Why We Are Not Allowed to Sell organs The second argument against commodification is that it is presumed to lead to increased exploitation of th and already vulnerable members of societ The main concern is that the seller would be an individual at the bottom of society, often a resident of the Third World, and the buyers rich Westerners who had taken ill due to their affluent lifestyle. In short, it would be exploit ative. It appears valid to argue that whenever the First World deals with people who do not have their basic needs fulfilled, exploitation is just around the corner. As pointed out above, however, one could naturally imagine a regu lated, presumably less exploitative, version of the market The third argument is that people might be encouraged to take risks they would not otherwise take just to get some money. On the other hand, we allow people to take huge risks(from which they might otherwise have refrained)in exchange for money in other areas such as boxing and Formula 1 driving Further to the point, we praise those who take the risk to donate without compensation; suddenly the act of risk taking seems not only permissible but in fact admirable lI It should now be clear that the current debate consists of arguments, few of which actually manage to shed light on the selling versus donation dilemma. This state of affairs is quite problematic-although most of us agree that commodification should be kept at the gates, an exhaustive and coherent account of why this is the right standpoint is lacking. I believe that virtue ethics, by pointing to the fact that a virtuous person would donate rather than sell, can help in creating an ethical position strong enough to explain why organ selling should be ruled out Virtue ethics Just like other ethical theories, virtue ethics can be accounted for in various ways. In this section, an outline will be given of those components of virtue ethics that I deem essential to the position I wish to defend in this paper. Although virtue ethics is primarily occupied with what kind of person one ought to be, that is not to say that it is incapable of competing with, for example, utilitarianism as a theory of the right action. It is indeed central to the argument put forward here that virtue ethics can be action guiding. Rather than saying that virtue ethics is unable to live up to the demands of a comprehensive ethical doctrine and therefore needs to be supplemented br another theory of the right and wrong action, I believe that a strong case can be made that virtue ethics can be an action-guiding, stand-alone theory. It seems reasonable to assume that we can have an intuitive understanding of how irtuous person would act when facing a problem. At any rate the appeal what a certain person would do"is used, and appears to work reasonably well, in many other situations, for example, in healthcare and in the courts. In addition it is not clear that virtue ethics needs to claim that there is but one true account of what a virtuous person would do. Admittedly, it is not unusual to combine virtue ethics and healthcare ethics. In fact there is a relati standing tradition of care theory, a philosophical approach often associated with feminist ethical theories. 13 Most mainstream moral theories, such as utilitarianism Kantian ethics, and contract theories, occupy themselves with the issues of rightness and obliga- tion virtue theory, on the other hand, approaches ethics by asking"what traitsThe second argument against commodification is that it is presumed to lead to increased exploitation of the poor and already vulnerable members of society. The main concern is that the seller would be an individual at the bottom of society, often a resident of the Third World, and the buyers rich Westerners who had taken ill due to their affluent lifestyle. In short, it would be exploit￾ative. It appears valid to argue that whenever the First World deals with people who do not have their basic needs fulfilled, exploitation is just around the corner. As pointed out above, however, one could naturally imagine a regu￾lated, presumably less exploitative, version of the market. The third argument is that people might be encouraged to take risks they would not otherwise take just to get some money. On the other hand, we allow people to take huge risks (from which they might otherwise have refrained) in exchange for money in other areas such as boxing and Formula 1 driving. Further to the point, we praise those who take the risk to donate without compensation; suddenly the act of risk taking seems not only permissible but in fact admirable.11 It should now be clear that the current debate consists of an array of arguments, few of which actually manage to shed light on the selling versus donation dilemma. This state of affairs is quite problematic—although most of us agree that commodification should be kept at the gates, an exhaustive and coherent account of why this is the right standpoint is lacking. I believe that virtue ethics, by pointing to the fact that a virtuous person would donate rather than sell, can help in creating an ethical position strong enough to explain why organ selling should be ruled out. Virtue Ethics Just like other ethical theories, virtue ethics can be accounted for in various ways. In this section, an outline will be given of those components of virtue ethics that I deem essential to the position I wish to defend in this paper. Although virtue ethics is primarily occupied with what kind of person one ought to be, that is not to say that it is incapable of competing with, for example, utilitarianism as a theory of the right action. It is indeed central to the argument put forward here that virtue ethics can be action guiding. Rather than saying that virtue ethics is unable to live up to the demands of a comprehensive ethical doctrine and therefore needs to be supplemented by another theory of the right and wrong action, I believe that a strong case can be made that virtue ethics can be an action-guiding, stand-alone theory.12 It seems reasonable to assume that we can have an intuitive understanding of how a virtuous person would act when facing a problem. At any rate the appeal “what a certain person would do” is used, and appears to work reasonably well, in many other situations, for example, in healthcare and in the courts. In addition it is not clear that virtue ethics needs to claim that there is but one true account of what a virtuous person would do. Admittedly, it is not unusual to combine virtue ethics and healthcare ethics. In fact there is a relatively long￾standing tradition of care theory, a philosophical approach often associated with feminist ethical theories.13 Most mainstream moral theories, such as utilitarianism, Kantian ethics, and contract theories, occupy themselves with the issues of rightness and obliga￾tion. Virtue theory, on the other hand, approaches ethics by asking “what traits Why We Are Not Allowed to Sell Organs 63