The Rationale for Assisted Suicide Carried to the Ultimate

Here is the lead paragraph in a story from The New York Times about assisted suicide.

LONDON — The controversy over the ethical and legal issues surrounding assisted suicide for the terminally ill was thrown into stark relief on Tuesday with the announcement that one of Britain’s most distinguished orchestra conductors, Sir Edward Downes, had flown to Switzerland last week with his wife and joined her in drinking a lethal cocktail of barbiturates provided by an assisted-suicide clinic.

Downes was not mortally ill. He chose death over living without his wife's companionship. I understand that.

And I understand the reaction of euthanasia advocates. Downes' choice takes the argument for assisted suicide to the ultimate, far past their dream that euthanasia be incorporated into the dynamic of medical treatment.

They would assist the physically ill or the physically disabled,, but they do not want to face the fact that sometimes that other part of our make-up -- our intellect, our soul, our emotions -- turn against us.

We our free to kill ourselves. What I do not want is to shift that responsibility to an organization that might substitute its will for our own.

Budgets, and People

There was an interesting piece published recently in the Chicago Sun-Times. We all know nearly every government agency has taken a budget hit over the past few months. "It's the economy, stupid," to quote one of the instigators of this mess, Ronald Reagan.

But governments provide services, one of which in Illinois is paid attendant care for people with disabilities who need such to live independently -- and productively -- in the community.

Read the piece here.

Michael Ervin is waiting to find out if he will be able to get out of bed Wednesday morning.

That's what this state budget crisis means to him and thousands of other residents in Illinois.

Ervin is a Chicago playwright, free-lance writer and community activist. He also happens to be physically handicapped. Without the help of a home service aide, paid for by the state's Department of Human Services, he can't get out of bed.

This local-to-Illinois crisis reflects the need for the incorporation of the Community Choice Act of 2009 into national health care reform.

The uninformed might say, "A nursing home or other institution is the place for people in such circumstances."

That's wrong, both from a civil rights point of view and from an economic point of view. The cost of the attendant care Ervin needs is probably half the cost of incarcerating him in a nursing home -- a place where his life would be regulated rather than productive.

There is a place for nursing homes in our society, but a nursing home is not the place for every person with a disability who requires attendant care.

Review Reprinted

• On the newjerserynewsroom.com site

Book review: Defending the divine
Monday, 13 July 2009 12:04
REASON, FAITH, AND REVOLUTION: Reflections on the God Debate
By Terry Eagleton 185 pp. Yale University Press, $25.00




Click on cover image for Internet Review of Books site.

Fishbowl Greeting Cards

There's a new greeting card company which now offers cards featuring people with disabilities -- Fishbowl Cards, Inc.

I'm not sure how I feel about the idea. Of course, there seem to be greeting cards for almost every occasion -- divorce, for example -- and I do understand the impetus for dolls and other toys to be offered that reflect the identity of the buyer.

But, the ugly truth be told -- and despite nearly 50-years riding around boob-high to the world -- I would not put disability as the first element of that which makes up Gary.

The card designs are interesting, and fill a niche, all the same, and I wouldn't be offended if someone thought to send me one.

Assisted Suicide in Great Britain

There's an interesting article in The Herald wherein the writer, one Anne Johnstone, recounts her epiphany on the subject of assisted suicide. She writes ...

"Why have I changed my mind? The leader writer in me would carefully marshal the intellectual arguments against reform and harvest some key quotes from medical and religious leaders but that would be fundamentally dishonest because this change is primarily heart-felt."

... and goes on to relate the "heart-felt" change came about because of personal experiences.

It's well worth the read, and I finished the essay believing that among assisted suicide advocates once the personal meets the utilitarian there is invariably a change.

Sadly, if we recognize the impetus of the assisted suicide movement is utilitarianism -- an assumption that humans can take control, to direct life along the path of least resistance and most profit for those who can profit -- we find ourselves shouting into a whirlwind.

That understood, it is depressing that those who talk about "death with dignity" can be persuaded that humane and empathetic palliative care is far better than utilitarian disposal only when it influences them personally.

Crips, Midgets, Language, and Freedom

BROOKLYN, N.Y.: Little People of America is petitioning the FCC to add the word "midget" to the list of what cannot be uttered on broadcast television. The LPA, which represents people with various forms of dwarfism, is urging its 6,000 members to file complaints with the commission over the use of the word in an episode of "Celebrity Apprentice."

There is some discussion among disability activists about the The Little People of America's attempt to move the m-word into the province occupied by the n-word, the r-word, and f-word. Ironically, a good number of people with disabilities have co-opted the word "crip," although not without some controversy within the ranks. I use crip myself, mainly as a way to assume control of a situation.

One thread of the discussion focused on the idea that too many of the individual "ban the word" attempts are counterproductive to the collective disability rights movement. Alternately some worry about freedom of expression.

I find myself in the second camp, even though I truly understand that any language or label that attempts to differentiate often attempts to denigrate. The very incident the LPA points to illustrates the word was used in a hateful and derogatory manner. Think not? There's a simple enough test: substitute the n-word, or even its once-acceptable root word, negro.

I'll make it personal. Even though I don't believe the word should be removed from the language, I don't like being called a cripple, and so I can readily understand that a little person would object to being called a midget.

Funnily enough, I thought that forms of the word "dwarf" were not acceptable, but I note that it appears in the first paragraph of the news release. Apparently, the LPA proposes "little people" to incorporate every person of short stature.

We all know that language, which is both symbolic and defining, is one of the primary elements of self-identification. And people of small stature historically have faced derisive comments. In fact, the word midget has resulted from a negative derivation: midge -- small dipterous insect inflicting painful bites.

When dealing with the perception of disability by those who are not yet disabled, I sometimes think "Anything goes!" is the correct approach, by which I mean humor (aggressive humor) and in-the-face tactics work far better than complaints.

• For more on the issue, I suggest these two short pieces about the word.

The Last Vestige of Pain, and Comfort

Evangel to Demolish Last of WWII Barracks

Once in a while, I'll see a story in the local newspaper about a couple celebrating an anniversary, with the man having arrived in Springfield, Missouri either as a patient for or on an assignment to O'Reilly General Army Hospital.

It was one of the primary military hospitals in the midwest during World War II, quickly thrown up in the early days of that great conflict on a patch of open ground in the northeast part of the city.

From a local history of the hospital ...

O’Reilly’s staff served over 100,000 patients during the hospital’s five years of operation. 42,000 patients were wounded and injured soldiers—even a few German prisoners of war. All were treated at an average cost of five dollars per patient per day.— In addition, 60,000 civilian dependents of military men also were treated at O’Reilly’s outpatient clinic, and a few even gave birth to children there. Healthcare today could take a lesson about efficiency from O’Reilly’s staff.

During the years after the war, the part of the campus was turned over to the Assemblies of God church, and it became the site of Evangel College (now University).

"Swords into plowshares ... "

• Despite sharing its name with a prominent local family, the hospital was named for a former surgeon general of the US Army, Robert Maitland O'Reilly.
• Evangel University's O'Reilly Army Hospital history.
• I suppose the "last building" resonates so much with me because I lived in a converted hospital barracks, albeit at Fort Jackson, South Carolina, circa 1950 while my father was stationed there.