FIRST THINGS: On the Square » Blog Archive » Death on Demand

A number of months ago, as the small group I'm in was reading an article about the biblical basis for opposing animal cruelty, we read about how Sweden banned confinement in animal production.  Some people in the group tried to argue that this is an example of how Europe has a better society than America because they don't have the death penalty, they have universal health care, etc.

I tried to point out that insofar as any of these things is desirable, we should notice that they are not arriving at these conclusions by biblical logic that acknowledges the existence of God and takes its cues from the way He created the world and still sees the world today.  Instead, Europe's current culture has derived the logical basis for its choices primarily from an atheistic viewpoint that has elevated the value of animals (largely a good thing) as it has lowered the inherent value of human beings (a very bad thing).

This article depicts yet another example of this logic.  Humans and their being alive do not carry inherent value and worth, by this viewpoint.  Instead, human life is only valuable if someone who carries some kind of "authority" in the situation says they are valuable.  Like in the case of abortion, we can't look at a human being and know that they carry an inherent value, worth, and right to life.  We can only ascertain whether a human will be valued by asking the person or entity (in the case of the state) in authority if that human will be valued.  If the mother of an unborn child says the child is valueless, then the child dies.  If not, then she lives.

This, by the way, is in contrast to the death penalty, where, yes, an outside entity determines whether a person will live or die.  But at least in the case of the death penalty, presumably (though not always in reality, I know) the state has done due diligence to determine the condemned person's guilt, and the crime committed was heinous enough that the government had previously determined it worthy of death.

I'm no huge supporter of the death penalty, but I simply cannot buy the logic that glosses over the difference between abortion (the killing of the voiceless innocent) and the death penalty (the killing of the heinously guilty).  One can be opposed to both because of the inherent value of human life, but in doing so, an honest person must also admit the significant difference between the two concepts.

Anyway, the story that sparked this blog post says that anyone in Switzerland with a "hopeless illness" can legally be assisted in their suicide by a medical professional, if only they have a "sustained desire to die."  In this case, the "authority" I mentioned earlier is the self.  The assumption is that a person has the right to declare their life without value and, having done so, can seek the help of others with their desire.

I understand the intention of compassion, of wanting to end a person's suffering.  But the logic described in this article (the Bosscher story) would seem to presume that psychological suffering is incurable--the psychiatrist described here didn't even attempt to treat the patient by traditional methods, didn't try to lead her towards a conclusion other than death.

So if a person gets stuck on the idea that they should die, and convince someone like this psychiatrist that they're not going to change their mind, then no one else gets to go to bat for this person.  No one is legally allowed to be an advocate for their continued life, for other treatment options.  Because the emotionally damaged person is considered (in our age of hyper-individualism) the authority on their life's value, they make the decision on their own suicide.

Once the state stops defending the inherent value of human life, there is no built-in place to stop with the devaluing of human life.  Whoever is deemed the authority in a given situation (the self in the case of suicide, the caregivers in the case of euthanasia, the mother in the case of abortion) is given the right to kill.  So as time goes by, who else will be given "authority" in cases we haven't thought of yet?  And even in the cases we have now (here and in Europe), how do we know that the person is truly competent to make the decision?  How do we know that the mother wasn't pressured horribly by her family, friends, boyfriend, not to mention the rest of society, to get an abortion?  How can we prove that legal decisions like this don't have the (hopefully unintended) effect of actually encouraging others to take a life that they otherwise wouldn't have?  How do we know that a senior citizen wasn't conditioned by society their entire life to see their own life as only having value if they were of some "use"?  How do we know that a suicidal person wasn't suicidal primarily because they lacked community and connection to other people?

I guess one of the reasons this hits home for me is that there were times that, if I had been surrounded by people who only saw my value in terms of what I could do for them or for society, then they might not have been so motivated to defuse my suicidal thoughts, reinforce my sense of self-value, and save my life.

In a society like the one Europe is building, I fear I would not have survived.  Would you?