Comments on: On Pain and Death http://mlliu.com/blog/2005/03/29/on-pain-and-death/ Sun, 06 Jul 2008 06:32:00 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Vivian Darkbloom http://mlliu.com/blog/2005/03/29/on-pain-and-death/comment-page-1/#comment-27 Vivian Darkbloom Wed, 30 Mar 2005 04:50:00 +0000 http://mlliu.com/blog/?p=57#comment-27 I don't find it difficult to take sides in the Terri Schiavo case. I would not for a minute want to live like that, and those right-wing religious fanatics (Schiavo's "supporters") who are out there picketing and beseeching Jeb or Congress or God to intervene aren't being honest with themselves or anyone else (not very Christian of them, aye?) if they say they would. Schiavo has become a political pawn of the neo-cons, or, as Hendrik Hertzberg puts it in the latest <i>New Yorker</i> "a metaphor in the religio-cultural struggle over abortion." That's a shame, and an disingenuous exacerbation of the pain of the situation for everyone involved. <br/><br/>Coming from another angle, I have to wonder how it is that keeping someone alive at all costs with complicated medical technology is the correct way to carry out the "will of God"? How do people know they are correctly interpreting that will? And isn't it presumptuous to try to interpret what God wants anyway? <br/><br/>Anyway, I don't even believe in a "sky God," as Gore Vidal would say, so maybe it's not fair for me to ruminate on this aspect. My main concern is that this whole spectacle or "passion play" (Hertzberg's apt description) is a major point for Team Anti-Abortion. We may find ourselves living in Margaret Atwood's Gilead yet.<br/><br/>P.S. And Tom DeLay should talk about ethics while under investigation of the House ethics committee!<br/>P.P.S. I would just like to register my snaps for Atul Gawande. What an excellent writer! I've had a bit of a crush on him when I read his first piece in the <i>New Yorker</i> years ago--since then my heart goes aflutter whenever I espy a Medical Dispatch in the TOC.... I don’t find it difficult to take sides in the Terri Schiavo case. I would not for a minute want to live like that, and those right-wing religious fanatics (Schiavo’s “supporters”) who are out there picketing and beseeching Jeb or Congress or God to intervene aren’t being honest with themselves or anyone else (not very Christian of them, aye?) if they say they would. Schiavo has become a political pawn of the neo-cons, or, as Hendrik Hertzberg puts it in the latest New Yorker “a metaphor in the religio-cultural struggle over abortion.” That’s a shame, and an disingenuous exacerbation of the pain of the situation for everyone involved.

Coming from another angle, I have to wonder how it is that keeping someone alive at all costs with complicated medical technology is the correct way to carry out the “will of God”? How do people know they are correctly interpreting that will? And isn’t it presumptuous to try to interpret what God wants anyway?

Anyway, I don’t even believe in a “sky God,” as Gore Vidal would say, so maybe it’s not fair for me to ruminate on this aspect. My main concern is that this whole spectacle or “passion play” (Hertzberg’s apt description) is a major point for Team Anti-Abortion. We may find ourselves living in Margaret Atwood’s Gilead yet.

P.S. And Tom DeLay should talk about ethics while under investigation of the House ethics committee!
P.P.S. I would just like to register my snaps for Atul Gawande. What an excellent writer! I’ve had a bit of a crush on him when I read his first piece in the New Yorker years ago–since then my heart goes aflutter whenever I espy a Medical Dispatch in the TOC….

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