Are you ****ing kidding me? Your warped definition of irresponsible equals carrying a line of credit and paying it off? That is what you consider irresponsible? Paying off a debt?
Nope, paying off your debt is responsible. What was NOT responsible is getting yourself into that situation, and putting the hospital into a situation where they had to choose between not getting paid in a timely manner or not helping you at all.
Your attempts to equate this to a regular line of credit are NOT valid. This is not an auto loan, where you had collateral and where the car dealer knew you weren't going to die or be sick without the car.
For one thing, the hospital helped you against their own business interests merely because they were sympathetic to your situation. Put yourself in their position and look at it from a purely business perspective: If someone earning $12K per year wanted you to give them an expensive medical treatment and promised to gradually pay it off over time, what would YOUR answer be? From a business perspective only.
For another thing, you had no collateral. If you default on an auto loan, they repossess your car. If you default on a mortgage, they foreclose on your house. If you default on a medical loan, they cannot repossess your body.
Finally, a hospital is not a bank. The fact that you didn't carry insurance and just relied on the hospital to temporarily forgo their payment for services rendered, is the height of irresponsibility.
The only reason your situation worked out was because A) the hospital felt sorry for you, and B) you took advantage of their sympathy. If you're going to argue that the system is fine, that people just need to be responsible, and that people don't need health insurance, you'd do well not to mention your personal situation, since you exemplify exactly the opposite.
I mean, really. I've read some silly **** on here and this is next in the stupid line right after 1069s claim that one is "responsible and independent" if they live off the government.
You're basically arguing that you were responsible and independent because you lived off the hospital for a while. That's hardly much better.