Why should Terri live?

I've been advised via e-mail that I've not posted reasons for my decision to support Bob and Mary Schindler's efforts to save their daughter Terri.

In that same e-mail, the "antics of this administration" were called into question.  I suppose the "antics" would include the efforts by Congress to save Terri's life and the effort by President Bush to sign their bill into law.

Why is there support to see Terri's feeding tube re-inserted?  Why should Terri live?

As I was leaving the office for lunch yesterday, in the hallway, waiting to see an eye doctor whose practice is on the same floor, was a little boy in a wheelchair.  Not just any wheelchair but a mechanized one with a directional toggle on the arm, allowing the contraption to be moved in any direction with little effort.

The boy was clearly handicapped.  Pale, skinny, with thick glasses, and wrists bent that led to hands with fingers askew, giving evidence that the little guy was far from... normal.  I gave him a quick glance and moved on, not really thinking about him until I began to ponder the emailer's question to me.  Why should Terri live?

This little boy required much effort I'm sure on the part of a loved one to ready him for the day.  I can't imagine him being able to eat on his own, to be able to dress himself, or clean himself or do much of anything on his own absent the ability he clearly had to maneuver that wheelchair.

Why should he live?

I think back to my days some years ago when I regularly delivered meals to the indigent.  There was one couple who's husband always answered the door.  His wife (I assumed she was his wife) could be seen near the door in her chair.  Every day he would take the meals from me and then help feed his wife.  She apparently could not eat on her own.  He was, in effect, her feeding tube.

Why should she live?

I used to occasionally visit nursing homes as part of a local ministry.  Often there would be residents who required assistance and care from others.  Whether it be eating or the more humiliating act of cleaning up after relieving themselves, there were those who couldn't exist on their own, who were dependent upon others, whose existence required the presence of caring people.

Why should they live?

Terri Schiavo can breathe on her own.  Terri Schiavo requires no Ventricular Assist System that keeps her heart functioning.  She is not on 'life support' as some in the media have erroneously reported.  She does require feeding.  As does the little boy in the wheelchair.  Or the elderly woman with the loving husband.  Or the residents in nursing homes across the country.

Why should Terri live?

Because she epitomizes the least of these. 

Because her mother and father want her to. 

Because her so called husband left her for dead when he chose to bear two children with the woman he goes home to nightly, the woman he's been with for a decade or more.

Because Terri is a human being. 

Because she's made in the image of God. 

Because it's right.

So I've now posted my thoughts, delivered roughly, as to why she should live.

The bigger question in my mind, is why should she be starved and dehydrated to death?

Anyone?

UPDATE: Tony Woodlief, whose ability to write I sinfully envy, has his own response worthy of reading entirely.  Here's his conclusion:

There will be many tears when Terri Schiavo breathes her last. Some will be genuine, some will be fake, some will be hysterically generated by people who have overly invested their emotions in someone else's tragedy. Then most of us will move on. You and I will go back to our lives, Michael Schiavo will go back to his new woman and kids, his attorneys back to their other clients. But Bob and Mary Schindler will be left without a daughter, and they will know that it might have been different.

MORE: Thomas Sowell, no intellectual lightweight, not so easily dismissed (as I might be) by the ivory tower elites, has an opinion or two:

If the tragic case of Terri Schiavo shows nothing else, it shows how easily "the right to die" can become the right to kill. It is hard to believe that anyone, regardless of their position on euthanasia, would have chosen the agony of starvation and dehydration as the way to end someone's life.

A New York Times headline on March 20th tried to assure us: "Experts Say Ending Feeding Can Lead to a Gentle Death" but you can find experts to say anything. In a December 2, 2002 story in the same New York Times, people starving in India were reported as dying, "often clutching pained stomachs."

No murderer would be allowed to be killed this way, which would almost certainly be declared "cruel and unusual punishment," in violation of the Constitution, by virtually any court.

Terri Schiavo's only crime is that she has become an inconvenience -- and is caught in the merciless machinery of the law. Those who think law is the answer to our problems need to face the reality that law is a crude and blunt instrument.

Make no mistake about it, Terri Schiavo is being killed. She is not being "allowed to die."

Comments

[Marlene]

At the risk of being a blog hog, I just couldn't help posting this. :-)

I watched “The Laci Peterson Story,” which aired on USA this afternoon.

I can't help but compare the many similarities between Laci and Terri, right down to their dual-syllabic, "I"-ending names and the men they chose to marry.

Both women are beautiful, vibrant women with smiles that would light up any room.

Both women have handsome husbands who, on the surface, seem to be devoted to them.

Both women have parents who love them and work feverishly in an effort to save them.

Both husbands describe their living wives as being "gone:" Scott when he "confesses" to Amber that he'd been priorly married, and Michael when he says that "Terri's gone. She died 15 years ago."

Both men seek out other women while their wives are still alive.

Both husbands quickly bring suspicion upon themselves as a result of their own questionable actions.

Both husbands have obvious contempt and disrespect for the families of their wives.

It’s impossible for both wives to undergo autopsy after death due to the actions of their husbands.

There are two major differences, though.

Difference #1: Laci's parents, visibly and understandably broken-hearted, attended the trial of the murder of their daughter, were present as he was found guilty, had the opportunity to address him at sentencing, and have at least experienced a sense of closure and validation that the murderer will receive justice. It won't bring Laci back, but it's better than nothing.

Terri's parents, visibly and understandably broken-hearted as well, will never experience that validation or closure. They will all be left with suspicions but no real evidence and no hope of ever obtaining any. They will be left with a world that thinks they lied about Terri's true medical condition, but nobody will ever know for sure. Terri will be cremated immediately upon death, so any autopsy findings that could have led to the truth will never exist.

Difference #2: Michael has a court order.

Throughout all this time, Michael had the power to affect public opinion. If Terri truly is as he describes, he could have offered America the videotape of her comatose, unresponsive, trapped body. I would be the first to agree that she should be set "free."

As long as people see video of Terri clearly smiling, trying to connect to her parents with her eyes, her animated demeanor in general, and trying to speak -- as long as people see those things, they see merely a disabled woman who has become an inconvenience to her husband, and he desperately wants her dead.

Michael won't permit cameras in her room. I wonder why.

People just can’t stop talking about this case. I simply can't overstate the irony that this is happening during a weekend when we recall another famous person who was publicly crucified as the world watched, and we have never stopped talking about his case, either.

[True_Liberal]

Of course Terri Schiavo should live. The scarce medical resources that she requires belong to her and her alone, and the fact that those scarce resources are thus denied to others in suffering and pain is none of our concern.

The doctors and the nurses and the supplies she requires must continue for as long as they can keep her system functioning - never mind that her cortex is gone and she can have no appreciation of their care, no hope for recovery.

Let some other poor suckers go without and die instead.

[Dan]

I find myself flabbergasted and amazed at most of what I read about the issue of Terri. Don't any of you care what she would want? Are we now at the point where our lives are ruled by religious fanatics who feel that they can push their points of view on anyone? Also how is it that denying artificial, man made, care has now beocme classified as murder? I for one am very willing to believe that this husband knows what his wife would have wanted in this situation and that it is perfectly her right to do with her life what she wants. And, how many of you who supposedly care about 'life' are against the death penalty or are against spending $600 billion dollars a year on weapons of death? This whole circus seems like the height of hypocracy to me.
Peace,
Dan

[Jeff H]

Hey, Dan, whether you choose to acknowledge the reality or not, we don't own our lives--God owns them. And it is not our right to kill ourselves, even if we want to.

But of course, I'm just a "religious fanatic" who actually worships God, instead of the state, or a judicial system that is hopelessly narcissistic, or a culture of self-indulgence that leads to death-on-demand--even death of someone else who just happens to be an inconvenience.

Have we really gone THAT far down the slippery slope toward complete evil?

If I judged all humanity by you, Dan, I'd be forced to say "We're long past that threshold".