Terri starves to death
Here is one obituary.
http://tinyurl.com/6afea
In conversations at work and in letters to the editors of a couple papers I look at, I see similar illogical arguments to defend the starvation of a severely disabled adult.
1) Outsiders should shut up because they don’t know what she really wanted. Then why can’t the benefit of the doubt go to life? Especially since her husband finally recalled what she wanted after he won the lawsuit.
2) The court shouldn’t interfere with his custodial rights. That’s fine but he should be put in jail now for murder. That’s not a logical response, but I don’t understand why the court never doubted his motives.
3) People who want Terri to live are such hypocrites because they support the war in Iraq that has killed multiple thousands of highly functioning adults. Does Jesse Jackson support that war? This highlights a person’s inability to recognize a more complicated approach to life. Pacifism is not the only option to the philosophically consistent person who wants to prevent Terri’s pre-meditated death by neglect.
4) Since starvation and death hasn’t been overcome in third world countries, it is inconsistent to pour effort into helping a brain dead person. But they aren’t as concerned for those sufferers elsewhere when they are in need of medical attention. Are they really advocating we send all of our medical professionals and all of our medications to other countries until we all descend to the same level of suffering? Are they advocating all veterinarians of companion animals also be sent overseas to care for farm animals, since Terri is only existing on an animal level anyway, and she just needs to be put down like an old dog?
I agree with the Pope, although I am not Catholic, that tube feeding is not extraordinary treatment. http://tinyurl.com/5aoxg Why? Because without it they will definitely die. Also I don’t think it is inconsistent remove a respirator from someone who is brain dead. Why? Because that person’s body may continue to breathe on their own, they aren’t being denied oxygen. This is far too simplistic in a blog entry so I recommend a couple bioethics sites.
http://tinyurl.com/47fuv
http://tinyurl.com/5xxf3
http://tinyurl.com/6afea
In conversations at work and in letters to the editors of a couple papers I look at, I see similar illogical arguments to defend the starvation of a severely disabled adult.
1) Outsiders should shut up because they don’t know what she really wanted. Then why can’t the benefit of the doubt go to life? Especially since her husband finally recalled what she wanted after he won the lawsuit.
2) The court shouldn’t interfere with his custodial rights. That’s fine but he should be put in jail now for murder. That’s not a logical response, but I don’t understand why the court never doubted his motives.
3) People who want Terri to live are such hypocrites because they support the war in Iraq that has killed multiple thousands of highly functioning adults. Does Jesse Jackson support that war? This highlights a person’s inability to recognize a more complicated approach to life. Pacifism is not the only option to the philosophically consistent person who wants to prevent Terri’s pre-meditated death by neglect.
4) Since starvation and death hasn’t been overcome in third world countries, it is inconsistent to pour effort into helping a brain dead person. But they aren’t as concerned for those sufferers elsewhere when they are in need of medical attention. Are they really advocating we send all of our medical professionals and all of our medications to other countries until we all descend to the same level of suffering? Are they advocating all veterinarians of companion animals also be sent overseas to care for farm animals, since Terri is only existing on an animal level anyway, and she just needs to be put down like an old dog?
I agree with the Pope, although I am not Catholic, that tube feeding is not extraordinary treatment. http://tinyurl.com/5aoxg Why? Because without it they will definitely die. Also I don’t think it is inconsistent remove a respirator from someone who is brain dead. Why? Because that person’s body may continue to breathe on their own, they aren’t being denied oxygen. This is far too simplistic in a blog entry so I recommend a couple bioethics sites.
http://tinyurl.com/47fuv
http://tinyurl.com/5xxf3
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