Immanuel
Gold Member
- May 15, 2007
- 16,828
- 2,269
i partially agree with you. if you choose a job knowing that parts of your job could interfere with your personal morality, then you should not have chosen that profession. this would be akin to a religious conservative becoming on OB/GYN but refusing to perform a late term abortion because the mother is in serious risk of dying. the patient suffers in the end. the same could be true for many other religions.I do agree with you.
In this case, the pharmacists has been employed in the field and now the requirements of the field have changed. Should a person who is say two years away from retirement have to leave his life long career choice because the government now demands he fill perscriptions that he believes kill a human being? I don't think so.
As to your other questions, the way I see it is that if the owner of a pharmacy does not want to carry pain killers for whatever ridiculous reason, he would have every right not to do so. His clientele would also have every right to seek a business that more closely serves their needs.
If the pharmacist is an employee of the pharmacy and refuses to fill pain killer perscriptions then it is his bosses right to decide whether or not he will remain employed.
Immie
lets look at this from a different point of view. i have a personal objection to elderly drivers since they cause a lot of death (same argument could be used for teenage drivers as well). lets say i work at the DMV and an 80 year man comes in. he has had no accidents or tickets in 20 years. he has perfect eye sight, and is in great physical shape. but my morality tells me that those people shouldnt drive. so i deny the extension of his license. how is this any different that a pharmacist acting as the gate keeper?
completely different because in that scenario you are the gatekeeper to a license that is regulated by the state.
A better comparison is pretend you're a minister who performs marriages, now assume a couple has obtained a marriage license from the state and comes to you wanting you to perform the marriage. You decide that you don't think the marriage will last so you decline to wed them. Now have you taken away their right to marry? Of course you haven't, you've merely declined to be the tool they use to do so. Perfectly legal.
While reading that, I was almost certain you were going to say, but the couple was homosexual and that was why you decided not to perform the wedding.
I would think, though, that this argument is not a better argument because you are actually crossing the line between the Separation of Church and State. In this case, the goverment really would not have a say in whether or not you chose to marry the couple. At least not yet.
Immie