The right to choose
2009-06-02 12:02
I've noticed that the whale killings this past weekend have produced something close to hysteria and indignation amongst News24's readers and letter writers.
I'm also certain that at this very moment there's a woman who hasn't washed in a week, sitting in a tie-die smock, furiously scribbling a letter to the Cape Times which will drip with her eco-friendly disgust at the inhumane end these animals met. Not much happens in the Cape - apart from flooding - so when a whale gets murdered it's big news.
The standout comment on the matter has to be this, from a teary-eyed News24 user who even used a little unhappy emoticon face to illustrate his woe over the situation: "What if those whales were people, nobody would even think about shooting them."
There was another, which I can't find right now, which said something to the same effect, about humans "not lining up the sick and dying in the streets and putting them out of their misery". To which I say, why not?
There's been a similar frenzy to the whale massacring outrage in the British papers, only this brouhaha is concerned with a Swiss suicide clinic (Dignitas) and a person's right to choose their own expiry date (and method. I believe it's only lethal injection, though. Even if you'd like to go out in a blaze of glory, you can't request a firing squad of Swiss doctors with six-guns dressed in 10 gallon hats and chaps to shout ‘draw’).
Evolutionary check
Anyway, as of May 31 this year there are around 800 Britons on the waiting list to get plugged in, only to have the power switched off. These patients, it should be noted, are all suffering from terminal illnesses. They are suffering.
This from the Guardian: "One of the 34 (British patients) is due to undertake an accompanied suicide very soon. Four have already secured fixed dates for their deaths, but adjourned them. The remaining 29 have not yet arranged a specific date."
Admittedly, it's pretty harrowing stuff. Picking out a date on the calendar, ticking it off like a regular "Johnny round for lunch'" date, except this time it says "June 20. British & Irish Lions vs Springboks, 3pm. Meet thy maker, 730pm." But if not, why not?
There is little agreement on why the whales beached. But it's also a phenomenon that's been occurring for decades and probably centuries. One theory is that it's a naturally evolutionary check.
The whale pod reaches critical mass and so plonks itself on the nearest beach. I don't know if that's true, but it sounds reasonable to me. Too many mouths too feed, not enough to go around, let's cut the numbers. The animals were suffering, so bullets were used.
Humans, however, are obsessed with prolonging the agony. Right through from anti-aging creams to miracle cures for cancer, we're determined to eke out a longer life at any cost - maybe not the people suffering the most, but certainly the families.
Living longer
Our evolutionary check of the aged passing away is drawn out. The old live longer, but in what kind of state. (And let's be marginally cynical here for just a moment: be honest; if you've got a feeble-bodied, seriously ill older relative tottering around in your life, it's a lot of hard work).
I was in the hospital yesterday getting x-rays on a cracked tooth and I felt bad because I was so alive. Almost everyone else in the x-ray ward looked one stiff drink away from the grave.
I had no urge to run around like some hospital assisted-suicide avenger, unplugging dialyses machines with a cheery farewell to the dying and decrepit. But it does get you thinking. If you can go with a little dignity, you should definitely have the right to choose.
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