Terri is not on life support.
She is living, breathing, digesting on her own. Her "life" functions are intact.
She only requires feeding. Her family has pledged to attend to this.
There is testimony that as recently as 8 days ago she was attempting cognitive communication.
Yes, she is biologically existing. You're making an assumption that Shiavo was "attempting cognitive communication". There's no evidence whatsoever that her upper brain functions were operating at the time and plenty of evidence that she is incapable of any thought. The sounds that came out of her mouth were "ahhhhh" and "waahhh". From that the Schindlers heard, understandably, "I want to live", or at least that's what their attorney claimed.
I am in shock and awe that this public execution by starvation is taking place on CNN.
"Public execution" is a bit presumptuous. I understand that you feel her life is just as worthy as anybody else's and here I completely agree with you. But acting on a person's prior treatment wishes, to not be preserved in her current state, is not an execution. Judge after judge has ruled that Michael is acting on Terri's wishes so this is not an execution. The media circus is shameful and manipulative.
It seems the benefit of the doubt is given to death, not life -- in a civilization where heroic efforts are ROUTINELY applied to preserve life.
Putting aside the issue of treatment wishes, this is the philosophical debate. I will never understand how existing in Terri Schiavo's state is "life", how feeding her body so it can biologically exist while she wastes away is life enhancing in any way. And this is why consent and capacity issues are so fundamental. Nobody has the right to assert their morality and ethics on another person. Many choose to exist under these conditions and enshrine this in a living will while others make the opposite equally clear.
2Green, do you feel that the feeding tube is the deciding factor here, that she can breathe on her own? As I mentioned in a previous post a mother in Texas was denied the right to have life support continued for her baby. There was no public outcry that I'm aware of for this baby and no emergency bill signed by W to keep the respirator going. Do you see something very different about the feeding tube over the respirator?
Why can't those who CARE about her care FOR her?
It seems there are different ways of caring for someone and the law states that Michael is her guardian, not her parents. You're making a big assumption that Michael doesn't care about her so he's willing to let her die. As Dana points out, this is not an easy decision for Michael, he tried a number of treatments that failed and after these failed and money was secured for her care from a malpractice suit, he decided to act on her wishes. Assuming that this is true, which almost every judge that's heard the case believes it to be, it is caring to act on someone's wishes. You assume that Terri didn't make this wish known to Michael, that there's evidence to the contrary, or at the very least, we don't know enough so we should side "with life". Michael was her spouse and has cared for her for many years. Now that he is trying to act on what he and the courts have determined were her wishes people say this is uncaring. I don't agree that there is something innately caring about maintaining people under such conditions when so many court-appointed doctors have testified that she cannot think, perceive, or feel emotion about her environment existing as Bill described, a "living corpse". The only way to care for someone in any moral way here is to act on their wishes about whether to exist unders such conditions. I'm satisfied that after so many rulings and testimony, that Michael is doing that. And I could be wrong and the doctors could be wrong but I think the legal process and the decisions made are the most ethical in this case.
Mark
