Listen / Read
Jeez, that’s going to be such a chick flick. Fuck that shit. Even if Alec Baldwin is in it. I would rather have a kidney cut out and stuck in a complete stranger.
I’m going to a comedy club with a friend later. He’s meeting me there because he’s giving blood beforehand. He gives blood all the time. He’s not remotely religious, it’s just something he does. A lot of people do it. A lot more than 22. He doesn’t go on about it and he doesn’t think highly of himself for it, but I don’t think he should think any less of himself for not giving a kidney away. He’s in a long-term relationship and it’ll not be so very long before he and his girlfriend start trying for a baby. He has a family to think of in the long-term, and putting his own health at risk for a stranger would be a selfish thing to do from their perspective.
I guess that’s why only 22 people have done it in the last couple of years. Most people have loved ones they have to put before the needs of others. It’s all very well Fraser dismissing the consideration of an emotional context, but there’s obviously something unusual about these people for them to be members of such a small club. Perhaps they have no dependants to worry about, no one close to them to put first before the needs of a stranger. Perhaps they lost a loved one due to a donor organ shortfall.
I wouldn’t for a moment want to reduce such a singularly selfless sacrifice, but as well as appreciating those few in a position to take that kind of risk for a stranger, we should be grateful to the far greater number of people who help sustain the blood supplies needed to save the lives of a still greater number of strangers they will never meet.