Posted on 03/24/2005 8:34:20 AM PST by ElkGroveDan
I suppose those of you who are siding with Michael Schiavo are feeling smug today.
I have to ask a question that I wanted to ask when little Elian Gonzalez was whisked away to the island gulag. Will you cheer? Will you celebrate?
The reason I ask is that we certainly will celebrate if we win. If Terri is somehow saved from this horror at this the 11th hour, those of us who are fighting for her life will cheer and clap, some of us will cry and many of us will fall to our knees in thanks to Our Lord!
How will you feel if your side wins? What exactly is it that you have won?
Ongoing rehabilitation therapy instead of the alleged husband-ordered isolation and deprivation of stimulation might have made a big, happy difference. Maybe not happy by your (and others) definition, but happy is in the eye of the beholder.
The court is run by falliable men. In Florida, the courts have proven to be particularly falliable (see, the year 2000 election). You are comfortable with them giving the decision to someone who is, firstly, basing her wishes on something he just heard, rather than anything written - second, has questionable motives - third, who has relatives who say her wishes would be to live (please note, she is a Catholic, and thus has a strong bias against euthanasia). Furthermore, you are also comfortable with them rewriting the bias in such disputed cases to allow death - not just a pulling off of life support, but starvation and dehydration, a very painful death indeed.
Re-read what I just said. Think about it. And if you actually think that killing her still flies, then you are, quite frankly, morally impaired.
Ivan
I'm not sure exactly which way the opposition to starvation cuts. It's definitely cruel (though from what I've read, I don't believe Ms. Schiavo has sufficient mental capacity to process the pain signals her body sends to the brain.) And it's certainly a harsher path than we make our animals take.
From my perspective, this would be justification to allow for the administration of lethal injection. Her body is a prison. Life can offer no joy to a person in such a condition. Keeping her alive is no mercy. So, should we offer a long and slow death or a quick and painless death? I'd opt for the latter.
That is how ridiculous this has become when a man of impeccable integrity and convictions refuses to surrender to the Mob mentality and is ridiculed for it by Know Nothings. Pitiful.
It does no good since the Pack is in full pursuit and baying loudly against any voice of reason.
In this case, no one. However lay a doubt against a certainty - namely that there is doubt that she wants to die, against the certainty that if you kill her, it's not a mistake you can reverse.
I am not comfortable with her dying of starvation. I think it is ludicrous that in a civilized society that a human being cannot receive treatment as humane as I could provide for one of my pets.
You are obviously not bothered enough by it otherwise you would not be supporting it going ahead. She is suffering the pain associated with her kidneys dehydrating and with the cheerful endorsement of people like yourself.
As far as me being morally impaired, you are welcome to your opinion, and "frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn".
I am not the one endorsing the dehydration and starvation of a woman who may not want to die. Hope you're bloody proud of yourself. People like you just cheapened the value of human life in the eyes of the law - now it can be exterminated on hearsay and a whim.
Ivan
She does not feel pain. She does not respond to sound, light, or laughter. Are you aware of the fact that the videos on the site which appear to be proof of this are actually the result of very very very selective editing?
The original footage is SIX. HOURS. LONG. Everyone who has studied the tape has noted that Terri often makes sounds and movements in response to no stimuli at all, and just as consistently fails to respond to stimulation.
Terri is gone. And you need to read up the facts on the case.
If you believe these parents can afford these costs then I have a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you. They will still fall upon the taxpayer JUST AS THEY HAVE FOR FIFTHEEN YEARS.
At some point practicality must enter into these feel good schemes. This is socialized medicine at its worst and millions will be wasted in preserving this shell at the cost of sick people who could actually BENEFIT by the expenditures. Maybe someone should inform you that we do not have infinite resources for these kinds of things.
Terri died fifteen yrs. ago but they have refused to allow the body to follow. She is gone.
He was speaking of a very specific situation and after the family became adversarial the mother does not have free access. He could very well be correct.
Terri has been gone for fifteen yrs shutting done the physiological functions of the body is not starvation.
I don't understand this fear of death from Christians and this pathological clinging to the remnant of life.
It is as if you threw red meat into a school of sharks.
I could not agree with you more.
So what is "quick" or "painless" about being starved to death?
Why don't you try going without food or water for just 24 hours and get back to us to let us know how great it felt?
Funny, but wasn't that Nazi Germany's argument too when they started to kill the infirm, retarded and elderly?
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