Terri Schiavo

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@Rally: Pretty much everyone expects everyone to live in accordance with "don't kill", regardless of religion or anything. That e.g. some priest of a pagan religion believe it's OK for him to make human sacrifices doesn't mean we believe it's OK for him to do. Same way if someone believes it's OK to cut people from food and water if they are brain-damaged, doesn't mean we have to allow him to do it just because his beliefs are OK with it. If you believe something to be homicide, you don't sit with your arms folded as it happens, do you? This is the same principle.

As for her time to die and God's plan, it can be everyone's time to die when an opportunity arises and still none of us in this discussion would think twice before saving a person in lethal danger.

@JSBB: I rely on different bioethicists than the US and Canadian governments do. Governments aren't so much concerned with ethics, anyway. Liberties stuff is politics and definitions of even simple terms get adjusted to fit schemes. By changing the definition one changes the concept. Change the concept and you have changed the reality.

@dmc: It's more complicated than just that. There's money, there's also freedom to get. He already has children with a different woman. I find it hard to believe in unselfish motives on his part. But, anyway, since when is a legal guardian entitled to choose between life and death for you? And I don't think a tale about her comments during watching a TV docummentary about euthanasia are any proof or anything.

@Laches: There are certain limits to personal liberties. I don't believe in an individual's freedom to mutilate or kill himself.

 

I think chev hit the nail on the head perfectly a few posts ago...

If denying oneself food and water (eg. a hunger strike) is suicide...

...denying food and water to another is murder. Can't have one without the other.

Haven't seen it put so clearly any other way.


Interesting note...Michael has been with his "fiance" for over seven years now...I'm surprised someone isn't calling him common law married, accusing him of bigamy and attempting to end his marriage to Terri...which would return the decisions for her medical care to her parents...


Yeah...welcome back Laches...hope you're back to stay!

 

@Hack,

No it wouldn't. Go to Laches "Abstract Appeal" weblink. The courts basically have custody of her. It appears if he would jump up and down and say insert the feeding tube, he doesn't have the authority to do so.

 

Even if Michael divorced or was divorced from Terri Schiavo, it wouldn't change anything. Michael Schiavo didn't decide to have the feeding tube removed. Michael Schiavo petitioned the court to decide what Terri would want.

Also, I don't really think a hunger strike would be the equivalent of suicide. I don't think Gandhi attempted suicide.

Not speaking legally for the moment, and looking at this particular case, you can't murder someone who is already dead. I believe Terri Schiavo is already dead. All that is left is a resource consumption machine. That's a truly awful description I know, I don't intend it to be inflammatory, just descriptive.

 

For all intents and purposes, I agree, Laches; there is nothing left of Terri Schiavo, and she isn't coming back. I don't believe that any person should have to die in the manner that she will, and an overdose of painkiller would be a much more humane way to end this. Legally, it's murder (act and intention); morally, I cannot find fault with it.

She has been gone for 15 years; her body lives, but Terri does not. All that has happened is that the suffering and trauma involved in her demise have been extended, not diminished. If ever I heard of a case for "mercy killing", this is it. While I don't believe morality should always trump law, I fail to see how either could justify keeping this woman's body alive.

 

Not trying to gang up on Chev' here but I am confused about your assertion that no one has the right to end their own life. I was not consulted pre-birth about my existence. I was never asked if I wanted to be brought into the world. I am also not suicidal or depressed myself but if I, as a rational hyuman being decide that life is not as great as most make it out to be(in the same way that some people do not think "The Lord of the Rings" movies were worth sitting through) then why do I not have to right to check out? Isn't that like kidnapping and forcing someone to go to a Nascar race adn telling them they do not have the right to leave before the race is over and further asserting that if they do not think highly of the auto-racing they must be mentally unstable?

You will excuse me if I kindly reject your offer to protect me from myself and laugh at your moral evaluations of me if I , at some point and for whatever reason(including being ona respirator or somesuch), do not share your lust for life.

We humans have an annoying habit of placing entirely too much importance on our own lives, but only as it suits whatever political or religious axe we have to grind. If allowing Terri Shiavo to die is murder then owning wood furniture is also murder. A tree was killed to make your coffee table(and Terri is as sentient as a tree right now).

THe planet is too crowded and overpopulation too big a problem for us to be wasting resources preserving the "lives" of serial killers(insane or no), the brain dead and such.

I know, I know...horribly insentive, blah, blah, blah. I am speaking practically here. Regardless of how you or I might feel about life in general or human life in particular, we simply cannot go on like this. One way or another we will be killing people off. I am not saying that allowing Terri Shiavo to die will be what prevents the inevitable genocide we have in store when the Earth's population reaches the boiling point. I am just saying that, from a practical POV, we should be putting our efforts into saving people we KNOW are alive adn do not deserve to die(thrid world children etc.) rather than these dog and pony shows for the comatose, non-sentient and irredeemably sociopathic.

 

Nobody is to blame here. Just another example of how technology has outpaced humanity. Would I starve a fellow human being to death. NO...but its not my decision

 

15 long years and this farce still continues.
IMO there should be a time limit on these things. Missing people are declared dead after 7 years have passed from the date of their going missing. Her brain has been dead/missing for 15 damn years now. She should be declared brain-dead and thus technically dead. Pull the feeding tube or use some other method of euthanasia. Just get it over with.

This is no simple case, I agree. However, just because her body can be sustained artificially does not mean she should be kept on them indefinately. There are a lot of things that we have no answer for. Time should then be taken as the answer. Citing a couple of cases does not mean that we should remain idecicive on every such case.

A time comes when the state should (and has) say enough is enough. This inane prolonged legal procedure must come to and end and the parents should let go.

 

It worked for death penalty ban, shouldn't it work for people who have done nothing wrong, as well?

She isn't missing, she's here. With missing people, it's the fact you neither have a sign of life nor the body. If the person shows up after those 7 years (it's much more in some countries), he isn't kept legally dead but the declaration is voided.

By the way, I remember that case when my former civil law teacher almost declared someone dead after many, many years (she's a judge) and all of a sudden he popped up on a different continent.

 

You are right that she is not "missing" Chev'...she is DEAD. Has been for 15 years. She has not responded to anyone or anything and has shown no signs of life other than a heartbeat.

At what point DO we concede that a brain dead person is in fact dead? We are not talking about someone whose mind is active but she has just lost her motor reflexes or ability to communicate. She is not there. She has no more thought going on than John F. Kennedy does right now.

Like I said, a tree is technically "alive" but still we make furniture out of it(re: kill it) because we recognise the importance of sentience in the 'life equation'.

 

Look what I found here in Poland

http://www.koliber.net/ts/?id=3151

 

It does not surprise me that there are people in Poland who are misinformed about this case and the American legal system in general but the flat out stupidity behind the blatantly false allegations against Micael Shiavo are disturbing.


To reiterate:


Terri is NOT aware by any stretch of the imagination. She is incapable of thought or aknowledgement or reaction to external stimuli of any kind.

The mainstream media have gone out of their way to paint a different picture, using a few scant seconds of video from 11 years ago where Terri's movements almost seemed to coincide with the examiner brought in by her parents to say that she was not a vegetable. She does little more than breath now. Every chance she had at dignity has been stripped by well meaning but misguided politicals and religionists.

 

@ Chev: The pope, and many of his followers, religious leaders in Spain especially, also says using condoms to prevent AIDS or unwanted pregnancies is immoral and against the wishes of God. And he told people in Central America to keep having children, that God was proud of them, when they can't even feed the people they already have. The Pope is just another man, he is as fallible and prone to being wrong as the rest of us. God didn't appoint him because he has the truth of what's right and wrong, morally speaking, or that he is smarter or more understanding of God and His laws than the rest of us. This is not to say that he is a bad person, and he certainly isn't the worst pope the world has ever seen. But I still think he is wrong on some issues. As to the ammendments on Judgement Day, explain to me please why only 2 of the ten commandments, the ones against stealing and murder, are actually laws. Not only that, but one of our own ammendments grants us the right to practice any religion we wish, which is in direct contradiction to the commandment of having no gods before God. Also, a lot of businesses are open on Sunday. I could possibly go on, but my point is, agreeing with the Pope doesnt make you a good person, and disagreeing with him doesn't make you bad. What right does he have to dictate world policy like he understands everything? By that I mean telling the rest of the world if we don't do things exactly like he says, we'll burn in hell. How does he know he's right? Finally, more on topic, what gives him the right to try to dictate medical practice when he isn't even a friggin doctor? Recently, he has been in and out of the hospital for various reasons. Let's say hypothetically that he was in a state like Terri. Would the Catholic Church be willing to go without a leader until he dies naturally? If medical science could prove he was in excruciating pain, would they force him to stay on a machine indefinitely? I personally believe that God gave us FREE WILL for a reason. It is between you and God and NO ONE else if you chose to end your life. The Pope is here to guide people like any other religious leader, not dictate policy that he has no business getting involved in.

 

I just saw that the Supreme Court has refused to hear the case (again). It seems like that should settle it - there's no additional court to appeal to.

 

Saw a report on the news last night. They showed a video of her which I found gross. Let the poor woman die in peace.

 

@Ravynn: If you want to talk about the Pope, open a separate thread for that and I'll answer your questions, but they aren't relevant in this thread.

 

There were postings on the pope earlier in this thread, which is why I posted that. Rereading it I can see it is a bit of a stretch. Sorry about that.

 

I was watching CNN last night and
Now that each and every court has found against Terry's parents the pro-lifers want the governer to overrule the entire judicial system and keep IT on artificial life support and reinsert the feeding tube.
*shrug* When will this madness end

 

After reading all the posts here and with what time I've had to keep up with this case, I must say the same points nag at me:

Like Chev said, Dead people don't breathe.

There are people that want to help. Call it religious or pro-life hoopla, but there are people willing to give their own money to pay for Terri's feeding tube and make it no burden to taxpayers.

To me this whole case just hits a fundamental core of what I do daily. It's part of my humanity. I wake up to go teach in my special education classroom everyday. And while, I myself do not teach severe and profound mentally retarded students, I work in a field that does. I study it. I live it. I breathe it. I put up with seemingly countless frustrations of all magnitudes everyday and yet with persistence, I see learning, I see improvement with my students with moderate and mild mental retardation. I have first hand seen how the brain is a crazy thing. No matter what label we slap on a person, no matter how much we think we have them scientifically figured out, they can always throw us curveballs and do things we never thought possible. I understand that we do not know everything there is to know about the human brain and how it works.

What disturbs me mostly is that she has not been released to the care of folks who are willing to pay for her to receive better medical services than simply hospice or nursing home care. If as much money had spent on therapeutic medical services and good doctors (not just ones selectively chosen by the husband)as on all these legal fees, I can't help but wonder if we'd see a different Terri today.

Terri still has a role in this world. Even if it is only for us to think long and hard about our humanity. And that is a noble role IMHO.

God Bless you Terri.