From: David Buchanan (DBuchanan@ClassicalRadio.org)
Date: Sun Apr 03 2005 - 00:09:35 BST
Richard Loggins said to dmb:
I'll ventur to say that until you are personally in a
PVS situation yourself, you don't know what kind of
black board you have. Her parents say she responded to
them.
dmb replies:
Her parents deserve sympathy, but do you really think its reasonable that
their opinion should trump all the doctors and judges? There was a doctor
who took the side of the parents, but the court found him to be "not
credible". I mean, its clear that we do not have perfect knowledge about
such situations. The best we can do is rely on medical science and the law.
The best we can do is honor the opinions of the doctors who examined her.
Their finding were presented to the judges within the rules of evidence as
set by the courts. I think its wrong to dismiss all that in favor of some
rather wild speculations about the blissful awareness of vegetables or the
will of god. If she can't respond to static quality, then what reason is
there to believe she can respond to DQ? No. I think we have to handle these
things on a conventional level or this matter will get way out of hand. I
can just see a new law prohibiting any plug pulling for anyone unless such
wishes had been put in writing and can be proved in court. I can just see
the right opening new hospitals to care for those unfortunate souls who
failed to sign a living will. I can see religous-right lawyers looking for
loopholes in the ones that were signed. I can see a whole new industry.
Personally, I think its cruel to confuse human life with such low level
biological functioning. And 87%? of Americans say that they would not want
to "live" like that. They would pull the plug on themselves in that
situation. Only a tiny minority would choose that existence over death.
Ironically, these are the same people who believe most fervently that
they're going to heaven. What's up with that? Anyway, isn't that what it
really comes down to? We get to decide. I'm the one who gets to decide which
medical treatments I'll accept or reject. I'm the one who gets to decide
whether or not my life is worth living, not the congress or some guy from my
dad's church.
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