vegetarians?
If meat were prescribed by doctors and a vegetarian was hiding meat in the freezer and I had a prescription... yeah.

One question:

Should the owners of a restaurant be forced to sell meat products, because otherwise they're forcing their vegetarian beliefs upon non-vegetarians?

No.

But there is no "right to dine out."

There is a right to make determinations about your own body and health, rather than having someone else make them for you.

Since pharmacists have been entrusted with the distribution of medicine (which could justifiably have been accomplished by government monopoly), they have a responsibility to provide the medications prescribed by a doctor in consultation with her/his patient.

They may not withhold medicine--the distribution of which is the very purpose of their profession--because they think they know what decision a person should have made about her health. That is NOT their responsibility.

Governments run police departments because the public safety requires that they be held to the most exacting standards. And yes, police are treated as "means," in your sense, insofar as they must obey commands and uphold laws with which they may not necessarily agree.

The means/ends relationship between the government and the police officers is a reciprocal one. If the police officers did not receive compensation for their servitude, they would not accept it.

An alternative to the government monopoly is the regulated free enterprise: private entrepreneurs are licensed to provide a service, subject to public oversight. Essentially the same situation occurs, however: these people are free to choose less restricted professions.

Be a pharmacist, or don't be a pharmacist. He can make whatever choice he wants.

Excuse me for disagreeing, but "eventually" is not good enough when it comes to matters of health.

In what way is this different than any other profession you can think of???

We all pursue careers we find desirable. We all have to abide by laws we find objectionable. If our desire for the career outweighs our distaste for the laws, we continue in that profession. If our distaste for the legal requirements of the profession outweigh our desire for the career, we do something else.

Seriously, name a career--any career--in which someone does not have to obey laws with which he or she may disagree. Hell, janitors no doubt have to obey health codes that they may consider too strict.

Why do you think pharmacists are special in this regard?

All of this is true, contingent on whether the regulations are justifiable. I feel it isn't because I am an individualist who believes that one should not be forced to be a means to another's ends.

So why are some pharmacists bitching? From what I've read, the pharmacists who had issues with emergency contraception are the same ones who previously dispensed birth control pills.

Because their religion stops them from making rational judgements.

Consider a case in which governments do hold a (practical) monopoly: law enforcement.

In this case, governments have decided to provide the service themselves, rather than trust private individuals and corporations. They are justified because it is such an important function, and the risk for abuse is so great.

Imagine, however, that they chose the free enterprise alternative: private security firms would police the streets and respond to calls for help.

So when a woman dials the local "police" for protection from the husband who is beating her, can the dispatcher refuse to send anyone on the basis of his belief that men have "rights" to their women, and husbands should not be persecuted for exercising those rights?

The means/ends relationship between the government and the police officers is a reciprocal one. If the police officers did not receive compensation for their servitude, they would not accept it.



All of this is true, contingent on whether the regulations are justifiable. I feel it isn't because I am an individualist who believes that one should not be forced to be a means to another's ends.


he's not forced, the whole point of being a pharmacist is to be a means, between doctor and patient. You're the middle-man. Your job description should basically say. "Means to another's ends"

They may not withhold medicine--the distribution of which is the very purpose of their profession--because they think they know what decision a person should have made about her health. That is NOT their responsibility.

What if they withhold the medicine because they are afraid that they are being the accessory to the killing of a person?

So when a woman dials the local "police" for protection from the husband who is beating her, can the dispatcher refuse to send anyone on the basis of his belief that men have "rights" to their women, and husbands should not be persecuted for exercising those rights?

That is the cost of free enterprise, and the central reason why government should monopolize the police.

I tend to get pretty hot about this issue. At first the debate was over whether pharmacists should be allowed to refuse to fill birth control scripts (not the morning-after pill, but regular old contraceptives like the Pill and the Patch). I personally don't have moral objections to birth control, but I understand that many people do---HOWEVER, I believe that people should not be hired if they're not going to perform their jobs, especially if they're going to interfere with medical treatment. Birth control hormones are used to treat a variety of conditions and can be prescribed to help a woman normalize her period if it's irregular, heavy, or comes with painful cramping. Of course the morning-after pill is even more controversial, because as far as I know it doesn't have any other medical uses. Then it really becomes an issue of morality vs. doing your job.

Wal-Mart tends to support its pharmacists' right to refuse, but that's not surprising from a company that also pays its female employees less than the men. =/

What if they withhold the medicine because they are afraid that they are being the accessory to the killing of a person?
They have to say, "I'm no longer cut out for this." Or change the FDA approval. There are ways to do what you think is right and ways to not do them.

The means/ends relationship between the government and the police officers is a reciprocal one. If the police officers did not receive compensation for their servitude, they would not accept it.

Right. Costs and benefits.

All of this is true, contingent on whether the regulations are justifiable.

Yes, but your arguments (whether you think so or not) have been directed against all laws, not just this one.

I feel it isn't because I am an individualist who believes that one should not be forced to be a means to another's ends.

I agree. But licensing regulations perfectly respect the individual's autonomy: the pharmacist would only be a "means" to another's ends if he were compelled to be a pharmacist. Since he is free to choose what ends he will pursue, e.g. being a pharmacist, he is not being "used." He may do anything else he pleases, or he may practice pharmacy subject to the constraints applicable to the profession. It's his choice.

As has already been shown, there can be no profession of pharmacy without restrictions. If the government did not impose them, the profession would impose them on itself. Indeed, if anything the government mitigates the effects of association standards that might otherwise become overly protectionist.

What if they withhold the medicine because they are afraid that they are being the accessory to the killing of a person?

Then they shouuld be in a position to withhold it, just like people who get squeamish around blood shouldn't be surgeons.

he's not forced, the whole point of being a pharmacist is to be a means, between doctor and patient. You're the middle-man. Your job description should basically say. "Means to another's ends"

And in exchange for being the means to their ends, the customer becomes a means to the pharmacists end.

The key to a free society is the insurance of a reciprical means/ends relationship between all people.

"...liberal social theory proves that each single man sees in all others, first of all, only means to the realization of their purposes, while he himself is to all others a means to the realization of their purposes; that finally, by this reciprocal action, in which each is simultaneously means and end, the highest aim of social life is obtained - the achievement of a better existence for everyone."

- Mises

What if they withhold the medicine because they are afraid that they are being the accessory to the killing of a person?

Well, clearly they cannot be afraid that they are an accessory to murder, as the law indicates that they are not.

So "being the accessory to the killing of a person" is just another moral judgment, substituted for another. If they have a personal moral view that conflicts with their professional responsibilities, then one of them has to give. If they cannot abandon their moral view (or do their duty under protest), then they are free to resign.

That is the cost of free enterprise, and the central reason why government should monopolize the police.

By that argument, the "cost of free enterprise" in pharmacies is that pharmacists may exercise moral judgments over the health of others... is this then the "central reason why government should monopolize" pharmacies?

Personally, I'd be fine with that. But it seems to run counter to your argument.

And in exchange for being the means to their ends, the customer becomes a means to the pharmacists end.

The key to a free society is the insurance of a reciprical means/ends relationship between all people.

Now you are blatantly contradicting yourself. Previously you stated that no one should ever be means to another person's end. By your current argument, it appears that all "free society" violates your fundamental moral principle.

The pharmacist does get something in exchange for "being the means" to his customer: he gets money. If the law told him to hand out morning-after pills for free, I would have a problem with it, too. But the law merely tells him that, having agreed to engage in mutual exchange in the distribution of medications, he has a responsibility to make all medications available equally, rather than according to his whim.

Yes, but your arguments (whether you think so or not) have been directed against all laws, not just this one.

Considering that I border on anarchist, that is not surprising.

All laws that do not solely exist to prevent theft (and that is almost undefinable) are unjustifiable to me.

Like I said before:

If any law uses one person as a means to another's end, it is unjust. The question then becomes whether result of taking away the law creates an even worse situation. I would say that the ramifications of having this law outweigh the ramifications of removing it.

The thing is that I feel this law enforces theft.

I agree. But licensing regulations perfectly respect the individual's autonomy: the pharmacist would only be a "means" to another's ends if he were compelled to be a pharmacist. Since he is free to choose what ends he will pursue, e.g. being a pharmacist, he is not being "used." He may do anything else he pleases, or he may practice pharmacy subject to the constraints applicable to the profession. It's his choice.

The thing is that the government is skewing his valuation of being a pharmacist by creating this legislation. His optimal end of being a pharmacist is lowered in order to promote the other woman's end of filling this prescription.

I guess because of my personal valuations, I feel that the pharmacist suffers a greater injustice because of this law than the denied person would were this law not inacted.


As has already been shown, there can be no profession of pharmacy without restrictions. If the government did not impose them, the profession would impose them on itself. Indeed, if anything the government mitigates the effects of association standards that might otherwise become overly protectionist.

As I said before, private licensing I am fine with. Let the profession impose it by free contractual agreement. If that happens and customers refuse to visit this particular pharmacist because he cannot get private license, good, fuck him. After all, he is the one being the prick, but I would rather people be free to be pricks.

Question:

What if there were a medicine the sole purpose of which was the treatment of sickle-cell anemia, but pharmacists complained of a "moral objection" to its use?

Would that be allowed?

Well, clearly they cannot be afraid that they are an accessory to murder, as the law indicates that they are not.

I don't think he is worried about the legal definition of murder. As we established before, legal definitions are not universally binding to opinion.

So "being the accessory to the killing of a person" is just another moral judgment, substituted for another. If they have a personal moral view that conflicts with their professional responsibilities, then one of them has to give. If they cannot abandon their moral view (or do their duty under protest), then they are free to resign.

I have not disputed this. Regulations and laws can be justified.

However, this one is not in my opinion.

By that argument, the "cost of free enterprise" in pharmacies is that pharmacists may exercise moral judgments over the health of others... is this then the "central reason why government should monopolize" pharmacies?

Personally, I'd be fine with that. But it seems to run counter to your argument.

Like I said before, I support the government selling pharmaceuticals, but not as a market setter.

With the police, you also are dealing with the fact that they are in the business of violently settling disputes. Their personal biases will naturally violate the rights of one of the two parties.

I would add something here but I don't want to open up a new line of discussion.

The thing is that I feel this law enforces theft.

Unless he has to cough up the medication for free, you're really stretching here. And I can't even begin to see how you could justify that claim.

The thing is that the government is skewing his valuation of being a pharmacist by creating this legislation.

All regulatory legislation alters our valuations. He has to keep records, which alters his valuation of being a pharmacist. He has to go to school, which alters his valuation--he may really want to be a pharmacist, but not enough to go to school for it. He may also really want to be a pharmacist, but not enough to compromise his moral beliefs to provide certain medications. That is his choice.

His optimal end of being a pharmacist is lowered in order to promote the other woman's end of filling this prescription.

My optimal end of being an educator is lowered in order to promote the smartest students' end of being marked "better" than others. So the fuck what?

I guess because of my personal valuations, I feel that the pharmacist suffers a greater injustice because of this law than the denied person would were this law not inacted.

Riiiight. The pharmacist may have to make a moral compromise (as we all do), or find another job. The denied woman may have to carry an unwanted pregnancy, perhaps from a rape for all we know, at least until she can find someone who will give her what she needs... and what if that takes weeks? (There is no guarantee, after all, that another pharmacy is available.) She will have to undergo a more dangerous form of abortion. Or, perhaps her own moral judgment is that the morning-after pill is NOT abortion, but that abortion itself is wrong... Now she has to either compromise her morals to have an abortion, or carry to term an unwanted pregnancy.

Whose hardship is worse? The man who has to decide whether he wants a morally complicated job, or the woman who has to decide whether she wants to abort an unwanted child?

Be serious.

Now you are blatantly contradicting yourself. Previously you stated that no one should ever be means to another person's end. By your current argument, it appears that all "free society" violates your fundamental moral principle.

I said they should not be forced into that position. When one is forced into that position they are sacrificing their own end to meat the end of another.

The pharmacist does get something in exchange for "being the means" to his customer: he gets money. If the law told him to hand out morning-after pills for free, I would have a problem with it, too. But the law merely tells him that, having agreed to engage in mutual exchange in the distribution of medications, he has a responsibility to make all medications available equally, rather than according to his whim.

The fact that he would not agree to this freely proves that he considers the exchange to not be equal and reciprocal.

With the police, you also are dealing with the fact that they are in the business of violently settling disputes.

So? According to you, the police have been unjustly deprived of freedom: why should their "optimal" end of being a police officer be constrained by the requirement that they serve others ends in violation of their personal morals?

Or, if this is not a violation of freedom (because I can always choose not to be a cop, even if that's a disappointment), why is it different for any other profession?

If I don't have a right to be a cop, why do I have a right to be a pharmacist?

Unless he has to cough up the medication for free, you're really stretching here. And I can't even begin to see how you could justify that claim.

It is obvious that the cost to him in providing this medication was far greater than any monetary amount he would have been provided.

All regulatory legislation alters our valuations. He has to keep records, which alters his valuation of being a pharmacist. He has to go to school, which alters his valuation--he may really want to be a pharmacist, but not enough to go to school for it. He may also really want to be a pharmacist, but not enough to compromise his moral beliefs to provide certain medications. That is his choice.

Yep.

My optimal end of being an educator is lowered in order to promote the smartest students' end of being marked "better" than others. So the fuck what?

I don't quite understand what you mean here, but if the regulation is beyond what is necessary to insure that you fulfill your contractual obligation to the students and whatever school that employs you, then you are getting screwed.

Riiiight. The pharmacist may have to make a moral compromise (as we all do), or find another job. The denied woman may have to carry an unwanted pregnancy, perhaps from a rape for all we know, at least until she can find someone who will give her what she needs... and what if that takes weeks? (There is no guarantee, after all, that another pharmacy is available.) She will have to undergo a more dangerous form of abortion. Or, perhaps her own moral judgment is that the morning-after pill is NOT abortion, but that abortion itself is wrong... Now she has to either compromise her morals to have an abortion, or carry to term an unwanted pregnancy.

Whose hardship is worse? The man who has to decide whether he wants a morally complicated job, or the woman who has to decide whether she wants to abort an unwanted child?

Be serious.

With this law inacted the pharmacist must either abandon his beliefs and morals (which you belittle, having been raised by a deeply religious family, I understand how strong these beliefs can be) and risk what he believes to be eternal damnation, or abandon a career that he has spent a lifetime building.

With this law scrapped, the woman, in all likelihood, will have to drive 10-20 additional minutes, and in the rare worst-case scenario, deal with the same moral dillemma the pharmacist would have.

Question:

What if there were a medicine the sole purpose of which was the treatment of sickle-cell anemia, but pharmacists complained of a "moral objection" to its use?

Would that be allowed?

Yes, there is very little difference.

With this law inacted the pharmacist must either abandon his beliefs and morals (which you belittle, having been raised by a deeply religious family, I understand how strong these beliefs can be) and risk what he believes to be eternal damnation, or abandon a career that he has spent a lifetime building.

He might have been faced with the same choice when ordered to serve blacks. If a man thinks God hates blacks so much that he will damn a person for serving them, does that give him the right to ignore the law?

It is not the strength of moral beliefs that makes or breaks the law.

Yes, there is very little difference.

Then, just to be clear, despite your earlier protestations you do not believe the government has a right to legislate against racial discrimination?

It is obvious that the cost to him in providing this medication was far greater than any monetary amount he would have been provided.


If it costs him sd much, quit.

So? According to you, the police have been unjustly deprived of freedom: why should their "optimal" end of being a police officer be constrained by the requirement that they serve others ends in violation of their personal morals?

The cons I listed outweigh the positives.

Or, if this is not a violation of freedom (because I can always choose not to be a cop, even if that's a disappointment), why is it different for any other profession?

If I don't have a right to be a cop, why do I have a right to be a pharmacist?

It is a violation of our freedoms, but the threat to our freedoms were private police force be allowed would far outweigh that violation.

You have a natural right to be both assuming you are actually able to do the job, but the government restricts both rights. One through licenses, one through government monopolization.

Because their religion stops them from making rational judgements.


Ah. Just as I suspected. Thank you.

If it costs him sd much, quit.

Ok, so you know, I don't oppose regulations, I oppose unreasonable regulations.

If the regulations are there to make sure he responsibly handles those contracts he accepts and he won't obey them, fine he's done. But if he loses his livelihood because he doesn't want to sell an item, that is unfair to him.

I was told on the thread about sex on the first date that birth control was 100%. So arguing about a morning after pill is a moot subject.