Columnist Meets the "Real" Jack Kevorkian
Mitch Albom, a columnist for the Detroit Free Press interviewed Kevorkian face-to-face, and apparently was taken aback by what he experienced. After a little time with Kevorkian, Albom writes, "I couldn't imagine a suffering so bad that I would want Kevorkian to be the last person I'd see on Earth." Here are a few other key moments from his column:
As we spoke, I heard intelligence, self-assurance, even arrogance. What I didn't hear was humanity. He didn't seem to think much of the human race. He likened life to "a tragedy." He quoted famous people saying they wouldn't bring babies into this world. When I said that would wipe out mankind, he said, "What's wrong with that?"A lot of people continue to cling to the idea of euthanasia as "compassion." But it isn't, or, at least, it certainly wasn't for Kevorkian. The root meaning of that word is to "suffer with." Kevorkian just discarded people.I began to sense a man who was more interested in death than life. Death was his academic passion, and sick patients were part of that academic pursuit, like lab rats...
I don't know what's the way to go. But after an hour, I knew I wouldn't want to go via Jack Kevorkian, a man for whom the world is bleak, happiness is rare, belief is a waste of time and life is a finite, meaningless entity. The act he champions may indeed be one of compassion, but how can it be delivered by such a cold, cold heart?
Labels: Jack Kevorkian
posted by Wesley J. Smith @ 1:11 PM
9 Comments
9 Comments:
If compassion means to "suffer with", then no one on this earth is compassionate. I certainly have never seen any masochistic carers who put themselves through what their charges are going through.
Then you just aren't paying attention to the loving people who care for the very ill and disabled continually, whether in families, as hospice or medical professionals, clergy, friends--sometimes, even strangers. People who relieve another's suffering, and in doing so, sometimes take some of it onto themselves. That is true selflessness and caring. There is a whole world out there of true compassion, Tony. And it has nothing whatsoever to do with killing.
But is there compassion in keeping them alive for our own sake? Why must they endure existential suffering? It's inhumane.
Existential suffering? You mean the suffering attendant on being itself?
Hell, that's just part of the deal of being alive. Any life has some measure of suffering; no measure of suffering makes any life meaningless. The thing about Kevorkian is that he apparently believes life to be meaningless, suffering or no.
Ah, so existential suffering doesn't deserve to be relieved. Thank you for your honesty. Make sure you tell carers in your living will that you DON'T want pain relief for such suffering.
With the current situation, those who don't want your brand of 'compassion' will commit suicide prematurely.
And if a lack of suffering makes life meaningless, then the Christian heaven would be the most meaningless place possible.
Your command of logic is appalling.
You have just committed the fallacy of "affirming the consequent," in a clumsy attempt to discrediting my position.
That is:
If P, then Q.
Q.
Therefore, P.
In fact, you have said nothing about my position whatsoever, and only disclosed that you have no respect for reason.
If it's not plain to you that these two statements are not identical, then I'm not sure you have any idea how to form a valid argument, or even how to recognize one when you see it:
"Suffering does not make a life meaningless."
"A life without suffering is meaningless."
You don't seem to know what the word "existential" means, either.
Well, if all life or existence is 'suffering', then heaven cannot exist. If it does exist, then no one could live there, because supposedly, there is no suffering there.
Red herring.
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