[Surgical assistant asks for advice on if they are bound by their belief to not assist a transition surgery]
Hi,
What the surgeon is doing it attacking a healthy organ, the man’s breasts, and mutilating them. There is no disease there. This is immoral and a sin.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church states: “Except when performed for strictly therapeutic medical reasons, directly intended amputations, mutilations, and sterilizations performed on innocent persons are against the moral law.” It quotes Densinger 3722 here.
So yes, I suggest that you refuse.
29 comments
"strictly therapeutic medical reasons"
I have no doubt this will include a situation where the 'problem' is psycological as well as physical. As long as the patent has a genuine problem which this surgery will solve, and the medical establishment recognises this problem as a genuine medical condition, you are within the exception in the quoted Catechism and should perform the procedure.
Same principle applies to removing breasts/ovaries/etc from those with a high chance of cancer.
Black letter lawyers FTW
directly intended amputations
So haircuts and cutting toenails and fingernails is out?
What about a nose job?
Where's the line? O yes, it's subjective, off the cuff. Moral law my ass.
“Except when performed for strictly therapeutic medical reasons, directly intended amputations, mutilations, and sterilizations performed on innocent persons are against the moral law.”
Like circumcision?
The surgeon wouldn't be performing the surgery if it weren't for strictly therapeutic medical reasons.
But why do I get the feeling this person wouldn't refuse to participate in a breast augmentation surgery or a facelift, which wouldn't be for "strictly therapeutic medical reasons?"
I would suggest they find another job since they're so unreliable. If your superstitions come first then you have no business in the medical field.
As for the moron responding to them, I would say that it's not mutilations if one wants the alteration. Or are they saying that pierced ears and dyed hair are mutilations, too?
Oh, come on. Transition surgeries are extremely rare and usually performed by expert plastic surgeons with experience. If you went to work for an expert in transition surgeries then refused to assist in them, you're an idiot. If you work for a normal plastic surgeon, you're a hypocrite. Otherwise this is probably the first and only time it will come up. Politely and respectfully excuse yourself and line up another assistant. Since these surgeries are really rare, your boss won't care and patient care won't be impacted.
Doesn't that also apply to face lifts and tummy tucks and boob jobs? None of these are to cure a disease, all elective procedures. What about rhinoplasty? Cleft palate? Club foot? What about laser eye surgery? Varicose veins? Hip replacements? Rotator cuff? Spinal decompression? Most of these things would fall under the category of Not "Diseased", but they are still all necessary for a person's well-being. If one has tender dainty itty-bitty scruples about all elective surgeries, one would be advised to find some other line of work.
Ear piercing?
Liposuction?
Nose jobs?
Basiorana has it right, this is never going to come up unless the SA works at a specialized clinic. You wouldn't be hired in the first place unless you were supportive of people who transition.
On the other hand, if someone who doesn't fit your quaint little concepts of binary sexuality is in the hospital for some other reason, and you balk at helping them, you should be fired. Hospitals routinely treat injured people who are convicted criminals, where are your religious feelings then?
@nazani14
"On the other hand, if someone who doesn't fit your quaint little concepts of binary sexuality is in the hospital for some other reason, and you balk at helping them, you should be fired."
Unless you're in a catholic hospital, in which case the doctor will be fired for helping them.
I know a guy who had a bad accident, and the usual treatment wasn't working. It turned out he was one of those non-binary people, his condition made the usual treatment useless.
The (catholic) hospital ordered the doctors to continue the standard treatment because his non-binary condition was, in catholic theology, non-existent.
@ Mister Spak
Goddamned that's fucked up.
Was he ok? Was he able to go to a hospital that wasn't willing to sacrifice the lives of their patients by blindly following the tenants of an intangible, unprovable spirit despite being stared in the face by concrete proof of that spirits lack of omniscience?
Actually I believe any surgeon can and DOES refuse to do this under the designation of ELECTIVE SURGERY.
Surgeons DON'T do EVERY fucking surgical procedure until the threat of "or lose your job". Surgeons are specialists, and usually specialize to specific disciplines. Some ONLY do nose jobs Others Boobs.
Cosmetic surgeons are often the sex change experts. EXPERTS, and they can even be team effort involved in the process of a sex change. If it was simple I could give you a quick layman explanation "We just cut the ball sack right off, split the dick in half, remove the insides, shut that vein off, cut the urethra back and shove what's left up near his taint".
Can I do your Hernia operation? I'm so skilled.
There's pharmaceutical processes involved before and after for one thing. Sex change people need tons of money for the procedureS and the follow up chemical backups.
Vague and potentially hypocritical as the statement is, I would much rather that this guy recuse himself from performing an operation he is uncomfortable with.
Whether that violates his terms of employment or negatively impacts patient care should be up to his employers.
I might have forgot to mention it before surgery, but I'm bound by my belief in socialised medicine not to pay this hospital bill.
Yeah, I can see that working. Hey, if I can't philosophically excuse myself from paying, you can't philosophically excuse yourself from cutting.
Confused?
So were we! You can find all of this, and more, on Fundies Say the Darndest Things!
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