There are no little things."Little things" are the hinges of the universe.
Fanny Fern
Pharmacist Conscience Laws
Picture this. You've had your annual exam and are taking your birth control prescription to the local Pharmacist to have it filled. You pass over the prescription only to hear the person behind the counter tell you that he/she will not fill the script because they object to it on moral grounds and they then proceed to hand back the prescription. Stunned, you think it is some sort of joke and hand back the paper. He/She hands it back and suggests you go elsewhere. What happened here?
This is the new Pharmacist Concience Law. If the Pharmacist morally objects to your prescription he/she can refuse to fill it. Period. And the law will back him/her up. Most people think, "who cares?" but let's think about this a minute... What if your local Pharmacist is against family planning? Good-bye birth control pills, Depo shots and maybe even condoms. Even if your DOCTOR prescribes them to you. What if the person behind the counter hates gay or lesbian people? Good-bye AZT or any other HIV type drug. What if you need medicine from an abortion? Nada. Scary, huh? I doubt any Pharmacist will find any moral objections to toe fungus or baldness, yet they can refuse to give you birth control so you won't become pregnant. What is to stop fundamentalists (of any faith...) from filling these jobs to enforce THEIR views of morality? What will happen to those in small towns with only one Pharmicist? What about prices? I realize many large chains are buying up the small drug stores, and these large chains will not allow such practices to occur, but what about those small drug stores that will not be bought out? I guess this seems pretty melodramatic, but I am more concerned that a law such as this could pass versus how upset I am that a pharmacist could go against doctors orders.
Doctors who refuse to treat patients due to personal beliefs lose their license. Policemen cannot refuse to help someone they might object to. So, why do Pharmacists get special treatment? Simple. Abortion, homosexual and feminist issues cannot "technically" be discriminated against, so the paranoid right created a "backdoor" law which gets around all those sticky Constitutional issues. Of course, these laws can later be used as a precident to protect that bigoted doctor who refused to treat a Pagan or refused to allow a woman to get her annual pill perscription. Get the picture?? This law allows prejudice and hatred to keep people from getting the medicine they might need. (What is to stop a person from refusing to give medicine because they hate the customer and then cover it up by a "moral objection"?). This is why anti-discrimination laws were created in the first place! This is supposed to be America...protected by the Constitution...yet this type of hate-filled law is allowed to pass. If a person cannot fill his/her job without moral qualms...THEN THEY SHOULD QUIT!!!! Do not use your position of power to discriminate! States have passed this law already (I can't remember which ones...sorry...), and others are looking at passing this within the year. CALL YOUR REPRESENTATIVE AND TELL THEM TO PROTECT YOUR RIGHTS AND NOT LET THIS LAW PASS, OR IF IT HAS TO REPEAL IT ON CONSTITUTIONAL GROUNDS!!! This law scares the BeeJezus out of me, and should out of you!
To flip through the pages of my BOS faster...
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Brightest of Blessings