Who Hijacked Our Country

Sunday, January 29, 2006

Biblehumpers and Witch-Hunters Have Rights Too

Four pharmacists are suing for their “right” to NOT fill prescriptions for the emergency morning-after birth control pill. Ironically, lots of conservatives — the same people who are always blubbering about “too many lawsuits” and “too much litigation” — are in favor of this lawsuit.

The Walgreen drugstore chain — complying with an Illinois state law — ordered all of its pharmacists to sign an electronic statement pledging that they would enable all emergency contraception prescriptions to be filled.

The Illinois law allows a pharmacist to refuse to fill a prescription, BUT the prescription must be referred to a co-worker who can quickly fill the prescription. Apparently this went against the “consciences” of four Walgreen pharmacists, who refused to sign the statement.

Here’s some career advice for the Four Douchebags: Become a minister, and get the F&%$#! out of the health care field. Either perform the job you’re being paid for, or find another job that doesn't offend your conscience. Duuuhhhhh!!!!!

What’s next, a vegetarian Burger King employee whose “conscience” won’t let him serve hamburgers? How about a devout Muslim working in a Bible store whose religious convictions won’t let him sell Bibles.

The Four Douchebags weren’t fired by Walgreen. They’ve been on unpaid leave since November, and they’ve been offered jobs at out-of-state Walgreen stores which wouldn’t be subject to the Illinois law.

Their lawsuit is being handled by the American Center for Law and Justice, an ultra-rightwing legal group which was founded by — you guessed it — Pat Robertson.

13 Comments:

Blogger Musicguy said...

well said! perhaps Mr. Robertson will hire them when Walgreen's fires them!

January 29, 2006 at 4:03 PM  
Blogger Francis W. Porretto said...

"Douchebags," eh? Gee, you're really courteous toward people who dissent from your preferences, aren't you?

January 29, 2006 at 5:02 PM  
Blogger Tom Harper said...

Music Guy: Yeah, that'd be poetic, Robertson hiring them.

Francis: They can "dissent" all they want, but they have no right to force their opinions on patients. If they want to pick and choose which prescriptions they'll honor, they're in the wrong line of work.

January 29, 2006 at 5:36 PM  
Blogger BlondeBlogger said...

"Ironically, lots of conservatives — the same people who are always blubbering about “too many lawsuits” and “too much litigation” — are in favor of this lawsuit."

Ironically, lots of liberals - the same people who are always blubbering about "freedom of choice" when it comes to killing babies- aren't in favor of freedom of choice for pharmacists.

January 29, 2006 at 5:48 PM  
Blogger spaceneedl said...

francis, you quibble with tom's language, but you don't bother to address the issue.

whatever field of work you're in, i doubt you'd be employed very long if you refused to do that job, or to serve the legitimate needs of the customer.

a pharmacy that picks and chooses which prescriptions to fill will soon be out of business. that's pretty straightforward, isn't it?

January 29, 2006 at 6:22 PM  
Blogger Tom Harper said...

WriteWingNut: Freedom of choice for pharmacists? Hey, that sounds like a cool line of work to go into, if you have freedom of choice on the job. I certainly never had freedom of choice at any of the jobs I've had. Guess I should have been a pharmacist.

Spaceneedl: Yup, you've got it. If there are any jobs where you can decide which customers you'll wait on and which tasks you'll do -- hey, that's where I want to work.

January 29, 2006 at 7:31 PM  
Blogger The Rambling Taoist said...

Hmm. George Bush seems to follow the "freedom of choice" meme to its extreme in relation to US laws. Maybe that's what gave the pharmacists the idea that they could do it too.

January 29, 2006 at 8:54 PM  
Blogger Tom Harper said...

Trey: Yeah, it's interesting who gets freedom of choice and who doesn't. Bush can decide which inquiries to cooperate with, which questions to answer; pharmacists can choose which medical patients to serve. But a desperate pregnant woman shouldn't have any choice in her own fate. Oookay.

January 29, 2006 at 9:05 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Tom
I wholeheartedly agree with your comments. I fully agree that bible thumpers and witch hunters have a right to their own views. After all this is America.

But when they get a job serving the public in a pharmacy, I don't agree that they should be able to unilaterally decide which medications they feel like dispensing.

I would hope that a lawsuit is filed in the near future to test this.

CoolAqua

January 30, 2006 at 10:37 PM  
Blogger Cathie said...

"Become a minister, and get the F&%$#! out of the health care field."

Amen to that. They can always get a job at Walmart selling cheap junk from China. No one is forcing them to work in the pharmacy.

January 31, 2006 at 9:21 AM  
Blogger Tom Harper said...

CoolAqua: Yup, people's religious rights are checked at the doorway when they report for work. That's the only way it can be; otherwise there'd be total chaos. Nobody's forced into a certain line of work, or to work for a certain company.

Daedalus: Amen. They can work where they want; it's up to them to find a job that doesn't clash with their beliefs.

January 31, 2006 at 11:45 AM  
Blogger Snave said...

Sounds like pharmacy was a good field to work in until those bad "liberals" came along. Bad, bad "liberals"! I tot I taw a "liberal"! I did, I did! I did taw a "liberal"!!! Baaaad old "liberal"!

Heehee...

Good post, Tom.

Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich (sp) should be commended for his actions against such nonsense in that state. I think the guy would be a good presidential candidate, but that he has a last name that folks with short attention spans wouldn't remember how to pronounce, so they'd just tend to forget about him.

But what about Bible-hunters and witch-humpers? Oh, I guess those are the "liberals". Heh... Those folks are so bad they must surely be out shooting Bibles and having sex with witches and

February 3, 2006 at 9:22 AM  
Blogger Tom Harper said...

Snave: Yup, pharmacy used to be a great field before those wicked liberals came along and ruined it. Used to be, you could just fill the prescriptions you wanted to fill, and if some cheap slut came in asking for (ugh!) birth control pills, you could turn on the fire and brimstone and then kick her out. And you could keep her prescription form and not give it back to her, so she isn't able to go and find a godless pharmacist somewhere who would give her the pills.

Those were the days. Them big-government, tax-and-spend Democrats are trying to ruin a good thing.

February 3, 2006 at 10:31 AM  

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