In the comments for this old Respectful Insolence piece, one less-than-deep-thinker made the mistake of announcing that he sometimes actually told patients "This stroke is God trying to speak to you..."
This attracted a certain amount of snark. If a god can't think of a better way to communicate with you than by bursting a blood vessel in your brain, I'm not sure I want to visit an afterlife run by him.
I hope, if I ever find myself in a similar situation, to have the presence of mind (somewhat dependent upon the presence of functional brain cells...) to say "Yes, you're right. There's clearly not much time left for me to die heroically in battle."
(If I just nodded and then yelled "BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD!" while lunging at the doctor with a letter-opener, he probably wouldn't get the joke. Besides, I'm definitely more of a Nurgle kind of guy.)
26 November 2008 at 3:52 am
There's always the old "BLOOD FOR ODIN!!!" story: http://msgboard.snopes.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=25;t=001186;p=0
26 November 2008 at 3:53 am
I think the comment from "Greg_P" is misunderstood.
He's not trying to convert anyone to christianity, he's trying to reach people where they can be reached. He's using psychology.
He specifically talks about cases where patients defy medical advice, so he tries to find arguments they might accept more easily than "if you don't stop eating burgers and start working out, you're going to die".
For _some_, the god argument might actually work. Not for you, certainly not for me. But maybe for me, something else would work, something along the lines of "you're not going to die of this, you'll just be unable to move and speak and somebody - your family, your girlfriend, society - will have to care for you until you die, which might be a long time".
I believe his comment was not about the doctor forcing his beliefs on his patients but about him trying to find arguments they'll listen to. And if that happens to be religion for some of them, so be it. I wish no ill to people just because they happen to believe in a god, just as I expect them not to wish me ill for not believing.
26 November 2008 at 4:48 am
What you say would be entirely correct, were it not for the fact that Greg_P unfortunately chose to end his comment with "And it doesn't matter what religion they adhere to, or whether there is any at all."
26 November 2008 at 5:12 am
See also the brand new I Was A Pre-Teen Christian Supercomputer!
26 November 2008 at 5:58 am
My brother used to play Khorne. He's never struck me as the sort to scream war cries in the hospital, though, but who knows?
26 November 2008 at 6:36 am
Dan: I saw that sentence in context with his first paragraph:
"I see spirituality as being intricately intertwined with our patients' psychological makeup, so if you believe that the psychological aspect of the patient is worth addressing, then that spirituality also needs addressing."
But, of course, he may have meant it entirely differently.
Let's agree on a solomonian solution: If he meant it as you suspect, that is indeed to be condemned; if he, however, meant what I hope he meant, his views are actually very sensible.
26 November 2008 at 6:08 pm
Reminds me of a tale two brothers at my gaming group (one Tzeentch, one Khorne) used to tell about scaring off a bunch of Jehovah's witnesses permanently: One opened the door to find them there, proceeded to yell upstairs to his brother `It's for you', who then came rolling down the stairs, foam from his mouth, screaming the aforementioned `Blood for the Blood-god, skulls for the skull-throne'.
According to them, they left without a further word...
Personally, I'm a Dwarf player, but I have no doubt that yelling `For Grimnir' and chopping off their knees with a battle-axe will have pretty much the same effect... (orange mohawk optional of course).
27 November 2008 at 11:03 pm
> If a god can’t think of a better way to communicate with you than
Sure, there are plenty of obvious better ways to communicate. Problem is, nobody pays attention to them.
28 November 2008 at 12:30 pm
Problem is, nobody pays attention to them.
Really? Talking burning bushes? Angels with flaming swords? Prophets whose words are comprehensible to everybody who hears them, no matter what their native language is? Nobody notices that?
Of course, it looks as if Yahweh didn't pay his phone bill or something, because nowadays He does indeed seem to be restricted to means of communication that're indistinguishable from stuff that arises normally from people's own brains. Thank goodness that some people are still receptive to these messages.
29 November 2008 at 3:23 am
Nurgle 4 life, yo. Although my "old-rules" 40K tactic of spamming important areas with Blight Grenades, and spending 30 minutes every turn incrementing their movement, was not popular.