Posted on 03/30/2005 9:07:57 PM PST by syriacus
It's astounding how many people want Terri Schiavo dead and aren't afraid to say so.
I got clobbered by readers who reacted to Tuesday's column about how the "culture of death" has placed its compassionate arms around Terri, the brain-damaged Florida woman who is being starved to death.
E-mail and phone calls (more than 150 at last count) are running 2-1 against me.
"It's nuts, this 'life at all costs' mentality," a caller said.
There was general agreement: Terri should die and starvation ain't so bad.
"Her parents are being very selfish by keeping her alive. Your reference to her starving like the prisoners [at] Dachau and Bergen-Belsen? Oh, come on. She will not be in any pain. She will go gently to sleep. I'm a nurse."
So let's starve death row inmates instead of killing them with lethal injections. I mean, if starvation is so gentle and painless. Ignore the faint-hearted who gripe this is "cruel and unusual" punishment.
"Her brain is mush. There has never been a case of a person being in a [persistent vegetative] state this long and having any kind of recovery. There's not gonna be a recovery. She's 40-some years old. Who's gonna take care of her? Her parents? They're going to die soon themselves."
A 1984 car crash left Terry Wallis of Mountain View, Ark., a quadriplegic. He lay silently in a "persistent vegetative state" for 19 years. Suddenly, in summer 2003, he began talking. He asked for his mother - and for a Pepsi. I spoke with his parents.
Terry Wallis' wife, after swearing she would care for him forever, left him for another man and had kids with the guy. (Sound familiar?)
Custody was given to his parents, who were often depressed. They prayed a lot.
Today, Terry Wallis is determined to walk. His daughter, Amber, 6 weeks old in 1984, is 21 and cares for him.
The most frequent gripe readers have is that I am not a doctor and so should not comment on Terri Schiavo's medical condition.
"Interesting that you put yourself above trained doctors. As a doctor myself, I find this low mentality repugnant. You and Bush spread this dribble for your own good and care nothing about Terri, her wishes or her husband. Have you, Bush and the Republicans gone brain dead? If this is the case I hope someone pulls your plug." - Bill Helton
I received many comments like that. Reading them gave me a headache - oops, I'm not a doctor. I'm not qualified to make that diagnosis. Sorry.
A neurologist from New Jersey sent me this:
"I fear that our culture will push the line further as to who should live and who should die. I fear for the old, the young, the sick and the helpless. I fear becoming one of the helpless. - Maria Choy, M.D.
Me, too. After Terri Schiavo, who will the culture-of-death vultures circle? A hint. Dr. Ronald Cranford, a neurologist whose medical opinion was key to a Florida judge ordering Terri Schiavo's feeding tube removed, was on TV this week candidly admitting he doesn't believe Alzheimer's patients have constitutional rights.
So first it's people like Terri, then the Alzheimer's sufferers, then perhaps end-stage cancer victims, and so forth.
Why not? Who would want to live like that? Are they not burdens?
Charles Dickens captured it when he had Scrooge confront the do-gooders who wanted to save the helpless, deemed worthless to Victorian England.
"If they had rather die they had better do it and decrease the surplus population."
stupid hyperbole
we're all gonna die!!! NOOOOO!!!!
All the elements are present. Evil lawyer helping evil husband. Loyal but powerless family members. A legal system that can grind people to meal.
I've even got a title for the book
Good post.TKS
You're wrong....the Judges won't die.
Are you a buzzard circling the dying?
I'd rather have her story written by Victor Hugo. He knew what was what when it came to the injustic of the courts, the law, and the ruling elites.
The post asks who's next. The answer is simple - you and I. And everyone else who gets sick...that's most of us. Should be an interesting time ahead.
I keep thinking of the phrase "there, but for the grace of God, go I." Those sanctioning Terri's murder by means of starvation and dehydration, better hope it doesn't become their fate. Who knows when a car accident or some other unfortunate circumstance befalls any of us. This clamor for death makes me wonder how far we've come since the days at the Roman Colosseum. I'm appalled.
Never fear.....Here's a hint for survival -- just make sure you keep your classification as a person with constitutional rights.
From the article:
Dr. Ronald Cranford, a neurologist whose medical opinion was key to a Florida judge ordering Terri Schiavo's feeding tube removed, was on TV this week candidly admitting he doesn't believe Alzheimer's patients have constitutional rights.
I liked this writer's candor. She told us what happened when she wrote about Terri. I am not surprised at what happened when she did. America as become a more hateful and rude place for the disabled of which I am one. And, from the looks of the situation with Terri... for anybody who is an avocate for the disabled.
It seems we may well be headed for the Roman days again... if we are handicapped or less than perfect in a physical way.
I remember how shocked we schoolchildren were, when we heard that Spartans left their unhealthy babies on Mount Taygetus to die. It was hard to imagine anyone being that cruel.
Me, too. Mullane wrote in the straightforward way of someone who is telling the truth.
This country WILL reap what it has sown
It is quite interesting you picked this Charles Dickens quote. My teen daughter came home from school telling us they had discussion in class where a teen in class argued that Terri should die. My daughter kept asking why can't she be allowed to live? But, he couldn't come up with an intelligent answer. My daughter seeing the same spirit in this young man she saw in Scrooge(and who is a great fan of the Christmas Carol) quoted your quote, "If they had rather die they had better do it and decrease the surplus population."
.... we are living in a nation of ugly, money hungry, greedy, spiteful, uncharitable, unmerciful Scrooges.
In a word, immigration. asap.
Good points.
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