Posted on 04/05/2005 5:42:20 PM PDT by Mr. Silverback
Note: This commentary was delivered by Prison Fellowship President Mark Earley.
While the world’s attention is focused on saying farewell to John Paul II, a great man who died peacefully last weekend, the world is finding no peace in what it has done to Terri Schiavo. The controversy over the decision of judges to starve her to death is not going away anytime soon—and that’s a good thing.
Many commentators are suggesting that the legal fiasco surrounding Terri was foisted on us by Christian zealots. This view is totally untrue.
In fact, the most compelling argument for saving Terri was made, not by a Christian, but by Harriet McBryde Johnson, a disabled lawyer and self-professed atheist.
First, she says, Terri Schiavo was not terminally ill. This case was not about “end-of-life” decision-making; it was about intentionally killing a disabled woman by denying her food and water.
Second, Terri was not on life support. She was simply being fed through a tube. Is this method of feeding fundamentally different from feeding someone with a spoon? As Johnson puts it, “No matter how you answer that, it has nothing to do with whether a person should live or die.”
Third, Terri’s case is not about a patient’s right to refuse medical treatment—not, that is, unless we call eating and drinking “treatment.” If we do, then all of us, every time we eat a meal, are acting to artificially extend our lives.
Fourth, Terri was incapable of making a decision to refuse treatment—and had never made one before. Should someone else be allowed to make decisions for her regarding the simple act of eating and drinking?
Fifth, advocates of killing Terri claim that she was unaware of her situation and thus incapable of suffering. If that’s true, Johnson argues, then her death cannot be justified as “relieving suffering.”
Sixth, Terri left no living will, so her death cannot be justified on the grounds that it’s “what Terri would have wanted.”
Seventh, Terri, like all disabled people, is entitled to statutory protection under the Americans with Disabilities Act. She had the right not to be treated differently because of her disability. For the sake of consistency, would we now have to deny or remove feeding tubes from everyone?
Some good can come out of Terri’s tragedy. I suspect that people will go rushing to get living wills in order not to be put in Terri’s position. I recommend the one found on the National Right to Life Committee’s website. Terri’s murder might also inspire federal legislation to protect the rights of future Terri Schiavo’s—to ensure that lives are not snuffed out because they are inconvenient, because the spouse wants to inherit money, or for any other arbitrary reason. Congress should pass a Terri Schiavo law that would guarantee that the rights of the disabled, who, as Senator Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) put it, “live in the shadows,” would be protected.
Life is precious; it is made in God’s image. The modern utilitarian notion that someone’s worth should be judged by what he or she can contribute to society is an abomination.
Thank you, Terri, for awakening us to the duty before us: defending human dignity and the sanctity of all human life.
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The day we need an essay on "why its wrong to starve someone to death" is the day this country has lost its moral compass.
Mr. Colson is correct, the legal fiasco was not foisted on us by Christian zealots, but the legal process was certainly the victim of a hijacking attempt by some of them.
Then we'd better get out there and start searching for it, ASAP. Apparently, about 9% of our fellow citizens see nothing wrong with killing a disabled person (recent Zogby poll). That number is way too high for comfort.
No one's buying it.
The Zogby poll was the only one that asked questions actually relevant to the Schindler case. The ABC poll completely misrepresented the facts--it was what is often called a "push" poll.
So you'd be in the murder the voice-free camp, I take it?
fwiw, I detect no 'hysterical grasping' in your post.
You got that right ... all except the way she was executed: she was dehydrate to death.
Applying such torture to those who do not even having the cognitive ability to acknowledge the person wiping their butt and changing their diaper for 15 years or longer?
And if you agree with the Schwindlers, then you also would have no compunction in chopping off all her limbs and ripping the heart out of her body to replace it with one that would keep that body "alive" or at least breathing. You live that way if that is your choice. You will never impose such sick thinking on me.
There was no murder. Just a judgement that is perfectly reasonable given the fact that a vast majority of people affirm that were they Mrs Schiavo, they would hope the Judge would make the same decision on their behalf.
Do you water your house plants?
The ABC poll was only one of many polls.
And even their(ABC) percentages were only an average 5% off the others.
Google.
No
" those who do not even having the cognitive ability to acknowledge the person wiping their butt"
Sounds quite a bit like what newborns are. Hope I never have to look to you for kindness and/or help.
This lady, though apparently quite disabled, was not dying from anything until they decided to do the Goebels experiment and see how long it would take to dehydrate her. I would not vote for that kind of torture for anyone.
I read that Terri's miserly husband refused to give her dental care or that her teeth be cleaned daily resulting in her having to have 5 decayed teeth removed.
I wonder if the oral surgeon gave Terri a sedative, novocaine, or general anesthesia to remove her teeth?
Or, because they thought she was pvs, removed the teeth without pain medication?
It would be interesting to find out what they did and if it would contradict Schiavo attorney, death loving Felos.
Schwindlers? Wy don't you find another forum to disrupt.
Few would want to live in such a condition but few would want to die in the way she did either.
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