Hacker News Reader

Comment by michaels0620 | Hacker News Reader

And repeating it doesn't make it any more true. In what sense his is plea for help shameless? Should he simply sit back, do nothing, and hope something works out? It's not like he is taking from others for his own benefit. Indeed as others have pointed out, it's likely that his campaign has benefited others, not only himself.

View on HN

I did not say it does not benefit anyone else. I just said it was shameless.

shameless: 2. done without shame; without decency or modesty

modesty: 1. having or showing a moderate or humble estimate of one's merits, importance, etc.;

In what philosophical framework does modesty or even decency come before preservation of one's own life? This isn't Breaking Bad -- making a website and asking for help is pretty well unimpeachable IMO.

He's not morally wrong, I'm saying the nature of what he's doing is shameless. Clearly this is an important issue to him, but he's vastly overestimating his importance to everyone else. If every person with a need had a poster plastered around the city with their name on it, every city would be covered from sidewalk to rooftop. I'm just calling it like I see it.

he's vastly overestimating his importance to everyone else

I think you're vastly underestimating the number of people in the startup community to who he's very important. He's not Steve Jobs, but he's someone a lot of us care about.

As I understand it, this will also help other people. Since the more people who join the registry or donate to it, the higher the chance that some other patient will find a match. If it takes some people plastering the web, so be it. In fact everyone, not just South Asians, should can use this opportunity to get on the registry.

First and foremost, I think this is a good cause,so please don't take this as a negative against the goal.

Second, I have not read the rules for donating/being on the reigstry so I may be jumping the gun and having a preconceived notion that doesn't hold true.

But there's assumption of the number of people who would help someone else if they were found a match as opposed to simply helping out Amit. If they are on the registry and do match someone else are they required to do the donation at that point? Unlike blood donation, the bone marrow is a just in time donation (if I understand it correctly). This puts it in a different category.

Again, I think this is a good idea and I hope those that are putting their names on the registry are doing so for the belief of doing good for all, not just for one.

Could we all just agree to disagree and leave it at that...?

I still have about 680 karma to burn through.

Now only 590...

And now even less than that. (567)

Not many people have a need for several hours of your time which will literally save their life. Just saying, everyone has needs, but the number of people with needs this urgent is very low (tens of thousands in the US, maybe?).

In any case, take a look at the marrow match site that Amit links; it requires people who send in swabs to commit to donating to any patient that matches, not just Amit. This is probably going to help a lot of people besides just him.

> He's not morally wrong, I'm saying the nature of what he's doing is shameless.

So...?

If whatever you are doing works out for you, it would be cool to see the point you are trying to make by commenting on other peoples' life-threatening needs shamelessly.

I did not say that you are cynical. I just said you are shameless.

Life and Death.

At what point do you admit to yourself you love your life and want to continue to live?

At that point, that's when shamelessness and modesty are thrown on the window and you do what you can to try to survive.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com