Sorry to be that guy, but is there a text-only way to read this article? I just can't handle the images, they're haunting me.
Katie's New Face
161–170 of 337 posts
Re: Katie's New Face
#162As a father to two so-far-healthy young boys, one soon to be a teenager I feel devastated at the thought of either of them having to endure the level of emotional chaos that Katie went through the moments leading up to her suicide attempt. My stomach goes into a knot at the thought. I mean gosh, it was a cheating boyfriend. I don't know what to do to protect them from such a path.
Perhaps if there are no instruments at hand that allow the young to act on such a disastrous suicidal impulse, at least some of these incidents could be prevented.
If you want to go that route, then you'll need to also remove the following instruments:
* Ropes or any kind of cords that can be used for hanging * Blades of any kind (kitchen knives, scissors, box cutters, utility knives, etc.) * Anything that can be sharpened into a point that can puncture flesh * Any kind of chemical substance that can be deadly in sufficient quantities. * Any bodies of water where one can drown * Any accessible point that is high enough for one to jump off of.
The list goes on. Eventually, the environment that is left would basically be a padded room in a psychiatric hospital in a straightjacket.
Re: Katie's New Face
#163Earlier quoted context omitted.
Make it opt-in. Then you give control away to the government deliberately. All it takes is a simple checkbox to say you want to be a part of it. It should be easier to receive mailing list spam, than it is to sign over your body, but opt-out makes it the other way around. Forgetting (or being unwilling to be forced) to sign a checkbox does not make one a willing participant, but an unwitting one. I understand this sa…
Bodies are a kind of use it or lose it deal. If you are buried, everything except your bones and teeth will be eaten. Organ donation is the least of your sovereignty problems.
Make it opt-in and secure, and I have no problem with it.
For instance, send a letter every 6 months where you tell of the social benefits of donating your organs and thank-you notes from receivers. Sponsor national organ donation days. Even properly aligned incentives: Make certain government-sponsored health care cheaper and more available for donors than non-donors.
But make any opt-in cryptographically verifiable, and signed with an e-ID. I really don't want my opt-out hacked during DEFCON 2023. And implement it correctly: often government attempts to curb self-ownership are well-intented (physical and mental healthcare), but ill-executed (block internet porn, close fast food restaurants, ban psychedelic drugs) and they compound.
I full well realize that anything that happens after my death is out of my hands. Even if I don't donate now and opt-out, maybe in a 1000 years they can clone some of my DNA to grow new organs. It is purely about opt-in vs. opt-out for me (and about democratically consulting the majority opinion on an opt-out).
Opt-out (happens during life and on life-support) of self-ownership [1] is, to me, a violation of human rights. One of the most fundamental and innate rights, which should be a given (but could be opted out of by opting-in for donorship). To partly take away a right, unless you say "no!" sets a dangerous precedent.
> Everyone's right to life shall be protected by law. No-one shall be deprived of his life intentionally save in the execution of a sentence of a court following his conviction of a crime for which this penalty is provided by law. - Human Rights Act 1998
> The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. [not: are beneficial to others, unless you want to posit that opting out of donorship injures others in need] - Jefferson
Re: Katie's New Face
#164As a father to two so-far-healthy young boys, one soon to be a teenager I feel devastated at the thought of either of them having to endure the level of emotional chaos that Katie went through the moments leading up to her suicide attempt. My stomach goes into a knot at the thought. I mean gosh, it was a cheating boyfriend. I don't know what to do to protect them from such a path.
I hear you (I also have kids) but I always feel like the level of hype here is 75% about that pretty, white "before" photo. Yes it is tragic but what about the 1000s of disadvantaged kids that yearly fall into crime and drugs, ruining their lives, being incarcerated or killed, because of institutionalized indifference to the poor non-white members of our society and the corresponding negative feedback loops that trap…
While I agree with you that stories about the plight of the underprivileged are certainly underreported, I strongly disagree with you that most of the hype around this story is due to race. Face transplant is a very new, highly risky, and highly experimental medical procedure that only recently became viable. There is an extremely non-trivial amount of scientific research, R&D, and funding that has gone into developing this procedure, and this story is nothing short of groundbreaking, regardless of the race of the patient.
For this particular instance, I think your claim is essentially the inverse of #whataboutism.
Re: Katie's New Face
#165If you have children, don't own guns.
She went to her brother's place. It was his hunting rifle. Do you comment on stories about Nikki Catsouras that her family should not have owned a Porsche? Or a car at all?
If you're curious like me and wanted to know what happened to Nikki Catsouras, skip it. There are some _extremely_ gruesome images that come up when you search for the incident.
Re: Katie's New Face
#166Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think I remember reading that the DoD deserves credit for the entire field of plastic surgery, it was originally pioneered to help soldiers who had suffered disfigurement in combat. Only later did it become something for civilian augmentation.
I don't know about the history of plastic surgery in the US, but in Germany apparently a lot of the plastic surgery for veterans was based on experience treating coal miners. Due to the frequent and horrific injuries, some coal mines had extremely good surgical teams and a lot of experience in reconstructive surgery.
Well, I’ll forgo the proper words to describe how the US treats it’s coal miners, but one suffering from black lung disease would often have to go through the court system just to get an appointment with a doctor.
I think it’s safe to say your experience in Germany does not apply here.
Re: Katie's New Face
#167Re: Katie's New Face
#168Jesus that was difficult. How the hell did she even survive the gunshot wound?
Looks like she aimed almost completely parallel to her skull, causing the bullet to expend most of its energy on bone. It barely had any energy left by the time it reached her brain.
Her choice of aim was likely just the first thing to come to mind, given her short stature compared to the length of a Remington rifle.
Had she thought on this one iota more, tilted her neck down and placed the muzzle onto her forehead ... the result would have been very different.
I should also point out that since a bolt-action .308 is just about one of the worst possible civilian weapons to use for home-defense, and that therefore it was likely a hunting tool ... there was no excuse for this gun and its ammunition to be kept in an insecure manner.
Re: Katie's New Face
#169woah-also this really like-viscerally demonstrates the destructive power of rifles.
Yeah, so destructive she took a head shot and lived.
Re: Katie's New Face
#170woah-also this really like-viscerally demonstrates the destructive power of rifles.
Indeed. If you're hunting large animals, you want to cause plenty of destruction to a vital location in a single shot, so that the animal dies quickly and humanely. (And you certainly don't shoot at their face, parallel to their face.)
If you own dangerous tools that don't happen to be useful outside hunting (bolt-action, small magazine, high-penetration cartridges), you also want to store the dangerous tool in a secure manner. That clearly was not the case in this story.