Non-religious can also oppose abortion

In regards to Lauren Peckler's article Wednesday: I cannot allow Ms. Peckler to decide what the anti-abortion position is based on, as she obviously supports abortion rights.

She claims that the pro-life movement is all based on religion.

I happen to be religious, but even when I passed through genuine moments of agnosticism in my life, I opposed abortion, not because the baby "is a soul," but because it is a baby with 46 chromosomes, composite of its mother and father just as I am of mine. Biology teaches that embryo and fetus are merely the first phases of human development. I didn't learn that in Sunday school.

My reason for opposing abortion's legality (and this one actually is in the Bill of Rights) is that the Fourth Amendment says people have the right to "be secure in their persons," (having a doctor open your cranial cavity with scissors and vacuum your brain out seems to fly in the face of this). The Fifth Amendment says that no person should "be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law," and that such due process involves indictment of a grand jury.

In other words it takes more than a decision "between a woman, God and her doctor" (as John Kerry and the religious left say) to kill someone.

The same Thomas Jefferson who wrote about "a clear wall between church and state," also wrote that all "are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights," as a basis for political separation from England. If religion influences my public policy, it is only because I believe, as he wrote, that "nature's God" entitled all humans to an "equal station," king to pauper and mother to fetus.

Monte Matheson
journalism senior

Writers 'uneducated' on genetically modified food

I'm glad the Wildcat covered the issue of genetically modified food in Wednesday's paper, but your writers seem extremely uneducated on the subject. Many seemed to have been suckered in by the "noble intention" lie coming from the industry. People don't starve because we can't grow enough food. We grow enough food to fulfill the world's nutritional needs 1 1/2 times over. People starve because of the greedy dregs that head these companies. It reminds me of a quote: "When I give food to the poor, they call me a saint. When I ask why the poor have no food, they call me a communist."

Your writers also fail to talk about how these companies use these patents on life forms. Are you aware that if a farmer from one of these Third World countries saves the GM seed from one harvest to the next, as they have done for millennia, companies like Monsanto charge them with "bio-piracy?" If they want to grow such crops, they have to buy new seeds every single year.

Are you aware that in the only non-industry supported study found that GM crops caused lower organ failure in rats? So maybe you don't want to eat GMs until there's more testing done. Well, too bad. The GM makers refuse to label their products as such even though they have patents claiming they are different from normal crops. This goes against the principles of freedom. Freedom implies choice, and the people of the world should have a choice in what they eat. If their products do just have a "bad rap" isn't that a task, not for the FDA, but for their PR department?

Michael Sousa
art education senior

Commodifying organs not the answer

In response to Mr. Luiten's letter to the editor yesterday, "Donors' families should be paid for organs," I would suggest that the simple exchange of money for organs would create far more problems than might be anticipated.

First off, his suggestion that the national organizational system that allocates and controls organ donation (UNOS) can simply set a dollar amount to be given to the organ donor violates the National Organ Transplant Act passed by Congress in 1984. This law was passed in order to prevent human organs being "sold" as commodities. Mr. Luiten may not realize that for someone who is in financial straits, the possibility of them selling their organs for someone who is more wealthy creates an environment of exploitation against the poor.

Secondly, the $100,000 figure mentioned for compensating a heart transplant is designed to pay for the medical costs incurred by the recipient (hospitalization, drugs, medical equipment, nursing care, etc). How is one to set an arbitrary figure for compensating the donor? If saving a life, is a heart worth more than two lungs? Would people's recently deceased relatives have their organs offered up in order to compensate grieving family members?

Lastly, the idea that the dollar would produce more donors might create an environment of "How much did you get for your kidney?" - an ethical nightmare for physicians, donors and most importantly, those in need of the transplant.

Although organ donation may not be for everyone, the act of giving part of your body to save another's life is, and should remain, one of the last few acts of altruism we have in our society. For the 87,000-plus people on the transplant waiting list, it is important that the organs they receive be motivated by kindness, not the bottom line.

Mark Dugan
first-year medical student