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The Case for Mandatory Organ Donation" - A Review (Reading Assignment, Week 7)
In “The Case for Mandatory Organ Donation” (2007), by Scott Carney, he makes the argument that organ donation shouldnot be a choice; instead Carney believes that organs should be donated regardless of the wishes of the deceased and their family. In this article Carney quotes Eric Johnson, a professor at ColumbiaUniversity as saying, “…there would be a [an] increase of between 16 percent to 50 percent in the availability of organs, and others have speculated that this would eliminate the shortage of organs insome categories” (2007). The argument that Carney has put together is very effective and is quite persuasive to solving the problem of a lack of organs to those that need transplants. However there areholes in the argument that Carney has proposed.

For example, although the opposition is stated briefly within the article, there is little attention given to the argument of spirituality and thebeliefs that come along with some people’s thoughts on the afterlife and what happens to the human body after one passes away. Carney also uses an argument made by Aaron Spital and James Stacey Taylor intheir article, “Routine Recovery of Cadaveric Organs for Transplantation: Consistent, Fair, and Life-Saving,” published by the American Society of Nephrology, that states, “…the government reservesthe right to draft young men against their will into war and risk their lives in combat operations” (as cited in Carney, 2007). This statement seems to constitute a fallacy in that it is drawing thereader’s attention away from the actual argument and is instead trying to play upon a sense of patriotic obligation. It is in the author of this review’s opinion that this quote is distracting from theargument and takes away from the validity of what is being proposed.

The target audience of the proposal is the American public, those that have the ability to put a policy into action to make...