The family of one Alabama prisoner says his body had no heart and another inmate's family alleges his body had no internal organs at all. A lawyer for the first family calls the cases "absolutely part of a pattern."
Edit: I failed to see the sarcasm in comradsalads post. Sometimes I fail to get out of Reddit mode. Haven’t even been on there in a long time! Keeping this comment for history. Sorry comradesalad!
Is that what’s going on in this case though? Because the prison isn’t claiming that.
A federal judge held a hearing in the Dotson case last week. Al.com reported that the hearing provided no answers about the location of the heart.
The lawsuit filed by Dotson’s family contended that the heart might have been retained during a state autopsy with the intention of giving it to the medical school at the University of Alabama at Birmingham for research purposes.
Attorneys for the university said that was “bald speculation” and wrote in a court filing that the university did not perform the autopsy and never received any of Dotson’s organs.
So no, the prisoner did not donate their organs to trade off a shorter sentence. That should be easily provable, with documentation and evidence to back it up.
By the way, I’m a communist, I think that morally the best thing would be for organ donations be done by default, and we have an opt-out system. I think that prisoners have rights and should not have their organs taken against their will, but it would be ethically better if there was an opt-out system instead of an opt-in one.
Of course the real issue here is the propaganda from Usonians that China harvests organs from prisoners against their will, while at the same time Usonian prisons are seemingly doing the same thing.
Also also, isn’t it just capitalist garbage that people can trade organs for shorter jail sentences? Like, what the actual fuck? Organ donation rates should absolutely not be determined by how many prisoners we have. That’s fucking disgusting. I absolutely disagree with “no ethical concerns with this course of action” even when someone in prison donates as a trade off.
I never said that this is what is happening in this situation. It was to demonstrate that the system is not above stealing organs from prisoners.
Prisoners cannot consent to organ donation. The power dynamic in that situation will ultimately create extremely coercive elements that prevent prisoners from being able to exercise full bodily autonomy.
Further, if they are given incentives to do so, that creates an even worse coercive situation.
Me saying that there were “no ethical concerns” was sarcasm, because it is blatantly false.
Many states have created bills that would allow inmates to reduce their sentences by offering organs.
There are absolutely no ethical concerns with this course of action. /s
https://www.wgbh.org/news/local/2023-02-02/a-bill-that-would-let-prisoners-trade-organs-for-a-reduced-sentence-faces-significant-blowback
Edit: I failed to see the sarcasm in comradsalads post. Sometimes I fail to get out of Reddit mode. Haven’t even been on there in a long time! Keeping this comment for history. Sorry comradesalad!
Is that what’s going on in this case though? Because the prison isn’t claiming that.
So no, the prisoner did not donate their organs to trade off a shorter sentence. That should be easily provable, with documentation and evidence to back it up.
By the way, I’m a communist, I think that morally the best thing would be for organ donations be done by default, and we have an opt-out system. I think that prisoners have rights and should not have their organs taken against their will, but it would be ethically better if there was an opt-out system instead of an opt-in one.
Of course the real issue here is the propaganda from Usonians that China harvests organs from prisoners against their will, while at the same time Usonian prisons are seemingly doing the same thing.
Also also, isn’t it just capitalist garbage that people can trade organs for shorter jail sentences? Like, what the actual fuck? Organ donation rates should absolutely not be determined by how many prisoners we have. That’s fucking disgusting. I absolutely disagree with “no ethical concerns with this course of action” even when someone in prison donates as a trade off.
I never said that this is what is happening in this situation. It was to demonstrate that the system is not above stealing organs from prisoners.
Prisoners cannot consent to organ donation. The power dynamic in that situation will ultimately create extremely coercive elements that prevent prisoners from being able to exercise full bodily autonomy.
Further, if they are given incentives to do so, that creates an even worse coercive situation.
Me saying that there were “no ethical concerns” was sarcasm, because it is blatantly false.
Shoot, sorry about that comrade. Missinterpreted on my end. Sometimes I fail to see the sarcasm.
All good comrade! It happens! No need to apologize!
I can mark my comment as sarcasm.