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Let me try to tie together two strings;
radiological stress and "victims". I have a friend who is both an anti-nuke and
a psychiatrist. A major reason for his attitude toward anything radioactive is
that, in his practice, he has seen several patients who harbor morbid fears
of atom bombs and all things that might be related. They continually worry
about how they and their loved ones are being affected by radioactivity.
They often manifest their deep-seated concerns by strongly opposing nuclear
arms, nuclear power, food irradiation, or anything that might involve
radioactivity. For some unexplained reason, neither medical applications
of radiation, nor natural background radiation seem to fall within
this category.
When I tried to explain, from a
scientific standpoint, that such fears were largely irrational and
unfounded, his response was interesting. He claims that the scientific realities
are irrelevant when dealing with psychological conditions, and that we need to
understand that the lives of radiophobic people have been seriously degraded,
many to the point of mental illness by the mere existence of nuclear programs of
any sort. His solution would be to eliminate such
programs.
I tried to counter his argument by
pointing out that racial and religious prejudice and fears have a similar
irrational basis, and that people often have deep-seated fears of others who may
be different from them even though such fears may have no rational basis. He
said this was ridiculous and that racial/religious biases are something
altogether different. We agreed to disagree.
In any case, radiological stress is
apparently quite real, and affects many people who have never been anywhere near
Hiroshima. Shouldn't all these "victims" be compensated for their
lives having been degraded?
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