Justin writes:
She is a corpse with a heartbeat.
According to a cast of characters which include a euthanasia proponent, a lawyer at the forefront of dehydration advocacy for the brain-damaged, and a doctor who thinks its morally acceptable to starve Alzheimer's patients to death.
Artificially feeding her against her wishes and/or the wishes of her husband (whose wishes have precedence over the wishes of her parents -- if you don't like that, get that law changed) is sick.
I think we have to divide things we do for disabled people into "care" and "heroic medical measures." I consider a feeding tube to fall into the former category. That which we may do to ourselves, if we are functioning, exceeds that which we may require others to do to us if we are not. I can deny myself food, water, and air, for instance. I cannot instruct others to deny me those things if I am rendered incapable of making my own decisions. I can instruct them to deny me things like a respirator, or dialysis, of course, which is reasonable. There is no reason for the feeding tube to be removed at all. It is not valuable. It is not horribly invasive or uncomfortable. It is not going to be taken out and used on another patient. They can certainly starve and dehydrate her to death with the tube in place. In fact, leaving it in place would be a prudent thing to do, to spare her the risk of having to have a new one installed if the decision to kill her is reversed before she dies. THe only reason the tube is being removed, is because they are playing the game that "The Tube" is keeping her alive. In reality, nutrition and hydration are keeping her alive, and in fact, they are also keeping you and me alive too. Nutrition and hydration are "care," not "heroic medical measures," and while people can refuse to eat and drink themselves, they should not be able to leave advance directives demanding others deny them such things. If Terri were able to be spoon fed by an attendant, would the judge have then ordered "spoon and attendant withdrawal?" Would the papers report that "the spoon is keeping her alive artificially?" If you want to make an argument for killing the cognitively impaired, let's at least call it what it is, and not engage in political theatre over feeding tubes.
If I have a living will (in writing or by the decision of a legal proxy) that restricts certain kinds of treatment, you're more than happy to see doctors violate that and keep me alive as long as someone on Earth is willing to pay?
Well, I would argue that you do not have a legal right to demand others restrict your air, food, and water, unless they need to be delivered in invasive uncomfortable ways that reduce your human dignity. You are of course welcome to not breathe, drink, or eat as long as you are in charge, but you do not have the right to demand we kill you by withholding such things if you become disabled.
That is not the way any sane legal or medical system should work. I suppose you don't believe in euthanasia either?
I think euthanasia is fine if the patient is suffering horribly, has all their marbles, and has less than six months to linger from a terminal illness. Terri Schiavo meets none of these criteria. I certainly don't support the right of an adulterous spouse who swore up and down at the malpractice trial that he only wanted to care for his wife for the rest of her natural life, and who didn't mention her "wish" to not go on until 7 years after her brain injury, to have his brain-damaged wife starved and dehydrated to death solely on his say-so, absent any written indication of her wishes. -- Eric Michael Cordian 0+ O:.T:.O:. Mathematical Munitions Division "Do What Thou Wilt Shall Be The Whole Of The Law"