You're doing a pretty good job of grossly abusing the English language,
and in addition I think your (pardon me, you're) idea of compelling
people to carry a specific kind of diabetic ID is both unlikely to
happen and inadvisable.

Absolutely untrue. The right to privacy is a basic right, and I have
nothing to hide. I'm a very boring person, but I have the right to be a
"private" boring person.

--
Cheri

guy wrote in message\

<4525a131.15602734@news.consolidated.net>...

I *strongly* disagree with this. Democracy is not an ideal regime. As
Winston Churchill observed, it's a terrible system, it just happens to
be better than any of the alternatives. The problem is the huge
temptations to abuse power for people in positions of authority. In
even the most perfect government of the most perfect state there will
be some people abusing their positions for reasons of personal gain or
agendas. And there will be conspirators. And there will be
high-functioning madmen. Etc..

The state has a natural tendency to want to remove troublesome
opposition and embarrassing questioners. For the safety of democracy
these people must be protected. That means strongly supporting privacy
laws, even if *you* have nothing to hide. Whereas the state wants to
have enough strict laws that when they want to get someone it won't be
hard to find them guilty of something, and they want enough enforced
snooping powers that they can easily dig up the dirt until they find
something they can use against you.

They say they want these laws and powers to protect us against
criminals and terrorists. Of course they'd say that! But what do they
*do* when they get thse powers?

One of the first people to be severely manhandled and arrested under
the UK's new anti-terrorism laws was an old pensioner and life-long
Labour party member who shouted some criticism at the Prime Minister
from the back seats of an auditorium.

Powerful privacy laws are one of the important safeguards of
democracy.

That might be OK if it was completely voluntary. But I venture to say
that very few diabetics would choose to display such a "mark of Cain"
in front of the idle curiosity of the world.

Let's face it -- there's a certain stigma to being handicapped. At
least with diabetes, the handicap can be hidden to some extent.

I've had Type 1 diabetes for 41 years, and for most of that time I've
kept that information on a "need to know" basis. Only recently, since
I've retired, have I been able to open up a bit. I'll tell you,
there's a lot of discrimination out there, and most of it is the
informal, under-the-table variety. Anyway, I wanted to be judged
strictly on the merits of what I did, rather than to be advantaged or
disadvantaged based on health status.

Regarding carrying identification -- in the early years of my
diabetes, I used to carry a wallet card. With experience, this turned
out to be superfluous. In 41 years, I've *never* had an incident in
which a diabetic I.D. would have been helpful. No one's even looked at
it.  I suppose that if you're prone to passing out, an I.D. might be
useful (under certain limited circumstances). But if you're passing
out on a consistent basis, something in your treatment regimen is
amiss. Maybe you should loosen up a bit on the tight control, because
passing out from a hypo is a far greater danger to your life --
immediately -- than letting your sugars run a little high.

Nowadays, all EMT's are supposed to be trained to look for Medic-Alert
bracelets and other standard forms of identification. They're supposed
to check around your neck, and at your wrists and ankles.

If a government mandate is required, it should be at the level of
enforcing this kind of training among EMT's and police personnel,
rather than at the level of the individual diabetics.

I've had Type 1 diabetes -- and I've been driving -- for 41 years, and
during that whole time I haven't had a single incident where a
diabetic I.D. would have been useful. (I used to carry a wallet card,
but I stopped doing so when I realized it was superfluous.)

I refuse to be branded publically with a diabetic "mark of Cain" just
because a few other diabetics behave irresponsibly.

Pretty much, yeah. I had the necklace type medic-alert for the first 8
or 9 years. When I spent all my time trying to convince the world I
wasn't diabetic I ended up convincing them I was a weird boy who wore a
stainless steel necklace :-).

Tim.

=================================
What's wrong with a tinfoil hat? You wanted
a cheap way to identify diabetics.

How about you? What do you wear to keep your head warm and your brain
functioning?

A Peter Heater perhaps?

Terri