Right to Life

Watching the different crowds mill around the Terry Schaivo case this Holy Week brings some thoughts of what has happened since then. Christ was the victim of the death penalty, but at the time of his crucifixion I wonder if there was anyone that questioned the right of the state to put those deemed to be worthy of the penalty to death. Christ certainly never questioned the right of the State to inflict the death penalty as he walked the path to Golgotha, and his insight into matters of "right" and "rights" are a bit beyond those of the talking heads. The ideas of "cruel and unusual" seem like they may have been a bit different then too.

Terry has been sentenced to death for failure to be responsive enough to please her husband. Historically that criteria only worked in India, but maybe we are starting a new trend here, it is often hard for me to keep up. The means of termination in this case is "death by dehydration/starvation", which under these circumstances is considered "humane". I think the standard technique in India was immolation. That sounds painful, but given the "pass out factor", I'm wondering if the speed may not even give it the "kindness winner" by a nose. Those can be tough calls when you have the kind of innocent life that is just begging for termination.

Sadly, the US is an "equal rights for women" country, so I'm a bit concerned for my life. If men get to evaluate their wives for suitabilty to continue life in this world, I must assume that the same right will be extended to wives. Mooses tend to fail to meet requirements on many occasions, and there have been allusions made to "brain dead" more than once cast my way. Both starvation and dehydration would be especially hard on me. I'm almost sure they would prohibit beer on the grounds of it being a fluid, and that seems cruel and unusual right there.

I suppose if a person can still move a bit, one could save their life by committing a crime that would be worthy of the death penalty. Then the left would stand up for you in a hearbeat. In fact, the lower your mental capability, the MORE likely they are to demand that you you live, and there isn't any potential way to kill you that isn't "cruel and unusual" in that circumstance.

In Terry's case however, a long drawn out death is just fine. Death by starvation isn't the panacea that the media seems inclined to make it out to be in this case. I watched a man that I visited as a volunteer at a nursing home die of starvation. He had inoperable cancer that interfered with his ability to eat, and tiny amount of remaining family decided on that end for him. I'm not saying they were "wrong". They had the right, they decided, and I wasn't going to interfere. I just know that it wasn't that "easy". I'm not saying dying of terminal cancer would have been easier.

Those on the left feel that the only kind of human life worth defending is criminal life. No matter what your crime, taking your life is just plain immoral. Innocent human life on the other hand, especially any innocent human life that can't speak directly for itself, may be terminated by any means available. I must stipulate HUMAN life though ... for if you are an owl, snail, beetle, bug or fungus, your "right to life" is suddenly again a matter of grave concern. Want to build a housing development where there is some rare fungus? The left might be able to stand a few rapes of 9 year old girls and letting the offenders even walk free if it was "just once", but don't be making any trouble for the fungus.

The "religious nuts" defend the right to life of the innocent voiceless humans, and the sensible scientific lefties defend the right to life of the criminals and the snails. I guess there is a certain order to the universe if one looks at it just right.