Czerwony Rynek. Na Tropie Handlarzy Organów, Złodziei Kości, Producentów Krwi I Porywaczy Dzieci (2011) - Plot & Excerpts
I'm not normally drawn toward books with skeletons on the cover, but glad I took the time to read this one. Carney illustrates an eye-opening glimpse into a netherworld that otherwise exists in oblivion to much of the developed population. Through a combination of investigative reporting and personal stories, we see how an underprivileged sector of underdeveloped countries is often manipulated, tricked, or coerced into relinquishing invaluable body parts to their relatively wealthy counterparts, as middle men line their pockets. If we treated your body as a commodity that could be openly traded, for parts, what would be its worth? While that's hard to say, the illegal worldwide trafficking of body parts--what Scott Carney refers to as the red market--is very clear: somewhere between $200,000 - $250,000. Of course very little of this value goes to the person who is the source, and often none of it to the deceased person's family.We live in a world in which we believe this shouldn't take place. Even our nomenclature of "donor" and "donated" hides the fact that many of body parts sold on the red market are stolen, and the rest? Harvested from the poor and destitute of the world to those rich enough to buy what's needed. For example, in a tsunami refugee village in India, every woman has sold a kidney in order to keep her family from starving. The small sum they receive is a small fraction of what is paid for that kidney by its Western recipient.Scott Carney writes:"If we want to live in a world where human lives are priceless and in some ways equal, then the market cannot be the best decider of which people have the right to other people's bodies. Inevitably even the best systems of tissue donation break down at some point and let in criminal elements. Even if most of the time it works without people being exploited, the crimes, when they happen, are so extreme that they undermine the benefits of the entire system to society at large.The current ethos that rules red markets around the world is the assumption that there is an ethical way to build a commercial system of flesh exchange on top of altruistic donations. And yet the short supply of altruism around the world makes the overall system unsustainable. When that supply falters, criminal elements look for illicit ways to increase supply."One solution to the hypocrisy would be to outlaw all monetary exchange for human tissue and bodies. This would include a ban on paying doctors for their services, tissue supply companies, medical transporters, and everyone else involved in the industry along the way. This, of course, would likely strengthen the black market and drive the industry underground while drastically reducing the supply of legal exchanges.Alternatively, we could do away with the notion of inherent human equality and accept that the body is a commodity like any other. Embracing the market would presuppose that humans can be treated like widgets and force us to accept the inherent unfairness that some people will always supply flesh, while others will consume it. In this formulation it might be possible to regulate away the worst offenses in tissue harvesting and cut incentives to criminal brokering. And yet, what would we lose as a society by formally creating these two distinct classes of people?In truth, these solutions are not very attractive. As a society we neither want to accept open trade in human tissue, nor do we want to reduce our access to life-extending treatments. In other words, we want to have our cake and eat it, too.A disturbing book, and it should be.
What do You think about Czerwony Rynek. Na Tropie Handlarzy Organów, Złodziei Kości, Producentów Krwi I Porywaczy Dzieci (2011)?
You must be willing to be disturbed of you want to read this. Fascinating and alarming.
—Carly
Not for the faint of heart, but a fascinating read.
—RiseAgainst71
Very thought-provoking read. Highly recommended.
—beast81
