The New Right to Kill

The so-called "right to die", previously "discovered" by the courts, of course, is specifically the right to refuse unwanted medical treatment:

"By clear and convincing evidence, it was determined she did not want to live under such burdensome conditions and that she would refuse such medical treatment-assistance," [Judge] Greer wrote.

Ok, fine. Take out the tube!

But why this insistence on using all the power of the State to prevent those who want to care for her from providing food and water?

I mean, if your parent had Alzheimers, and you had to feed them, and suddenly decided to stop doing so with the claim they wouldn't want to live that way so you locked them in the attic until they starved, you'd go to jail for abuse and neglect if not outright murder, right?

Right?

Well, you would have last week. Today it's not so clear:

Michael Schiavo's brother, Brian Schiavo, strongly disagreed with that assessment, telling CNN that Terri Schiavo "does look a little withdrawn" but insisting she was not in pain. He added that starvation is simply "part of the death process."

Well duh, if you're actively starving someone to death, it sure is!

Thursday, a lawyer for Michael Schiavo said he hoped the woman's parents and the governor would finally give up their fight.

In the federal court hearing, Schindler lawyer David Gibbs III argued that Terri Schiavo's rights to life and privacy were being violated. Whittemore interrupted as Gibbs attempted to liken Schiavo's death to a murder.

"That is the emotional rhetoric of this case. It does not influence this court, and cannot influence this court. I want you to know it and I want the public to know it," Whittemore said.

But, even if Terri Schiavo WERE able to express her wishes, and said she didn't want to live like this, suicide and assisted suicide are still illegal in every state, aren't they? Isn't the nudge-nudge, wink-wink behind-the-scenes euthanasia supposed to be reserved for the suffering and terminally ill?

Or has that changed today?

So how is this not murder?

Because "food and water" cannot be considered "medical intervention" that can be refused -- or withheld "for your own good" -- because, like, it's something every single one of us needs to survive, no?

So the courts are here inventing a new right, and it's not just a right to suicide, it's an explicit right to Euthanize.

And based on the flimsiest of hear-say evidence, from parties with a clear conflict of interest!

Now I'm all for avoiding unnecessary pain and suffering for the terminally ill.

All for it!

But here, there is no suffering, no pain. Indeed, by the claims of those ending her life, she can't be "unhappy" with her current state at all, lacking the capacity to do so.

The State used to be tasked with speaking for and defending those who cannot defend or speak for themselves, but instead it is actively aiding those who would snuff out her painless, carefree life.

It used to be, if somebody wanted to die who wasn't terminally ill and suffering, that they'd be given psychiatric treatment, maybe medication, to help change their minds and make their lives bearable.

But what, now the ACLU is going to start demanding this barbaric practice of attempting to heal the minds of the depressed elderly cease immediately, so as not to artificially interfere with their "right" to spiral downwards into demanding an early death?

Why cloud their minds and avoid their true wishes with Prozac?

I mean, it would probably save Social Security if we shuttled them along more quickly to the glue factory, wouldn't it? It would save a lot of trouble for everyong. Less drain on precious resources we're always being exhorted to "conserve." Given this social utility -- because it's all about the cost, isn't it? -- we can now deny food and water to anybody who an outside party can claim wouldn't want -- or shouldn't want -- to live in their current condition, and even feel good about it!

The social utilitarian "ethicists" like Peter Singer should be all over this, pushing to stop treating depression in the elderly.

So now the safety of my life, and yours, has been reduced to a subjective judgement of its "quality."

It has been reduced to a purely probabilistic calculation -- whether or not you "most likely" won't recover, whether or not you "most likely" wouldn't want to live, and whether or not you "most likely" wouldn't feel pain as you starved.

Once those conditions are met, it's State-enforced murder time! Run, Logan, Run!

(tip to 2$$G of The Washhouse for the above 1976 movie reference. He has some comments on this subject as well.)

This is all very new, and very broad. This is not simply the right to refuse medical treatment!

It's not like the experts even agree:

The issue arose again this week when a neurologist, Dr. William Cheshire of the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Fla., said in a court document that he believed it's more likely that Schiavo is in a "minimally conscious state" than a persistent vegetative one.

They can't even agree whether earthworms or lobsters feel pain, and now we're making life and death decisions with that kind of uncertainty, just for the pleasure sticking it to Evangelical pro-lifers?

So down the slope we slide. Look, it's not like mass State-ordered murder of the weak and infirm and unproductive and other general "undesireables", under the euphemism of Euthanasia, is some kind of generic fantasy of what might happen, but instead is something that did happen in reality, not so very long ago!

And I stress, they didn't think they were engaged in an evil scheme at the time!

The cliched phrase, "The road to Hell is paved with good intentions", is, as they would say on The Simpsons, "funny, because it's True!"

This is the problem with unelected, aristocratic judges making up social law, which should be the realm of The People, through their elected representatives, so we can all decide and argue and finally feel, mostly, that a reasonable compromise has been reached. Instead, we're having vital social issues, like this new right to be Terminated, and gay "marriage", dictated to us. Which is all fine and dandy if you agree with the dictates, but don't cry to me when they come for you and suddenly everyone's hands are tied.

It's high time these activist judges had their lights punched out.

And it's high time we realized they're not the highest branch of government, but a co-equal one, and as Napoleon would say, "how many divisions has Judge Greer?"

It's time for the Andrew Jackson option: Governer Bush, if he has any integrity and takes his duties seriously, will decide the court has erred, and to properly follow the constitution of Florida, as he is sworn to do, he must disobey an unlawful order (even judges make mistakes), and use his power to order the State Police to go in there and take her away to those who want to care for her. He can, and should, do it. Ann Coulter and NRO elaborate on this option. Suffice it to say, recall how Clinton found the nerve to use armed agents to take little Elian back to a Stalinist dictatorship, despite rulings of the now-apparently-infallible Florida courts! But that was an important issue, making a dictator happy, which is far more important than the life of a defenseless woman.

Who even if she could explicitly refuse medical treatment, and refused food, would be treated psychiatrically and fed, according to the law of every state...at least up until last week!!!

So how is this not murder?????

I can only believe Michael Schiavo's motives, after all this time (he has certainly "moved on", with a new family yet! and there are plenty of people who will take his burden off his hands if he'd just walk away) is to "win" over Terri's parents, just for the sake of "winning."

Congratulations, Mike! You've "won"!

Does it feel good?

What you've won is an all-expense-paid trip to Hell.

You'll meet lots of people who justified killing the weak there, I'm sure you'll have lots to talk about.

Have fun!