I've followed the Terri Schiavo case in the U.S. with mild curiosity and thought about the issues involved. On one hand, I can understand the desire for people to want to die with dignity and the desire of her husband to put what is left of Terri out of her misery. At the same time I can understand why the parents want to keep her alive as long as possible regardless of what chances the doctors says she has. Personally, I believe that we never have the right to end the life of another but that if they choose death with a clear mind than we should grant that wish. We should never end a life because it has become inconvenient to us or we would not want "to live like that". That seems shallow and selfish. If someone can no longer communicate their wishes to us then we are obliged to act on the safe side and assume they want to live.
But that's not why I'm posting. Regardless of what I feel the fact is that Terri's husband has gone through the courts and received approval to act as he feels is necessary even though it is against the wishes of her parents. He has acted in a lawful manner and one assumes he is acting in good faith.
However, one has to question what the Congress and President are doing in this debate, passing resolutions all willy-nilly to block the law of the land. This to me is disturbing as it basically says that following the laws and the courts is not good enough if you are doing something that they do not agree with. That's dictatorship, not democracy.
And that's scary.
2 comments:
Very scary indeed, Bill. I agree completely with you take on this. The family should have been left to deal with this agonizing personal matter on their own (with the courts, of course, since there was sincere disagreement on both sides.)
The government getting involved in specific matters like this just politicizes a family's suffering, which is wrong on every level.
The family are who got the national media involved. The media (and lots of special interest groups) came to Florida pre-2003, pushing Governor Bush to pass a new law about those in a persistent vegetative state to gain popularity with the religous right (mostly). The President is doing the same, as is future presidendial hopeful Senator Bill Frist.
This is a brutal, brutal story. I'm very familiar with pallative care, and know of more than one "snowing" of unrecoverable patients. A damn sight better than starvation.
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