# Pharmacist's conscience and new Indiana abortion law **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 14, 2011, 12:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-conscience-and-new-indiana-abortion-law/581850 "2011-05-14T00:04:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![margin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/65b543/32.png) [@margin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/margin)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2011, 4:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-conscience-and-new-indiana-abortion-law/581850/101 "2011-05-15T04:29:08Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > Well, a lot of them have become more libertarian from hanging out with them for so long but back in 1980, they were not natural allies. They started adopting each other’s principles but I still know a lot of single issue voters who will vote for a pro-life socialist democrat over a pro-choice libertarian republican. The republican party can’t survive without the abortion issue, the democratic party can’t get anything else done because of the abortion issue. Whenever the Republicans start losing ground they start talking about abortion, between abortion and tax cuts, Republicans have nothing else to offer. Yeah, stop calling them pro-life until they start agitating against the death penalty, war, and other forms of Republican cruelty. If people are really pro life they’d hand out birth control and promote sex ed. They don’t. In fact, they’re opposed to it. Look at this thread. Who else are these pharmacists targeting but women who wish to control their fertility? As I said above, perhaps an AIDS patient here and there, but they’re going after women and birth control That has nothing to do with libertarianism. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2011, 4:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-conscience-and-new-indiana-abortion-law/581850/102 "2011-05-15T04:38:30Z")
> [@margin](#): > > So a woman has to die before you give a shit. No, but a woman has to die before you can start claiming that women are dying. Heck, you can even just prove that a woman is likely to die. > [@](#): > > Good to know. And if a pharmacist gives her an aspirin but won’t give her BC , it’s totes okay and it means he’s a good guy! No, it means he isn’t refusing to serve her because she is a woman. If you want to start bringing segregation lunch counter analogies into the mix then don’t be surprised when I show you how stupid those analogies are. > [@](#): > > Even though he decided she wasn’t raped _enough_ or the fetus matter more than her stupid little female life, that’s okay, because he’ll give her anything but medication that enables her to control her fertility. Are you maing this up or are you engaging in mind reading. Perhaps you have a cite to a pharmacist that refused to sell something to a woman because he didn’t think she was raped enough or the fetus is more important than the woman’s life. > [@](#): > > Maybe you should tell her to keep her legs closed, too. Why would I do that. When preserving one person’s right does not infringe on another person’s rights, then why would it be necessary to choose between forcing a private party to accommodate a woman’s fertility choices and sewing her knees together. A woman has a right to be free from state interference with her to birth control. She does not have the right to enslave others to accomodate that right. > [@](#): > > You think pregnancy doesn’t kill women? Google Angela Carder. Pregnancy is not the walk in the park that the anti-choicers like to disiss it as. Either way, you know what? Don’t wanna dispense meds? Drive a truck instead. Why is it that complicated? Go to another pharmacist. Why is it that complicated? How is the Angela Carder case even remotely relevant or did you want to bring up an extreme example and pretend it was some sort of regular occurrence? ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2011, 4:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-conscience-and-new-indiana-abortion-law/581850/103 "2011-05-15T04:41:01Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > There are laws based on moral judgements, without regard to fairness and rights, and those laws cause innumerable problems. Morality implicitly includes consideration of fairness and rights. Please give me an example of a moral judgment that rejects equity and rights. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2011, 4:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-conscience-and-new-indiana-abortion-law/581850/104 "2011-05-15T04:43:15Z")
> [@needscoffee](#): > > While some religions believe that human life begins at conception, plenty of people who believe that do so all by themselves, not because it’s a religious belief. It’s not a far-fetched belief. It’s a religious belief whether they know it or not. It’s magical thinking. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2011, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-conscience-and-new-indiana-abortion-law/581850/105 "2011-05-15T04:45:40Z")
> [@margin](#): > > It’s amazing the amount of effort people will put into ignoring the obvious. These guys, these pharmacists, want to deny medication pretty much to women alone. There might be AIDs victims as well, but these pharmacists apparently only have conscience issues when it comes to treating outcasts as human beings who should be able to live their lives. Women are the primary victims of these scumbags, and they’re women seeking medication for reproductive issues. Justify \* that.\* First of all “these guys” are often gals. Second of all, their focus is not on the gender, it is on the drug and its effects. There is nothing to justify, '“these guys” are private actors, they are typically under no obligation to provide services they do not want to provide. These “victims” can go three miles down the road and get their birth control pills from another pharmacy. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2011, 4:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-conscience-and-new-indiana-abortion-law/581850/106 "2011-05-15T04:46:26Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > Morality implicitly includes consideration of fairness and rights. Please give me an example of a moral judgment that rejects equity and rights. Prohibitions against drugs. Marriage laws. Divorce laws. Imprisonment for property crimes. Abortion prohibition. Oh, sorry, you only asked for one. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2011, 4:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-conscience-and-new-indiana-abortion-law/581850/107 "2011-05-15T04:47:30Z")
> [@tumbleddown](#): > > I just discussed this in another thread on the topic.’ > > They don’t hate themselves, because they don’t divide the world into men vs. women. They divide the world between immoral people and moral people. They, by virtue of their unflinching anti-abortion beliefs, are moral. Pro-choice people, with our obvious hatred for the unborn :rolleyes: are immoral. > > From there, everything else flows; they don’t see themselves as affected by laws which position women as incapable of making their own medical and life decisions without outside interference. Those laws, and those problems only accrue to immoral women, and thus there’s no self-hatred involved. Just your garden variety us vs. them. The holy and redeemed against the heathens. And heathens get what’s coming to them. Its not because they think they will never run into these problems its because they have firm convictions about what the answer should be in these situations. So if their daughters got pregnant on prom night, they would be happy to ruin their daughter’s lives in order to save the life of their grandchild. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2011, 4:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-conscience-and-new-indiana-abortion-law/581850/108 "2011-05-15T04:50:12Z")
> [@margin](#): > > Yeah, stop calling them pro-life until they start agitating against the death penalty, war, and other forms of Republican cruelty. > > If people are really pro life they’d hand out birth control and promote sex ed. They don’t. In fact, they’re opposed to it. Look at this thread. Who else are these pharmacists targeting but women who wish to control their fertility? As I said above, perhaps an AIDS patient here and there, but they’re going after women and birth control That has nothing to do with libertarianism. I’m not saying they’re libertarians, you were. Perhaps I have you confused with someone else but you were the one that said these folks wanted to save these babies and then didn’t care if they starved after they were born. And you don’t think there are pro-lifers standing vigil at executions in Texas? They don’t all get on a bus at the abortion clinic rally and head on over to the state penetentiary and a lot of them will tell you that there is a difference between a mass murderer and a baby. ---
**Author:** ![needscoffee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/needscoffee/32/1076_2.png) [@needscoffee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/needscoffee)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2011, 4:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-conscience-and-new-indiana-abortion-law/581850/109 "2011-05-15T04:52:28Z")
> [@Boyo\_Jim](#): > > If it is not a religious belief, what kind of belief is it? It is not backed up by any verifiable scientific knowledge. > > Shall we call it non-religious superstition? Do you have a preferred term? Superstition is pretty good. I would just say they have a sentimental, romanticized idea of what’s going on. ---
**Author:** ![Zeriel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/58956e/32.png) [@Zeriel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeriel)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2011, 5:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-conscience-and-new-indiana-abortion-law/581850/110 "2011-05-15T05:01:34Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > You don’t sign away your conscience when you adopt a profession. I disagree when it comes to licensed professions. It would be every kind of foolish, for example, to let lawyers determine their own ethical codes rather than have them set down by state law or the state bar association. ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2011, 5:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-conscience-and-new-indiana-abortion-law/581850/111 "2011-05-15T05:12:52Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > …Aren’t there laws that would force a pharmacist that owned their own pharmacy to stock and sell birth control pills on pain of losing their license? I believe that was the case before these so called “conscience” laws were enacted. [Here is what Indiana law has to say as of 2007](http://www.in.gov/pla/files/2007PharmacyCompilationV1.pdf): > [@](#): > > A pharmacist has a duty to honor all prescriptions from a practitioner or from a physician, podiatrist, dentist, or veterinarian licensed under the laws of > another state. Before honoring a prescription, the pharmacist shall take reasonable steps to determine whether the prescription has been issued in > compliance with the laws of the state where it originated. The pharmacist is immune from criminal prosecution or civil liability if he, in good faith, refuses to > honor a prescription because, in his professional judgment, the honoring of the prescription would: > (1) be contrary to law; > (2) be against the best interest of the patient; > (3) aid or abet an addiction or habit; or > (4) be contrary to the health and safety of the patient. I am somewhat mystified as to why this specifies the duty to fill out of state ones but instate ones. There a note that suggest to me (a non-lawyer) that this is an addition to prior state lawon which is not included here. I can’t imagine that pharmacists would be held to a higher standard of performance for distant prescriptions than ones for the neighborhood, so to speak. But it is clear they has a duty to fill all prescriptions, except under specified and limited conditions, and their own moral convictions were not among them. ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2011, 5:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-conscience-and-new-indiana-abortion-law/581850/112 "2011-05-15T05:19:59Z")
> [@needscoffee](#): > > Superstition is pretty good. I would just say they have a sentimental, romanticized idea of what’s going on. So, are you okay with basing legislation and public policy on superstition and romantic sentiment? ---
**Author:** ![needscoffee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/needscoffee/32/1076_2.png) [@needscoffee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/needscoffee)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2011, 5:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-conscience-and-new-indiana-abortion-law/581850/113 "2011-05-15T05:44:12Z")
> [@Boyo\_Jim](#): > > So, are you okay with basing legislation and public policy on superstition and romantic sentiment? Of course not. I was responding to Der Tris proclaiming to someone “You are just bending over backwards trying to pretend that this isn’t about persecuting women.” I don’t think it’s \*about \*persecuting women, at least not for a lot of people, but women are certainly the collateral damage. ---
**Author:** ![margin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/65b543/32.png) [@margin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/margin)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2011, 5:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-conscience-and-new-indiana-abortion-law/581850/114 "2011-05-15T05:46:17Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > First of all “these guys” are often gals. Second of all, their focus is not on the gender, it is on the drug and its effects. > > There is nothing to justify, '“these guys” are private actors, they are typically under no obligation to provide services they do not want to provide. > > These “victims” can go three miles down the road and get their birth control pills from another pharmacy. Often gals? Gals? Wow, that’s not sexist at all. And prove it. Their focus is not on gender? Really? Remind me again, how many men take birth control pills? These victims cannot go three miles road and get their birth control pills from another pharmacy if they don’t have a car and the next pharmacy is more than three miles away. Oh, and by the way? Why bother becoming a pharmacist if there’s some pills you know you won’t give out? I see you’ve avoided addressing the idea of proving that these guys have targeted _anybody_ but women. ``` What part of, "Don't want to give out pills, then don't take a job where that's the major duty" do you not get? How much more simple can one make it? Can you show me where any of these guys have refused to fill some asshole's prescription for weiner pills? They're going after women, and as people like Phyllis Schlafly and Ann Coulter show, there's always a few women around to suck up to assholes if they think they'll get to be Serena Joy. ``` ---
**Author:** ![margin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/65b543/32.png) [@margin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/margin)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2011, 5:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-conscience-and-new-indiana-abortion-law/581850/115 "2011-05-15T05:49:45Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > **Well, a lot of them have become more libertarian from hanging out with them for so long but back in 1980, they were not natural allies.** They started adopting each other’s principles but I still know a lot of single issue voters who will vote for a pro-life socialist democrat over a pro-choice libertarian republican. The republican party can’t survive without the abortion issue, the democratic party can’t get anything else done because of the abortion issue. Whenever the Republicans start losing ground they start talking about abortion, between abortion and tax cuts, Republicans have nothing else to offer. Bolding mine. YOUR statement, not mine. Wanna try that again? ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2011, 1:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-conscience-and-new-indiana-abortion-law/581850/116 "2011-05-15T13:03:56Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > We do this every thread. Please find this mythical pharmacy that does not have another pharmacy within 100 miles? > > I don’t think that this is dispositive of whether you can force a pharmacist to dispense birth control pills but its about a mythical as folks losing the family farm because of estate taxes. Agreed, and even if it was so, I don’t see how it matters. Just because some people live out in the sticks then every Business X must provide Service Y to anyone who walks through the door because an extreme minority of the country doesn’t have another feasible option? That’s the trade off for living out in the middle of nowhere (and I’ve done it). There is peace and quiet, you can throw loud parties, scream at the kids all day, but you have to drive a long damn way to get to anything decent. You can’t live in the middle of nowhere and have a shopping center next door. That magical pharmacy that is an oasis in the desert, the only one for 100 miles, could legally shut its doors, no? Then why can’t it offer a smaller selection of meds if it wants? A private business is not required to cater to the whims of every single person in any other scenario. Why this one? ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2011, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-conscience-and-new-indiana-abortion-law/581850/117 "2011-05-15T14:39:11Z")
> [@needscoffee](#): > > Of course not. I was responding to Der Tris proclaiming to someone “You are just bending over backwards trying to pretend that this isn’t about persecuting women.” I don’t think it’s \*about \*persecuting women, at least not for a lot of people, but women are certainly the collateral damage. Sorry, I lost my scorecard for this thread and for a time didn’t know who was arguing what for why. ---
**Author:** ![margin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/65b543/32.png) [@margin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/margin)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2011, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-conscience-and-new-indiana-abortion-law/581850/118 "2011-05-15T14:59:10Z")
> [@jtgain](#): > > Agreed, and even if it was so, I don’t see how it matters. Just because some people live out in the sticks then every Business X must provide Service Y to anyone who walks through the door because an extreme minority of the country doesn’t have another feasible option? > > That’s the trade off for living out in the middle of nowhere (and I’ve done it). There is peace and quiet, you can throw loud parties, scream at the kids all day, but you have to drive a long damn way to get to anything decent. You can’t live in the middle of nowhere and have a shopping center next door. > > That magical pharmacy that is an oasis in the desert, the only one for 100 miles, could legally shut its doors, no? Then why can’t it offer a smaller selection of meds if it wants? A private business is not required to cater to the whims of every single person in any other scenario. Why this one? Yeah, I’m sure you’d be this dismissive if it was your boner pills or blood pressure pills or whatever that they decided to phase out. It’s funny how it’s so easy to dismiss womens’ concerns. ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2011, 3:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-conscience-and-new-indiana-abortion-law/581850/119 "2011-05-15T15:17:57Z")
> [@margin](#): > > Yeah, I’m sure you’d be this dismissive if it was your boner pills or blood pressure pills or whatever that they decided to phase out. It’s funny how it’s so easy to dismiss womens’ concerns. Sure I would be upset if they didn’t carry my medication. I’m upset that my town doesn’t have a Dunkin Donuts. Neither of these mean that a private business must be set up to accommodate my wishes. ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2011, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-conscience-and-new-indiana-abortion-law/581850/120 "2011-05-15T15:22:27Z")
> [@needscoffee](#): > > I don’t think it’s \*about \*persecuting women, at least not for a lot of people, but women are certainly the collateral damage. Like others in the thread, I would like to know what damage is being talked about. Where exactly in this country can a woman live that there is not a pharmacy within a reasonable driving distance that will fill her birth control? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-conscience-and-new-indiana-abortion-law/581850.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pharmacists-conscience-and-new-indiana-abortion-law/581850.md?page=7)