Posted on 03/27/2025 5:38:11 PM PDT by Morgana
Twenty years ago today, Terri Schiavo’s feeding tube was withdrawn with court approval, commencing a cruel deprivation of sustenance that resulted in her death by dehydration 13 days later.
For those who may not remember, the case became the most hotly contested bioethics issue since Roe v. Wade as Terri’s husband Michael fought in courts and in the media with her parents and siblings over his desire to remove all Terri’s food and fluids. In the end, he won — and Terri died.
Now, two bioethicists on the influential Hastings Center blog decry the case as wrongly brought. They get some facts wrong and omit crucial information — like that Michael was living with another woman with whom he fathered two children during the litigation — but let’s not relitigate the case here. (Read this post for a more complete discussion)
The authors, Arthur Caplan and Dominic Sisti, and I do agree that the Schiavo case was a cultural “canary in the coal mine,” but for diametrically opposing reasons. They complain that it has empowered the wrong cultural forces into political prominence:
In retrospect, Schiavo launched a new, emboldened prolife movement, one that would eventually lead to conservative rule in state houses across the U.S. and the election, twice, of Donald Trump. The seeding of a new ultraconservative judiciary would support a strategic assault on medical privacy that would eventually lead to the end of legal abortion protection in Dobbs.
The Schiavo case did not “embolden” the pro-life movement. It was thriving when the case hit the headlines. Moreover, some of the most vociferous opponents of dehydrating Terri to death were disability rights activists — who, generally speaking, are politically liberal and not pro-life on abortion.
Caplan and Sisti complain that the case led to intrusive health-care policies.
We hear the echoes of Schiavo’s death in today’s debates over reproductive rights, end-of-life care, transgender care, vaccinations, and medical privacy more generally. The end of Roe v. Wade, the continued attacks on gender-affirming care, and the looming threats to contraceptive access all stem from the foundational fight over Terri’s bodily autonomy. Today’s autocratic playbook remains unchanged from those days: intrude upon and weaponize deeply personal medical decisions, rally the support of a mob, enact draconian regulations, ignore what medicine and science have to say.
Few knew it then, but the case of Terri Schiavo was a canary in the coal mine, warning us of bad things to come. The fight to honor Terri’s values in death was won, but the broader battle over government intrusion versus health care privacy rages on.
Good grief, no:
The Schiavo case did not cause the overturning of Roe v. Wade. Rather, the key precedent was an assisted-suicide case called Glucksberg v. Washington.
“Gender-affirming care” for children is not supported by “what medicine and science have to say.”
Vaccine mandates impede the making of “personal medical decisions.” Indeed, Covid vaccine mandates (supported by Caplan) were “autocratic” and — as the thousands of fired members of the military, medical personnel, and others will attest — forced people to take jabs or lose their jobs. How’s that for “weaponized deeply personal medical decisions”?
And if closing schools for so long weren’t “draconian regulations,” I don’t know what were.
The Schiavo case was a tragedy, but not for the reasons Caplan and Sisti claim. Before Schiavo’s death, most people were shocked that feeding tubes could be removed from disabled people who can metabolize food and water. After the case, polling majorities supported doing so. With that, people with severe brain injuries became a disposable caste.
The case also elevated the culture of death into a conflagration. It boosted the passage of assisted suicide laws. Euthanasia groups and bioethicists now teach people who can eat and drink how to commit suicide by self-starvation and dehydration (VSED). It has gotten to the point that the usual euthanasia suspects even campaign for legalizing advance directives that force care givers to withhold orally received food and water from dementia patients even if the patient eats and drinks willingly.
Yes, Schiavo was a horrible tipping point. But because the family lost, not because they were supported by millions of people in “Terri’s fight.”
I just interviewed Terri’s brother, Bobby Schindler, on my Humanize podcast. He discusses his memories about the case and the good works engaged by the Terri Schiavo Life and Hope Network defending the medically vulnerable. To listen, hit this link.
LifeNews.com Note: Wesley J. Smith, J.D., is a special consultant to the Center for Bioethics and Culture and a bioethics attorney who blogs at Human Exeptionalism.
profoundly and permanently shaped my view of the medical system
Everyone else has.
I signed on here at Free Republic just as the Terri Schiavo threads were ending, and so I never joined in the fun.
But I know they were brutal. Vicious.
Lots of arguing back and forth.
Never forget.
Twenty years ago this summer, I was dealing with two sick cats, one of which had a serious digestive problem the vet said was an enlarged esophagus. He was born with it, although the symptoms didn’t get worse until he was about 11 years old. He couldn’t keep anything down and had lost a considerable amount of weight. My other cat at the same time was diagnosed with cancer of the nasal passage. I ended up putting them both down on the same day, because as the vet asked me, “Would you rather do them both together, or come back in another month, and go through it all again?” Before the decision to put my cat with the digestive problem down, the vet told me that the last thing they could try was putting a feeding tube in the cat. I immediately thought of Terri Schiavo, and how they had removed her tube so she could die, but now a vet was mentioning putting a feeding tube in my cat. I immediately rejected the idea. I never would have put my cat or myself through that procedure.
Here is one thread.
Judge sets Oct. 15 as date to remove Terri Schiavo’s feeding tube
Sept 17, 2005 thread
https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/984495/posts
Thank you for memorializing this story. Terri deserved better from everyone involved.
I had not found FR in 2005.
At that time Glenn Beck was still on the radio and he was covering the case and I followed updates on his show daily.
I remember a lot of people were for it and I was shocked. I said she did not leave a living will in writing before this happened to her so I’m not at peace letting this happen to her. Most everyone agreed to that.
I suspect to this day her husband did something to cause her “accident”. She was starting to get better and could have told on him, that is why he wanted this done.
Terri Schiavo has passed away
CNN ^ | 3/31 1005 | CNN
Thanks
Another one.
Nancy Cruzan Case - She Took Ten Days to Die (Schiavo) 1992
https://freerepublic.com/focus/fr/1368237/posts
From March 2005. Shows how long the Schiavo back and forth went.
We can’t forget Nancy Cruzan either. (Although I had, til I saw this old thread)
I can still remember Glenn Beck talking about her death. I just sat there numb. I remember Father Frank Pavone giving a speech but I don’t know what he said, only that he said it. I know Fr. Pavone was with her when she died.
Her death was one of those things in life that puts a paperclip in your memory. Like when the space shuttle blew up or the world trade center fell. You know where you were and what you were doing when you learned of it happening, and you never forget it.
Medically Assisted Death the rage nowadays in New Zealand, Canada the UK.
But more is on the way in Keir Starmer’s UK medically assisted suicide...
I know but I post more about abortion than those. I should but the abortion cases are overwhelming.
I don’t recall who it was but there was a national, conservative radio host who argued that the husband just may be carrying out Teri’s wishes, which is a true statement but what I found hard to swallow is that starvation was the method of execution. You can bet every bleeding heart would have cried bloody murder had it been someone on death row.
For some of us that is the case. I think of it as a day of dying to the Republican Party and their Mike Pence “Pro-Life” Front Called the National Right to Life Committee.
Then Florida Governor Jeb Bush sealed his fate then IMHO.
If they wanted her to die, why the hell didn’t they inject her with chloroform? Dehydration is one of the most agonizing ways to die, and I pray that she was not conscious when they pulled the plug. I hold Jeb! responsible for letting this happen, and if Jeb! had gotten the presidential nomination, he would not have gotten my vote.
Thanks Morgana for posting this. I would have missed it. George Bush was the strongest man in the world,(sarc) but he was unable to save Terri./s Same with his loser brother Jeb, the Governor of Florida at the time.
It was sickening. God saw what happened. God saw.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.