loyalty vs human rights.
October 8, 2008
In Jody Picoult’s my sister’s keeper, Anna, the youngest of the family of five, was altered through scientific means to be born and made up to be with what her sister deficits. However, this was not a blessing because she was made to go through the countless surgeries to help her sister, Kate, fight leukemia which includes donating her own bone marrow and her kidney next. She then decided to sue her parents for using her; for bringing her into the world for the exact purpose of saveing Kate even though her mother did claim that she loved her more because she was the reason why her sister was still alive. The twist of the story is that, she sued her parents because of Kate. Kate wanted the surgeries to stop, she was not afraid to die. But there is no way she can share these sentiments with her parents because her parents love her too much to let her have her wish.
But I guess the question would be, did the parents even think of Anna’s own rights when she was born? She was brought into the world with only one purpose, which is to save her sister. She wasn’t given a choice. Her first surgery was done when she was just three years old. Anna suing her parents was also a move to tell them that she should have her own rights over her own body, and that she should have more reasons to live besides just saving her sick sister.
In the case of Anna, her rights were infringed upon by her own parents. But maybe when it comes to family, it is difficult to practise your own rights especially with regard to family matters or problems at hand. Family loyals comes first, before personal rights. Filial piety is also another contributing factor. To be raised by your own parents, and also inculcated with values of the family, there is a stronger need to serve the family first. To practise human rights perhaps thus becomes a second priority, with family loyalty topping the list. In one of my modiels, we learnt that a person will internalize another’s opinions during socialization and the opinion of a generalised other crops up at the back of the person’s mind before his own actions take place. When one wants to have his own freedom in decisions, or whatnot in a family, he will always consider the opinions of his family first that it may even come to a point where he has to forgo his freedom just to please the rest of the family members. One may argue that it is natural for a person to prioritize family first before personal needs, but what if the situation is similar to Anna’s case? I think the extent to which a person prioritizes family needs before personal freedom depends on the environment that he/she is raised in, as well as the people or community he/she is part of. The extent as to the freedom that one seeks also depends on the blood ties or the degree of the relations. Individuals feel more responsible for members not only those of the same blood but probably also from the same ethnic group. Solidarity among the people is prevalent with or without a choice. Some may have felt the need to conform while others are just comfrotable in the presence of the same group of people. It will definitely affect the way a person thinks. Despite the need to fight for their own rights, they will still consider the consequences of such fronts will affect the perople close to them, or those in the same community sharing the same beliefs and values. Hence in a way, this also affects the way a person decides on whether their personal needs and rights should be met before others or the other way round.
