Michigan lesbian couple says pediatrician denied baby care due to sexual orientation

Re: Michigan lesbian couple says pediatrician denied baby care due to sexual orientat

prometeus said:

Of course I do I used to date her...
But why are yo making this stuff up?

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Because hypocrisy is the tribute vice pays to virtue

tb knows that this sort of bigotry is despicable, but since the doctor is presumably a right winger, partisanship forbids her from criticizing the doctor. And so, she has to pretend that this about a doctor hurting someone's feelings, and not about discrimination. She has to pretend that it's because the doctor could provide the proper bedside manner, and not the doctor could not provide the proper bedside manner because the parents were lesbians

She knows that if she admitted this was all because the parents were lesbians, she'd be admitting that she's condoning bigotry.

Re: Bigotry is well and alive even among doctors.

Henrin said:

Indeed, and it does a considerable amount of harm and thus violates their oath. It also doesn't treat or cure the condition, but instead deals with the side effects of the condition. :shrug:

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What condition exactly is circumcisions, which is what I was referring to, dealing with?

Re: Bigotry is well and alive even among doctors.

prometeus said:

By the way how do you feel about being humiliated? Does it just roll of your back, do you feel angry, even a desire to even the score?

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It's not about humiliation or any other feeling

It's about "separate but equal". It's about "one set of providers for one group and another set for everyone else". It's about segregation.

Re: Bigotry is well and alive even among doctors.

clownboy said:

No, the refusing doctor was NOT "medically wrong". And her reason could just as well been because the parents were daredevils, or professional beggars, or never bathed. The doctor couldn't face the parents' lifestyle, so the medical group provided another doctor that could to cover this patient.

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Ack, I just posted something very similar to that. The issue here isn't that the baby was seen by her partner - it's that people are angry at the doctor because she doesn't like the gay lifestyle.

Who cares who likes who? I didn't care about anyone's opinion on my husband when I decided to marry him. And if someone didn't want to be around me because they didn't like him, fine - I wouldn't want to be around those people either. This is nothing but an emotionally charged debate and an emotionally charged thread because people are fuming that some doctor in Michigan doesn't like 2 women who got married.

Re: Bigotry is well and alive even among doctors.

The lgbt set seems to be going through that same asshole phase that some smokers who have recently quit go through where they smell smoke everywhere and are offended by it.

Re: Bigotry is well and alive even among doctors.

roguenuke said:

What condition exactly is circumcisions, which is what I was referring to, dealing with?

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That isn't what he was referring to. As for your argument, male circumcision has been proven to be harmful to the patient and unnecessary. It is very much a breach of the oath for a doctor to circumcise a newborn baby boy.

Re: Bigotry is well and alive even among doctors.

Lursa said:

You are obviously not reading my posts at all. I never said that. (bold, like in other post)

However the point I'm trying to make is....what if it was an emergency situation? "Hypothetical" does not mean "without value." This incident happened...is it your position that it would never happen in a life or death situation?

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Your questions seems perfectly reasonable to me. I think we are talking about a principle here - do doctors have an obligation to treat patients without regard to their sexual orientation? If the answer is an unequivocal "NO!" then that answer applies in cases of emergency, i.e. in the ER, when there might not be another doctor within 100 miles, there might not be another doctor covered by the person's insurance, etc.

If the answer is, "No, but.... " then the relevant next question is 'what are the exceptions?' No, they're not obligated to in cases where the child is not at risk BUT would be in the ER. Or they would not be obligated so long as another doctor was available for this child, but if she was the only physician within 100 miles, she DOES have an obligation or at least a higher obligation to ignore sexual orientation of the parents. Etc.

I thought about it and in this case it worked out well for everyone, IMO. I wouldn't want to see a doctor who held me and/or my spouse in contempt in some ways. So the couple have a doctor who respects them and their child - all that's good. But the problem in saying it worked out fine here, so there is no issue with physicians declining to treat LGBT patients, is that if this is based on principle and not the results IN THIS CASE, then the principle has to apply when it will or could cause substantial harm to the couple or their child. Or else people should be willing to identify the exceptions to the principle.

Re: Bigotry is well and alive even among doctors.

tres borrachos said:

Ack, I just posted something very similar to that. The issue here isn't that the baby was seen by her partner - it's that people are angry at the doctor because she doesn't like the gay lifestyle.

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She specifically stated that it was because she objected on religious grounds. And that is recognized and protected under the law. Not liking an imaginary lifestyle is not protected.

It's not about whether or not the kid was just handed off to a partner. It's about doctors being allowed to refuse treatment based on their religious beliefs.

That's the whole thing, in a nutshell. People like yourself choosing to minimize it just because there was a safety net (partner) for the child in this case by no means indicates that there will be for other situations where doctors refuse service due to their religious beliefs. So the legitimacy of her actions will be examined by the courts so that laws or policies can be put in place to address such situations in the future.

Feel free to ignore the part in blue. You already said that you dont feel it's relevant to the OP. I wrote it because it demonstrates why the OP has broader context *in real life.*

Re: Bigotry is well and alive even among doctors.

Hicup said:

They are, but the state has said, it doesn't matter, you must provide emergency care if you're a doctor, pure and simple, really.

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Not quite. The state said nothing about doctors not on duty in an emergency room, but so we are on the same page, please quote the relevant law or rule.

That's a false dichotomy, and as such invalid on its face.

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Not really, as it is the natural next step in that line of reasoning.

Again, I point to the delusion that one must feel, thinking that everyone must be accepting of homosexuality.

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The delusion if any must be entirely yours, as not I or anyone else has asked anyone and you in particular to accept anything.

The truth is that, not everyone agrees with your lifestyle choice

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No the truth is that you know nothing about my lifestyle nor is ti the topic of this discussion. So quite frankly I do not give a crap about who does or does not agree with it. Now if you can stop with the delusions, as you put it, can you remain on topic?

Rhetoric aside, do you not interview a doctor before choosing them? For that matter, do you not interview any one person providing a service? I do all the time.

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Perhaps if you took the effort to familiarize yourself with all aspects of the issue, you too could realize that the doctor in question has seen them in a pre-natal visit. So clearly the doctor had a change of heart subsequently. By the way, I am curious, do you ask your doctor about sexual preferences, inclinations, likes of oral sex and usage of toys, locations and positions, number of partners etc. etc. I'd love to know how well you fare with that.

Again, this was not an emergency situation so your analogy fails.

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No one said it was and there is little if any difference from a faith perspective.

Because the simple truth is that not everyone thinks homosexuals are as wholesome as some would lead you to believe.

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Good for them and BS. Were you ever asked to partake?

Re: Bigotry is well and alive even among doctors.

Lursa said:

She specifically stated that it was because she objected on religious grounds. And that is recognized and protected under the law. Not liking an imaginary lifestyle is not protected.

It's not about whether or not the kid was just handed off to a partner. It's about doctors being allowed to refuse treatment based on their religious beliefs.

That's the whole thing, in a nutshell. People like yourself choosing to minimize it just because there was a safety net (partner) for the child in this case by no means indicates that there will be for other situations where doctors refuse service due to their religious beliefs. So the legitimacy of her actions will be examined by the courts so that laws or policies can be put in place to address such situations in the future.

Feel free to ignore the part in blue. You already said that you dont feel it's relevant to the OP. I wrote it because it demonstrates why the OP has broader context *in real life.*

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Yes, I know Lursa. The laws say you can't discriminate based on sexual orientation. And somewhere in this world there may be a rogue doctor who tries it and someone dies. That isn't what I'm arguing. What I'm pointing out is that nobody cares about the baby, the baby's care, or that the baby had to see another doctor in the same practice. People are pissed because someone has religious beliefs that make her oppose gay marriage.

In other words, she could have refused to see this baby for any reason, as long as it wasn't based on her religion. I'm a completely non-religious person myself and I support gay marriage, but I also don't get dramatic over those who don't feel as I do.

Re: Bigotry is well and alive even among doctors.

clownboy said:

Let's be clear, this wasn't about emergency care, heck this wasn't even a doctor's appointment for something wrong, it was a standard wellness check. Also, the child was immediately seen for the check by another doctor in the same group. The parents didn't even need to reschedule. They easily found another HMO to treat them going forward.

This is mountain out of molehill time.

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Yes, a standard wellness check that really is important to have done on time and can be crucial to diagnosing certain conditions such as autism, but only in those appointments during the first 6 months. We can detect autistic visual cues very early in that first 6 months, if doctors actually start using the proper tests/charts.

New study detects signs of autism in infants by their declining eye contact | Society | The Guardian

Doctors studying autism have found that those with autism tend to look at people's faces much more often in the first months of their lives and rapidly decline to looking mainly at objects, while those who are not autistic work their way up to looking at people's faces much more often as they age than they look at objects.

So this would mean that if a parent had to put off those first wellness checks because a doctor refused to see their baby because of something against them the doctor had, that could possibly cause them more hardship in the future by not having something potentially diagnosed in those first few months. This isn't some fantasy hypothetical either. There are places with very few local doctors and/or that have mainly doctors that are like this one. And since the insurance company (including Medicaid) decides which doctors they will pay for, this limits a person's choices. With the increase in wait time for at least some areas for appointments, not to mention busy schedules of today's parents, it could mean appointments that are vital to diagnosing things like autism in those first 6 months are missed so that then they have to wait for the more subtle cues and delay actually getting proper help to a child in times when it could make a difference for many diagnoses, both physical and mental health wise.

Re: Bigotry is well and alive even among doctors.

Henrin said:

So you ran out of things to say to defend your entitled mindset. Good to know.

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No, I am still waiting for you to come up with something relevant and real. So far your rants are not even close.

Re: Bigotry is well and alive even among doctors.

prometeus said:

So you would deny firemen the same freedom you advocate for this doctor because you do want to save your house. How noble of you.

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When it's not their ass on the line, it's all about principle.

When it is, it's all about "save my ass and to hell with principle"

Remember, hypocrisy is the tribute vice pays to virtue

Re: Bigotry is well and alive even among doctors.

clownboy said:

And really, what parent that's worth two ****s wants to have a doctor who is opposed to the choices they've made as people to be the main source of medical care for their precious child?

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The doctor, if professional, will not allow their disapproval of the parents be a hindrance to the care they give to the child. What kind of a idiot doctor cannot separate their personal feelings about something they aren't involved in from caring for their patient? What exactly would she tell opposite sex parents about their child that she couldn't tell same sex parents about caring for theirs?

Re: Bigotry is well and alive even among doctors.

JasperL said:

Your questions seems perfectly reasonable to me. I think we are talking about a principle here - do doctors have an obligation to treat patients without regard to their sexual orientation? If the answer is an unequivocal "NO!" then that answer applies in cases of emergency, i.e. in the ER, when there might not be another doctor within 100 miles, there might not be another doctor covered by the person's insurance, etc.

If the answer is, "No, but.... " then the relevant next question is 'what are the exceptions?' No, they're not obligated to in cases where the child is not at risk BUT would be in the ER. Or they would not be obligated so long as another doctor was available for this child, but if she was the only physician within 100 miles, she DOES have an obligation or at least a higher obligation to ignore sexual orientation of the parents. Etc.

I thought about it and in this case it worked out well for everyone, IMO. I wouldn't want to see a doctor who held me and/or my spouse in contempt in some ways. So the couple have a doctor who respects them and their child - all that's good. But the problem in saying it worked out fine here, so there is no issue with physicians declining to treat LGBT patients, is that if this is based on principle and not the results IN THIS CASE, then the principle has to apply when it will or could cause substantial harm to the couple or their child. Or else people should be willing to identify the exceptions to the principle.

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I think a more realistic example would be if the cops responded to a domestic abuse case and it was a gay couple. And they 'chose' not to assist because they objected on religious grounds. While I doubt that would be their real reason, they could their religious beliefs as an excuse.

Re: Bigotry is well and alive even among doctors.

AliHajiSheik said:

No confusion, just a difference of opinion.

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Yes, confusion. You think this is about "forcing people to do stuff they don't want to do because someone else thinks they should"

Re: Bigotry is well and alive even among doctors.

roguenuke said:

Yes, a standard wellness check that really is important to have done on time and can be crucial to diagnosing certain conditions such as autism, but only in those appointments during the first 6 months. We can detect autistic visual cues very early in that first 6 months, if doctors actually start using the proper tests/charts.

New study detects signs of autism in infants by their declining eye contact | Society | The Guardian

Doctors studying autism have found that those with autism tend to look at people's faces much more often in the first months of their lives and rapidly decline to looking mainly at objects, while those who are not autistic work their way up to looking at people's faces much more often as they age than they look at objects.

So this would mean that if a parent had to put off those first wellness checks because a doctor refused to see their baby because of something against them the doctor had, that could possibly cause them more hardship in the future by not having something potentially diagnosed in those first few months. This isn't some fantasy hypothetical either. There are places with very few local doctors and/or that have mainly doctors that are like this one. And since the insurance company (including Medicaid) decides which doctors they will pay for, this limits a person's choices. With the increase in wait time for at least some areas for appointments, not to mention busy schedules of today's parents, it could mean appointments that are vital to diagnosing things like autism in those first 6 months are missed so that then they have to wait for the more subtle cues and delay actually getting proper help to a child in times when it could make a difference for many diagnoses, both physical and mental health wise.

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You went into depth creating that huge strawman there. No appointments were missed or rescheduled. The child had their scheduled appointment and could have scheduled more, but the parents chose to go to another peds group for the future.

Re: Bigotry is well and alive even among doctors.

tres borrachos said:

So where in Michigan are these dying people being turned out in the emergency rooms because of sexual orientation?

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"Separate water fountains for black people are OK because no black people died because they couldn't use the whites only water fountain"

Re: Bigotry is well and alive even among doctors.

Lursa said:

I think a more realistic example would be if the cops responded to a domestic abuse case and it was a gay couple. And they 'chose' not to assist because they objected on religious grounds. While I doubt that would be their real reason, they could their religious beliefs as an excuse.

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Should cops be allowed to respond to a domestic abuse case and choose not to assist for any reason? And if so, what are those reasons?

Re: Bigotry is well and alive even among doctors.

sangha said:

Yes, confusion. You think this is about "forcing people to do stuff they don't want to do because someone else thinks they should"

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Still a difference of opinion. In terms of this subject, that is exactly what people want.

Re: Bigotry is well and alive even among doctors.

clownboy said:

You went into depth creating that huge strawman there. No appointments were missed or rescheduled. The child had their scheduled appointment and could have scheduled more, but the parents chose to go to another peds group for the future.

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The baby at the center of this story got a wellness check from the other doctor in the same practice at the same time and on the same date and in the same location as the scheduled appointment with the original doctor.

Why does this thread keep going off the rails with hypotheticals?

Re: Bigotry is well and alive even among doctors.

tres borrachos said:

Yes, I know Lursa. The laws say you can't discriminate based on sexual orientation.

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No, not in every state. I dont know about Michigan.

However it is clear from the OP, the doctor and the legal case, that it's based on *her stated* religious beliefs. Now...why are you going off on a tangent?

Is it your opinion she did it based on bigotry towards gays?

Re: Bigotry is well and alive even among doctors.

roguenuke said:

The doctor, if professional, will not allow their disapproval of the parents be a hindrance to the care they give to the child. What kind of a idiot doctor cannot separate their personal feelings about something they aren't involved in from caring for their patient? What exactly would she tell opposite sex parents about their child that she couldn't tell same sex parents about caring for theirs?

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A HUMAN doctor. And this is yet another advantage to working in a medical GROUP. If you don't like the doctor, or the doctor doesn't like you, there are more doctors in the group. And again, what ****ed up parents want their child's doctor to be someone who objects to their lifestyle?

Re: Bigotry is well and alive even among doctors.

SmokeAndMirrors said:

I mentioned nothing about abortion. I mentioned the implications of pregnancies women are not prepared for, whether they birth or abort or even miscarry.

I notice you're still ignoring the clear implication here.

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That would be consistent with her ignoring that this is about discrimination and segregation, and not about someone having to see another doctor

Re: Bigotry is well and alive even among doctors.

sangha said:

"Separate water fountains for black people are OK because no black people died because they couldn't use the whites only water fountain"

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Doesn't at all answer the question:

Originally Posted by tres borrachos View Post

So where in Michigan are these dying people being turned out in the emergency rooms because of sexual orientation?

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