A Very Smelly Business - The Schiavo Affairis a lengthy, cogently reasoned explanation of why you should think about Terri Schiavo's situation and a court's moves toward euthanasia. It is very scary and if it happened in Florida, it can happen anywhere. Florida is full of elderly retirees and you would not expect a decision like allowing a person to die by starvation and by court order in that state. Yet, it happened.
I have said for years, "When I become a vegetable, please pull the plug; don't leave me warehoused in a home for discarded human beings". But I have, as everyone else has, a caveat; I want to make the decision for myself. Obviously, that is not possible.
Many of us have no-one who is going to look after us in that state -- as Terri Schiavo has, that is, her family. As--or if--I live long enough to become extremely disabled, stroke-ridden, or otherwise incompetent to make decisions for myself, I have had to accustom myself to that prospective reality. In my case, I have made the decision that I shall live with whatever the state decides to do with me at a certain point in my life -- and try not to think about it -- mainly because I probably could not make the decision to commit suicide. In other words, I have accepted the inevitable because I have to. Terri does not have to accept that because she has a family that has and will intercede for her. Bless them.
Besides, there is money for her care -- money being wasted by her husband Michael's lawyer--at his behest--in endless efforts to see that Terri dies leaving at least some money intact. Then Michael can get on with his life with a new woman, I assume. In Terri's case, there is no reason to make a doubtful decision. If most of us could be assured of having the money and family that Terri has, we would not want to die. No-one does. We just do not want to be uncared for and warehoused with people who are paid at a very low wage and who have no real familial interest in us.
Link to the following. This is a post that gives far more details and legal implications concerning Terri's situation than I--and possibly you--are cognizant of; read it and be concerned.
