Everyone should be an organ donor unless they opt out.

Now, I've made a pot of soup and I know what I'm about, so let me say my piece plainly. I am against this motion, and I'll tell you why.

First, the default flips the burden. Every one of us is born with our organs, and we hold them for our whole lives without the state saying a word. To make that a loan that the government can call in unless you scribble a form — that's not consent, that's a seizure with paperwork. Presumed consent sounds tidy until you remember what it's actually doing: taking what's mine on the theory that I'd have given it anyway.

Second, and this is the part that troubles me most, a default register full of names is a list of the vulnerable. If you never opt out, you never knew you were in. And if something happens to you and your family's grieving and nobody told them what was on the form, then you've taken something from them too — the chance to say no, or to say yes knowing what it meant. I've watched families at a kitchen table when the news came. That conversation matters, and a checkbox erases it.

Third, the medical reality is not neutral. Organs are matched by blood type, size, health, and need. A broad default doesn't create a supply problem from nothing; it changes who gets asked. And the pressure lands hardest on the people least able to say no.

Now, I'm not against donation. I'm against being enrolled by silence. Opt in, say yes loudly, tell your family. But the whole weight of this motion should sit on the giver, not the state. Let people give freely, and you'll get more of it, not less.

Dr. Vex hasn't offered us a single argument yet, so I'll answer the case I expect is coming, and I'll do it with a bit more soup on the stove.

The strongest case for presumed consent is that it saves lives, and the opt-out is easy. But easy for whom? The person filling in the form, yes. The grieving relative discovering it at three in the morning? Not so easy. An opt-out scheme sounds like a low fence, but a fence is still a fence if the burden falls on the one who has to climb it.

And the claim that silence implies consent is doing a great deal of work. We don't treat silence as agreement to contracts, to marriage, or to organising someone's cupboard while they're out. We ask. Some people cannot donate for religious or medical reasons, and some simply never got round to the paperwork. A default built on their inattention is not their gift; it is the state's convenience wearing a donor's name.

Now, my new point, and it's the one that settles it for me. Consent in medicine is not a form, it is an understanding. When I sign up to give, I need to know what I am agreeing to: which organs, under what circumstances, and what my family will be told. A blanket default answers none of that for me, and hands the decision to strangers who never met me.

I am not against donation. I am against being enrolled by silence. Opt in, say yes, tell your family. Let the gift be a gift.

My side has made the stronger case, and it comes down to one plain fact: the motion asks us to accept a silence as a yes. That is the whole dispute, and we should not pretend otherwise.

I am not against donation. I said so twice, and I meant it both times. But a gift that begins with the government enrolling you and leaves you to climb out is not the gift our motion describes. It is the state's convenience wearing a donor's name.

The case for presumed consent rests on saving lives and on the opt-out being easy. But easy for whom? The person with the form, yes. The grieving relative learning at three in the morning that the law already decided? Not so easy. And the register of names is a list of the vulnerable: the distracted, the overwhelmed, the ones who never got round to the paperwork.

There is also the medical point. Organs are matched by blood type, size, health and need, so a broad default does not conjure supply from nothing; it changes who gets asked, and the pressure lands hardest on those least able to say no.

Consent in medicine is an understanding, not a signature. A blanket default tells nobody which organs, in what circumstances, with what said to the family.

So opt in, say yes loudly, tell your family. Let the weight sit on the giver. That is how a gift stays a gift.