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Rant

The White Coat Syndrome

Posted 20 months ago|38 comments|1,076 views
The Men in the White Coats
Written by
Paper Tiger
England
If a compleat stranger said to you, 'take off you clothes I want to look at your body"
What would you say to that person.

If a man you had never seen said to you "I have got a very sharp knife can I stroke it across your face"? What would you say?

If a person said, "take this poison and swallow it now?", would you do it?

Of coarse you would the person is wearing a white coat!
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COMMENTS
20 months ago: Where can I get one of these coats?
Paper Tiger
Paper Tiger
England
20 months ago: Stan you can rent mine.
20 months ago: All depends on the setting. In a bar, not likely, in the woods, ha ha, at the movies, he better be on the screen. As many times as I've been "under the knife" you'd think I would be easier, but the after effects, wounds not healing, nerve damage, scaring are all detractors from the expected goal of fixing the problem.

Never let a person in a white coat just have his/her way with your body parts, it's their job to justify what they are about to do, it's your job to make sure they do a good job of explaining it.
Paper Tiger
Paper Tiger
England
20 months ago: Hi Six

Yes there is a funny side to this. but there have been some sinister misuse of perception using the white coat.

An actor was behind a glass window with wires attached to his body.

Another actor went into the street wearing a white coat and he had a clipboard.

He asked a passer by if he would help in a government sensor and the guy was ok with it.

The white coat took the passer by into the room where the actor behind the window was wired up, and the coat asked the guy to ask the actor behind the glass a queation. that was written on the clip board.

The guy asked the question to the man behind the glass and he got it wrong so the coat said to the guy off the street, "Press that button on the table."

The actor behind the glass said to the man off the street,"That button will give me a 240 volt shock if you press it, it will probably kill me."

The guy off the street looked at the coat, the coat nodded at the button the guy from the street pressed the button.

By the way six we cannot say the Oba***** word here in the UK. A 15 year old from Bedford sent him some mail, he was arrested and has been barred from the US for life.
20 months ago: Not nice to send unwanted mail to powerful people, they tend to have powerful friends. Lots of people get banned from countries they might have wanted to visit. As for not being able to say certain words or phrases.... well, does it really stop you?

I've heard that scenario before in several different versions. I'd press the button too.
Paper Tiger
Paper Tiger
England
20 months ago: re-I've heard that scenario before in several different versions. I'd press the button too.

What if the button was connected to your own body, because the coat says press you would press?

This is exactly my point you have no reason to press the button but you would because a superior being told you to?
20 months ago: Didn't Obama hand out a bunch of white coats to impress the news people during a presidential conference on health care?

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/national/it...
Paper Tiger
Paper Tiger
England
20 months ago: Nice to see you Cypress.

I din't see the thing with Obama, but its the old perception chestnut, about quickly creating an image we all trust. People that want to control us use our trust and the white coat is what we respect.
I doesnt represent force, command, or violence, its a smiling face saying" let me do what I want but trust me"
Altruist
Altruist
Eugene, OR
20 months ago: I wouldn't just trust someone with a white coat. I wouldn't trust many of the paid actors selling drugs on TV. I would trust someone with a medical degree on the wall however.

We as a nation have to trust our institutions and have faith that the people wearing the white coats, police uniforms, firemen boots and coat etc. are the people who have actually gone through all of that education and training. If we put our lives in their hands they better be skilled hands.

That is why there are laws against impersonators.

The folk Obama's people gave lab coats to were doctors, but the audience wouldn't have known that without some external sign.
Paper Tiger
Paper Tiger
England
20 months ago: If you say that a person is in that position of trust, because of your society's values and beliefs, and the goodness from that society is our marker for trust. Because society has trained, educated and put them in a position as a superior being I've got to accept that?
20 months ago: "Position as a superior being", not hardly. Their greasy carcass is no more superior than mine. Maybe superior social standing, but that has more to do with money than actually being socially superior, there are some really crass rich people out there that got their money by being doctors, or at least pretending to be one.
Paper Tiger
Paper Tiger
England
20 months ago: Re-Position as a superior being.

So Six; what do you mean when you say," Well maybe superior social standing?"
Are you saying "I have to be seen as a person who has an opinion on certain matters, but not the real important ones, as money is the real social measure. We all know there is an unspoken hierarchy so lets go with it, it works in my society?"

20 months ago: PT, superior social standing, usually gained by having enough money that working an hourly paid job is not necessary allowing the person to spend time doing more worthy projects such as donating time to public services, or to better say it, in the public's service (service to the public). A person with this standing is well known not because they have money but because they freely donate their time and skills to others with no expectation of any type of return. A thank you once in a while is all they would like but do not need it to continue to give. This standing is not limited to the wealthy, but it helps to be wealthy so that more effort can be devoted to good works than to just earning enough money to be able to eat. Too often those with money and a tad bit of generosity, demand that they be perceived as superior, socially, when all they have actually earned is a thank you.

My opinion is my opinion. I have varied opinions on many matters and have been known to express them on occasion. How much money I have at my disposal is a pittance and will not raise my social standing one infinitesimally small step, much less allow me the freedom to do good works for the public at the level I would, if I could.

That hierarchy exists in all societies, what matters, is how much stock do you put into it?
Paper Tiger
Paper Tiger
England
20 months ago: Hi Six

I have the utmost integrity and respect for you Six, I am having a rave please excuse my passion.
20 months ago: So Six. exactly how many acres of land is in your deed? How many structures? Please don't play the I can't afford to eat role.
Paper Tiger
Paper Tiger
England
20 months ago: Re-We as a nation have to trust our institutions.

What if we were talking about a different nation? The nation is the people! What about a nation of nazi right wing believers, because they have an institution would you trust that?

The top 5% of any nation build, the rest of the nation to protect themselves. Are you telling me you agree with the concept of being manipulated because its the right thing to do for the least amount of people?
Gregoire
Gregoire
20 months ago: Here's something that circulates freely where I work.
"What's the difference between God and a neurosurgeon?"

God doesn't think He's a neurosurgeon.
Paper Tiger
Paper Tiger
England
20 months ago: Sorry but the glove is off on this one. Joking about something you cannot control is fear.
20 months ago: A little levity breaks the tension. If we can't laugh at ourselves, then everyone will be laughing at us.
Paper Tiger
Paper Tiger
England
20 months ago: Gregoire - Please accept my appologies, I am very passionate about this subject I enjoy a good joke as well.
Altruist
Altruist
Eugene, OR
20 months ago: Yes Paper Tiger I do think that if society agrees that working their butts off getting good grades during 9 years of college, serving an internship that requires them to work insane hours, and acquiring the knowledge and skills that will allow them to save lives, that those people are superior beings. Very few people could do that. They are indeed in the upper echelon of humanity.

You as an individual may not consider them superior but collectively we as a society do consider them superior, and therefore worthy of our trust.

I would not trust a high school drop out to operate on my brain no matter how bright he was. I would demand that piece of parchment and I would also investigate his experience and find out how many similar operations he has conducted and what his "success rate" was.
20 months ago: Al. Why don't they bypass all of that and get a I.T. certificate and start building self promotion websites that charge a fee or....

are paid by the click...

Dang. Who does that sound like?
20 months ago: Even the student that makes "average" grades gets a document to hang on the wall, says the same thing as the student that got top marks (not "The" top marks). Sometimes it is better to be worked on by the "C" student than the "A" student, they tend to try harder and don't think that they have all the answers like the "top of the class" ones do.
Paper Tiger
Paper Tiger
England
20 months ago: Even the student that makes "average" grades.

Six read the document, is it a red brick average pass, is it an Ivy League average pass, or is it an inner city project pass? Out of those three I bet I know who worked the hardest.
20 months ago: Red brick worked the hardest. Ivy League puts on a show. Inner city, you got me there, they are lucky to put two and two together, but then again, they won't be in college either. Don't get me wrong, there are a lot of smart inner city students, but judging from media (written and video) the general education level is sub-par. They appear to be idiots but could posses a strong intelligence, if anyone ever bothered to tap it.
Paper Tiger
Paper Tiger
England
20 months ago: Re-getting good grades during 9 years of college.

How many people do you know, or think you know can afford to pay for their offspring to study for 9 years. Al we are going round in circles, this is why 5% of the people control 95% of the people. Because they take the contolling positions and make it sound like they are doing us a favour, the sad thing is we believe it. Or tell ourselves we do so we can live with ourselves.
Paper Tiger
Paper Tiger
England
20 months ago: Re-experience and find out how many similar operations he has conducted and what his "success rate" was.

Al; who would he have to work on to get a 'success rate' or the experience?
20 months ago: He is going to be working on the poor for experience, once he gets his skill level up, after a few dozen tries, he'll raise his rates and start working on the more affluent. His success rate will be based on who ever's case he bothers to select to include in the ranking. He may be present in some of the cases, but simply by allowing another doctor to take credit for the case, he selects which ones go in his file.
Paper Tiger
Paper Tiger
England
20 months ago: Lets look at this power machine from a different perspective.

In a newly built prison some students took the role of prisoner and some took the role as guard. For a few days the game went very well they all learned something from this game.

The game went on for another four weeks. Two weeks in to the game the men in uniform, the coats, started to think that they wanted an early night, or a night out on the town. Although it was only a game, the men playing the prisoner role had to be locked up early that night so it took less guards to play the game, giving the guards more choice of what to do that evening.

The men playing the game of prisoner did not like the new rules and said so very loudly. The gaurds who wanted a free evening to choose what they would do responded very loudly, so loud in fact they were hitting the loudest of the pretend prisoners with big sticks.

They game had to end before its time because someone would have been killed.

Where does that culture of behavior come from? The cloth maketh the man?

Who makes the cloth?

Altruist
Altruist
Eugene, OR
20 months ago: Board certification is a good way to determine if your doctor is qualified or not.
This and many other sites will tell you how to determine Board Certification. http://patients.about.com/od/doctorsandp...

The following site gives you reports and ratings of 750,000 physicians. also hospitals and nursing homes.
http://www.healthgrades.com/

I am familiar with the experiment with the roll playing prisoners and guards. I believe that culture of behavior comes from the patriarchal authoritarian Judeo Christian world view that states that people are born bad and need punishment, and authority figures to teach people how to behave.

The alternative is the humanistic nurturing world view where children are considered good and have to be taught to be bad. A good nurturing environment keeps people from becoming bad and they grow up doing what is right because it is the best for the community.

A humanist does not need coercion or the threat of hell to do what is right. I doubt that someone raised in a nurturing environment would have taken to the role of violent guard as easily, nor would they have shocked the subjects to death in that other famous experiment.
20 months ago: Now if we could all go back to being babies and have preselected our parents.....
Paper Tiger
Paper Tiger
England
20 months ago: All I wanted is for someone to ask the guy in the white coat,

Why do you want me to press the button?
Paper Tiger
Paper Tiger
England
20 months ago: I have now got a headache, so I am to write about a steam train driver.
20 months ago: Hope it is interesting and you share it.
20 months ago: The scenario didn't allow for that kind of question. The person agreed to participate and was instructed on what to do. His job was not to ask questions other than what was on the clipboard and do what the white coat told him.

If we all questioned everything that we are instructed to do, not much would get done. Sure we can question things, but time and place are tantamount. This one isn't one of the ones where the participants had that option.
Paper Tiger
Paper Tiger
England
20 months ago: You are dead right Six

I tried to have direction but I lost the plot.
Out Of The Box
Out Of The Box
 Moderator
20 months ago: Many years ago I conducted sociological experiments of my own. I once wheeled a handtruck into Sears with one hand, a clipboard of computer paper in the other. I went to the furniture section, made a few checkmarks on the clipboard, loaded up an Easyboy recliner, threw the clipboard on the cushion, and wheeled it outside, past the sales people and customers, nodding and smiling all the way. I went around the corner, sat down and waited for about fifteen minutes, and wheeled it back inside, still smiling.

The fact is, most people are too consumed with their own lives and their need to feel safe to question someone with an air of authority. They don't ever consider the fact that the doctor they are seeing is their employee, however temporary. They don't realize that the cop has a life that probably far more out of control than their own. They also don't ask questions, out of fear of looking stupid. And they don't take the time to learn things for themselves.
Paper Tiger
Paper Tiger
England
20 months ago: Hi OTHB

You have hit the nail on the head!

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