We had an activity in class the other day that got me thinking about human dignity. We were learning about politics and how the dominant members of the community can sway a decision one way or another; and how this concept also applies in organisations.
The activity was to debate on the following question:
In 1943 (WW2 era), penicillin which is used for the prevention of infection, was in short supply among the allied arm forces in North Africa. Decisions had to made whether to use this meager supply for the thousands of hospitalized victims of venereal disease or for the thousands of victims of battle wounds at the front. If you were a member of a team of medical and military personnel, whom would you use the penicillin for? The victims of venereal disease or the victims of battle wounds?
* excerpted from D Johnson and F Johnson (1987), Joining together 3rd edition
I was placed in the group of medical personnel who argues for the battle-wounded. We were supposed to stick to our guns unless logically persuaded otherwise and to achieve consensus on who gets the penicillin.
At first, I thought that I was arguing for soldiers who are wounded in battle and that the victims of venereal disease were civilians. In fact, both the VD victims and the battle-wounded were soldiers who were hospitalized due to different reasons.
Anyway, the two other girls in my group were locals and they argued with passion and conviction that we were on the 'right side' to give the penicillin to the wounded soldiers. The other team were from India and Sri Lanka so they were also arguing passionately for the penicillin to be given to the soldiers with VD. Their main argument was that these soldiers could recuperate within 1 day whereas the battle-wounded soldiers might take weeks, even months to recover. So based on the recuperation time, if we wanted to have enough troops to fight the war, the soldiers with VD would be able to join the troops faster than those who had to recuperate from their injuries.
Then our team argued about why we should allow soldiers who got wounded while fighting should be passed over for soldiers who are in the hospital for not practising safe sex and who probably visited brothels, etc. Our argument was on the moral viewpoint that just because they can recover faster does not mean that they deserve the penicillin more than their wounded counterparts. Furthermore, those who were out there fighting were always keeping an eye on what our decisions may be. If they thought that we preferred to give medical treatment to irresponsible soldiers rather than those who fought and were still fighting on the battlefield, what would become of their morale?
After a good 20 minutes of arguing and banging tables and raised voices (what can I say, we were a passionate group), we started to really talk about the issue and the best way to come to a mutual decision. I said that we should probably categorise the soldiers according to the severity of their symptoms (for both VD and injuries) to see who needed it most. Those with less severe symptoms could probably try other anti-bacterial remedies like quinine, etc. (My background in Health Science and my one semester in medical school probably helped with these recommendations)
My team mate said why don't we just share the penicillin around and everyone gets half or less than a dosage. Another one said give it to those who are not so severely ill so that they can recover faster and help us fight the war. Another said we should just force those soldiers with VD to fight because the worst that can happen is that they cannot pee.
Anyway, the group who were arguing to give the penicillin to the soldiers with VD finally said that the penicillin should be given to the battle-wounded. I guess our group 'won' the argument because we were louder and more intimidating. This made me think about power and how we went out of our way to assert our power over the other group. We used job titles, 'medical expertise', loud voices and refused to listen to the other group in order to get our way. I guess we took the 'stick to our guns' instruction literally.
I suppose all our suggestions could have been used but the crux of the matter is that you can't save everyone. So who should get the medicine? And who should decide? The ones with the power I guess.
I couldn't help thinking that this was probably how they argued who to give medicine to in times when there just isn't enough to go around. If you were on the dominant team, you would have gotten your way. Just like how the other team conceded to our team, I wonder if we would have conceded to the other team if they were more dominant. And what happens to the dignity of the soldiers? They were all sick and they would all die if they were not medicated properly. What is more important? The war or the people?
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