#also standard disclaimer that I think Wei Wuxian did this because he was a scared kid who loved his brother and was terrified that he

[winepresswrath]

the core transfer wasn't "surgery without consent" tho? it wasn't informed consent - jc didn't know he was getting *wwx's core* - but he did absolutely consent to getting a core from bsr and didn't ask/care how.

In order for consent to be valid you cannot have obtained that consent by lying to the patient about material facts which you know would change their yes to a no. This is not a subjective standard I personally happen to have invented; the idea that deceit can vitiate an agreement is well established in law, and I would argue is also a pretty standard part of most people’s moral codes. That’s why, for example, misrepresentation is grounds to void a contract; if you lied to me about what I was buying, then I didn’t really agree to the sale, because I’m not buying what I agreed to buy.

In a medical contex lying can undermine the patient’s consent both legally and ethically, and that is in my opinion a much more serious problem than a broken contract. In a modern context, a physician can be charged with assault or sued for battery when treatment goes beyond or deviates significantly from what the patient consented to. In order for consent to be valid, the patient must have been properly informed. If consent isn’t informed, it isn’t consent, because if you don’t understand what you’re agreeing to or if you think you’re agreeing to a different procedure then you are not consenting to the thing that is actually happening to you.

Jiang Cheng, as you said, consented to go up a magical mountain so BSSR could restore his core. He did not consent to a dangerous experimental procedure performed by Wen Qing, which had a 50% chance of failure and would, even in a best case scenario, permanently disable his brother. Where the core came from was very relevant to Jiang Cheng, which is why Wei Wuxian lied to him about that in the first place. He knew that Jiang Cheng would not want his core, and he wanted to give his core to Jiang Cheng anyway. He lied about the nature of the treatment and its likely outcome, which is, as you suggested, the heart of informed consent, but it was not a careless omission. It was a deliberate attempt to get him to agree to the core transfer under false pretences. It wouldn’t be valid consent even if it was an honest misunderstanding, but I think it’s pretty relevant to the question of how Jiang Cheng feels about the whole mess that it wasn’t.

Regardless, medical consent isn’t a gotcha where you can lie about what the treatment entails, who will be performing it, and what the possible adverse outcomes are and then turn around and say the the patient got the result they wanted and the only bad thing that happened was someone they loved being maimed so it’s fine. That’s not how any kind of consent works. You have to understand what you’re agreeing to in order to agree to it, and if someone deliberately lies to you in order to compromise that understanding, they are compromising your consent as well.

[amedetoiles]

#this could be longer! #corecourse #I’m not a doctor and this is not my field but yeah #also standard disclaimer that I think Wei Wuxian did this because he was a scared kid who loved his brother and was terrified that he #was going to lose him #after he’d already lost almost everyone else#and been blamed for it #this is not me saying Wei Wuxian is bad #this is me saying what he did wasn’t cool#and it’s not unreasonable for Jiang Cheng to be upset about it (tags by the incomparable @winepresswrath )

CORRECT. And I, in fact, say this as an actual medical doctor. I think it would behoove all of my fellow Wei Wuxian fans to recognize that Wei Wuxian is an extraordinarily complex character with multiple facets, one of which includes, yes, being a ruthlessly pragmatic asshole. And we love him for it! But there’s a difference between loving him and condoning or minimizing the truly terrible consequences and selfishness of his actions. The fact that he gave up his core out of love on the backbone of incredibly difficult circumstances absolutely DOES NOT NEGATE the fact that he willfully and knowingly lied about the nature of the golden core transfer and the risk of an incredibly never-before-done difficult surgery. If Wen Qing had been brought to the governing medical board of ancient fantasy China, her license would have been immediately revoked; she would have been fined astronomical amounts; and then possibly even imprisoned and never again be allowed to practice medicine. The awfulness of it makes the tragedy that much more poignant, but it doesn’t make what Wei Wuxian did any less awful or wrong, y’feel? Consent cannot be given if the person giving the consent is not informed. Medical consent is no different from any other realm of consent.

the core transfer wasn't "surgery without consent" tho? it wasn't informed consent - jc didn't know he was getting *wwx's core* - but he did absolutely consent to getting a core from bsr and didn't ask/care how.

In order for consent to be valid you cannot have obtained that consent by lying to the patient about material facts which you know would change their yes to a no. This is not a subjective standard I personally happen to have invented; the idea that deceit can vitiate an agreement is well established in law, and I would argue is also a pretty standard part of most people’s moral codes. That’s why, for example, misrepresentation is grounds to void a contract; if you lied to me about what I was buying, then I didn’t really agree to the sale, because I’m not buying what I agreed to buy.

In a medical contex lying can undermine the patient’s consent both legally and ethically, and that is in my opinion a much more serious problem than a broken contract. In a modern context, a physician can be charged with assault or sued for battery when treatment goes beyond or deviates significantly from what the patient consented to. In order for consent to be valid, the patient must have been properly informed. If consent isn’t informed, it isn’t consent, because if you don’t understand what you’re agreeing to or if you think you’re agreeing to a different procedure then you are not consenting to the thing that is actually happening to you.

Jiang Cheng, as you said, consented to go up a magical mountain so BSSR could restore his core. He did not consent to a dangerous experimental procedure performed by Wen Qing, which had a 50% chance of failure and would, even in a best case scenario, permanently disable his brother. Where the core came from was very relevant to Jiang Cheng, which is why Wei Wuxian lied to him about that in the first place. He knew that Jiang Cheng would not want his core, and he wanted to give his core to Jiang Cheng anyway. He lied about the nature of the treatment and its likely outcome, which is, as you suggested, the heart of informed consent, but it was not a careless omission. It was a deliberate attempt to get him to agree to the core transfer under false pretences. It wouldn’t be valid consent even if it was an honest misunderstanding, but I think it’s pretty relevant to the question of how Jiang Cheng feels about the whole mess that it wasn’t.

Regardless, medical consent isn’t a gotcha where you can lie about what the treatment entails, who will be performing it, and what the possible adverse outcomes are and then turn around and say the the patient got the result they wanted and the only bad thing that happened was someone they loved being maimed so it’s fine. That’s not how any kind of consent works. You have to understand what you’re agreeing to in order to agree to it, and if someone deliberately lies to you in order to compromise that understanding, they are compromising your consent as well.