Sunday, July 15, 2007

To the anti-Michael Moore fans about Sicko

I was moved by this film and loved it, and feel empowered by it, but I also don't really care about the health care debate either.

I imagine that if in France, everyone gets unlimited sick leave, there's going to be abuse of that system and stuff and I'm sure there are pros and cons about universal health care. I also have never had problems with the U.S. Health system because I think my parents just probably have good coverage, who knows.

I have however had problems with the U.S. legal system (I once felt mistreated by my own lawyers when I needed legal representation a little while back) and can relate to this film in the sense of greedy professions that lost sight of the little guy a long time ago (which I feel can often plague the law community).

But more than that, I don't think this movie is just about the little details. It's about, "Sticking it to the man," as Jack Black says in School of Rock, or moreover, being critical of our government and the C.E.O.s of large companies. I don't know about the specifics, but it's obvious that the C.E.O.'s of companies don't care about most of the people under them and at least, that needs to change.

Whether we go for universal healthcare or not, I don't want to see people being kicked out into the streets of L.A. because they can't pay for hospital bills. I don't want to see a medical community who treats human beings as economic commodities and tries in every way possible to cheat them out of their insurance so they can have money in their pocket. I do not want to live in a system, where doctors are rewarded for letting their patients die. Do you? Can we at least agree on this?

I mean you can debate whether these things actually happen and maybe if too much is lost by finding a better solution, but can we at least start there? Can we at be united on the front that hospitals who want their patients to die so they can profit from it is not a good thing? I don't care about anything else. You can point out that hospitals usually like their patients to live and support that with a set of facts like Michael Moore does, and if you showed me that, I'd be even happier because I'd know that the problem isn't as serious as I thought it was. I also think we can debate whether France, England, Canada and Cuba are actually better than us, but don't you agree it's a great thing Michael Moore does by raising those questions and showing us those systems so we can see for ourselves?

3 comments:

Livingsword said...

As a Canadian I can tell you there are just as many problems with our medical system as there is with the American system. The waiting lists here for treatment are outrageous. Many people cross the boarder to the US for medical care so they will not have to wait for say a hip replacement in 14 months when they can get it one day in the States. If you are in an “emergency” you get immediate care but if it something that can “wait” you end up waiting a long time.

The positive is everybody is covered, but if I almost never use the system I am still paying the same as everybody else that uses it all the time. People take the attitude that it is “free” when tax dollars are paying for it so the system gets abused. You will not get the kind of innovation that you currently have in the US because the rewards for R&D are limited under this kind of system. Probably a hybrid Canadian-American system would be the best.

Since there is a cap on how much doctors can make many leave the country to places where they can be properly rewarded for their expertise, and hard work.

Just like Moore lied about the crime rate in Canada in his other movie you can’t believe much of what he says; so then what do you do with his “documentaries”? The problem is they are not documentaries, they are just propaganda.

People in the medical field up here (half my relatives and friends fall into this category) think Moore is an idiot.

sophomorecritic said...

That´s interesting but you missed the point of my post. I don´t support Michael Moore because he has great views on the medical system, i support michael moore because he´s critical and encourages us to be critical of the way things are done in this country. We can disagree or agree with him, but at least we´ll be thinking of it openly and discussing it

Livingsword said...

I understand your point, but the fact that he is deceptive means most earnest, honest people will disregard the situation, much like Gore and the environment (another very important issue). They provide such a large political out that people do not take it seriously and move away from the topic.