 |
 |
Jacob wrote: >Indeed, Bob. Most of the responses might have been quite different if the >writers would have known if they knew how it came about. >I will tell them now. I would be very surprised indeed if most of the respondents to Jacob's "cure NOW!!" posting were not aware of the cause of his Parkinsonism. He has made no secret of it and has mentioned it several times in the nearly 2 years I have been a member. Whilst I applaud the courage shown by his openness on the subject, I am saddened that anyone feels that he should be treated differently because of the way in which he contracted the disease. This implies that there is some sort of hierarchy involved, some sense in which some of us are more worthy than others. This is an easy trap to fall into. Jacob himself fell into it in his own original posting which implied that he was more worthy of a cure than others on the list because he was losing more of his life to PD than those of us who were diagnosed at a later stage in life. But how could we measure such things even if we wanted to? - Does my idiopathic PD score higher than Jacobs self inflicted carbon monoxide poisoning induced PD. And if it does why do we hold someone like Christopher Reeves in such high esteem when he too is in the condition he is because he did something dangerous by his own choice. (see note below) - Does Jacob's early onset get him more points than my later presentation at the ripe old age of 37? - Do my 2 children who were only 7 yrs old and minus 3 months (she was born 3 months after I was diagnosed ) at the time of my diagnosis and whose lives have been as much altered as mine, give me bonus points. - do we allocate more points for tremor dominated or for bradykinesia dominated PD. - does someone like Ali get more points because PD has robbed him of a body once tuned to the highest level of fitness and athleticism whilst all I lost was one that tended to get out of breath at any exercise more strenuous than turning a hamburger. I find it hard to believe that anyone seriously believes that some of us "are more equal than others" (though Jim Finn might possibly make a case for himself <grin> ). PD just is. It doesn't discriminate, and neither should we. Dennis Note on Christopher Reeve: Before anyone leaps to CR's defence, I am full of admiration for his courage and positiveness in the face of huge challenges. My point is that he chose to do something which he must have known carried a risk, yet no-one is suggesting that his paralysis is somehow inferior to that of someone paralysed as the result of, for example, an accident to a bus in which they were a passenger. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Dennis Greene 48/11 [log in to unmask] http://members.networx.net.au/~dennisg/ +++++++++++++++++++++++++++