The Whole or the Sum of its Parts?

  Both Nancy Scheper-Hughes' "Commodity Fetishism in Organs Trafficking" and by Lesley A. Sharp's "Strange Harvest" deal with the discourse around the issue of organ transplant, the donor/recipient dichotomy that tends to favor the recipient and keeps the donor in the shadows, mysticizing and depersonalizing (for not to say dehumanizing) the figure of the donor. In Sharp's we get introduced to some of the inner workings and complications surrounding the issue of organ donation and transplantation in the US. The writer focuses particularly in organs coming from dead bodies and she identifies important underlying ideologies that drive the Organ Transfer world: the notion of transplantation as a medical miracle; a denial of the comodification of bodies [as a result of and intrinsic part of organ transfer]; a general rhetoric defining the donation as a "gift"; the historical invention of the medical term/concept of "brain death"; a narrative of scarcity of organs and of biomedic altruism; and a naturalization of technologically-melded bodies. These ideas, Sharp argues, shape the discourse and systems at work in the domains of organ procurement, organ donation and organ transplantation, which are all interrelated.

The website for the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center's Transplant Services can certainly be used as a clear and evident example of some of these basic ideologies, for example when the home page welcomes the viewer/prospective client by saying "Patients facing organ failure can find hope at UPMC" or it tries to establish itself as a legitimate organization that is looking for the well being of its patients, community and/or human beings in general. In other words, it presents itself as an altruistic entity that is providing necessary and services to a hurting a needy clientèle. When the website tells us that it is " giving hope to patients across the country and around the world", or it creates a specific sections for "international services" it also presents itself as conscious of the international market and demand and as an experienced player in it. One thing that Sharp does not focus on and that Hughes' piece complements is precisely the scale of the organ transfer industry [to call that if you will], and the economic and socio-political structures that allow for such systems to exist. Hughes, for example talks about transplant toursim, another aspect of this complex set relations, in which patients looking for organs will travel abroad to receive the transplant or organs procured also abroad. This puts in evidence the lucrative global capitalistic nature of organ transfers, and it also spotlights different levels of mobility that are facilitated through all this, or negated. In the same website we can also see examples of this when we read the list of services the hospital is willing to provide to traveling patients, such as arrangements for interpreters, transportation or accommodations. The fact that the hospital is willing to put this much effort in facilitating the lives of those receiving the treatment tells us it must be in their best interest to do so because it benefits them as an enterprise trying to make money.

These examples can also help us see who is privileged by these practices and who indeed is actually benefiting from them and using them. Nowhere in the website do we see a section that focuses on those thinking about donation, but only about those seeking donors. Those with insufficient resources, no insurance, or credit to back them up are eligible for any of the services provided by the hospital, giving us to understand that only a certain affluent sector of the population does. Of course, all of this raises questions discussed in class of where are the organs coming from and how are those bodies/humans treated, how does it affect them. The discourse actively seeks to obscure those donating and discourages receivers from connecting with their donors [if they are alive]. Why so much secrecy? Why the mystery if the general discourse tends to frame the act as a gift, an act of altruism? Bodies are dehumanized and comodified and minimized to transactions and capital flow, but not the free movement of those donating. We know that those seeking donation have the ability to cross borders and obtain organs from across borders, but what about the bodies and people where those are coming from? Do they have means to move so freely? What are their reasons behind it? And most importantly, what kinds of systems of oppression are at play in all this? In the end, it seems like the website is precisely the image of what both Sharp and Hughes have been talking about.

What seems problematic, and that both authors point out, is the lack of knowledge from the donating side, a lack of stories and experiences of those donating, or the families of those whose bodies have been used?

These are 2 versions of a clip from a live 30 Rock episode that I found disturbingly appropriate.

30 rock live
30 rock live 2