Amiga.org
Coffee House => Coffee House Boards => CH / General => Topic started by: T_Bone on March 26, 2005, 01:04:22 PM
-
http://apnews.myway.com/article/20050326/D892CJ600.html
I really havent paid as much attention to this as maybe I should have, but why exactly can't the family be allowed to feed this woman?
I understand the husband (ex? he has another woman now) is the legal guardian, and doesn't want her resuccitated, but FED? Why are we starving her to death? Is her only problem right now that she just can't feed herself?
-
I can understand the wish to end her life; nobody deserves to live like that. But starving someone to death is cruel.
-
whabang wrote:
I can understand the wish to end her life; nobody deserves to live like that. But starving someone to death is cruel.
I think I had originally thought that she was on life support systems or something, but apparently, her parents could simply take her home and feed her.
If this isn't about resuccitation, what's it about? Does guardianship mean we have the legal right to not only refuse to feed someone who can't feed themselves, but forbid others from doing so?
I don't understand what the courts are thinking. I had thought this was about life support, but no.
-
She's been like this for 15 years, the entire frontal lobe of her brain is gone and has been replaced with spinal fluid.
The only reason she moves and makes noises and has a hearbeat is because her brainstem is intact. Her EEG readings for the past 15 years have been completely flatlined. The woman is braindead, but her body doesn't know it.
FL state laws give the husband custody, and he has stated quite firmly that she wouldn't want to "live" this way. Her parents are fighting it.
The longest in recorded medical history that someone has been in a Persistent Vegetative State and come out of it was 6 months.
She has no conciousness, and is not aware that she is starving. It's not life support, but it's nearly the same thing.
-
I with Wain... let the woman die!!! If I was in that state I would want to die!
-
Maybe it's the fact that there's no documentation of her will that bothers me. You'd think that any decision that would result in someone's death, would require documentation of the item justifying the decision. There's no proof that she ever told anyone what she wanted, yet her death is being legally ordered, based on this premise.
Normally there's checks and balances involved in any legal situation... but this woman is being legally executed based on something we can't prove but someone claims is true, even though others claim otherwise, and they happen to be family.
It seems in any dispute the compromise shouldn't involve death. When we don't have evidence to execute someone, we don't. This womans life doesn't even enjoy the due process we give convicted murderers.
I don't like how the husbands desires are trumping the parents here. He's moved on already, he's with another woman, etc. If the parents want to be the legal guardians I can't think of one reason they should be denied.
-
bloodline wrote:
I with Wain... let the woman die!!! If I was in that state I would want to die!
Oh yea no disagreement there! Me too!
What I definately wouldn't want though, is for the government to ASSUME that's what I want, even though my parents insist it isn't, and ORDER MY DEATH because of it.
I would hope unless someone could PROVE I wanted to die, I would be fed.
-
T_Bone wrote:
What I definately wouldn't want though, is for the government to ASSUME that's what I want, even though my parents insist it isn't, and ORDER MY DEATH because of it.
I would hope unless someone could PROVE I wanted to die, I would be fed.
Well, it may seem like nitpicking, but what is meant with 'you' and 'I' when the brain is dead, atrophied and all functions we associate with normal human consciousness are gone? As far as I, in my current conscious state can make out/decide, I will be dead, and irreversibly so. I even think doctors use this as a definition of 'death'. What reasons are there to keep on feeding me (or you) under such conditions? Keep in mind that this is the crux of the matter. If there were still noticable higher brain functions, there is still a chance that 'you' are around. In this case, there are none.
-
T_Bone wrote:
I understand the husband (ex? he has another woman now) is the legal guardian
If he has another woman, why should he be allowed to make this descision ?
Why not pass guardianship to her parents?
-
I have to be honest, if her brain is so much mush, then she's dead already as Wain says. As it stands, theres just enough left for life support, but beyond that theres not much difference between her and a mixed grill.
-
the_leander wrote:
I have to be honest, if her brain is so much mush, then she's dead already as Wain says. As it stands, theres just enough left for life support
There's not even enough for that... if they stop forcing food down her throat through a plastic tube... she'll die..
-
Well she doen't look 'brain dead' to me! Who says her brain is 'mush'? What sort of diagnosis is that? Yours presumably. When I saw her on tv over the last couple of weeks, She clearly recognised her mother/father and had a significant capacity to communicate using her eyes. She also moves her head and seems to follow what's happening around her. This woman isn't brain dead and she is not in a PVS (in my opinion).
This decision to withdraw food, in spite of her parents' willingness to look after her, smells like someone's convenience.
JaX
-
(http://arstechnica.com/images/news/schiavo.jpg)
This is Mrs Schiavo's brain, note that big dark spot - thats spinal fluid that has replaced the cavity that was left by her brain rotting, or as I put it "turning into mush"
This, just for the sake of fairness is what a brain scan *should* show.
(http://arstechnica.com/images/news/normal.jpg)
Yes, she moves, makes sounds etc. But there is NO brain activity, no amount of doctored video is going to change that, she is brain dead. The only thing keeping the whole shabang going is that her spinal cord is in tact. To think that she is in any way alive or capable of recognising ANYTHING is wishful thinking only. I know that might sound calous but quite frankly I don't care what you think. She is little more then a mixed grill attached to $10,000's worth of equipment.
-
JaXanim wrote:
Well she doen't look 'brain dead' to me! Who says her brain is 'mush'? What sort of diagnosis is that? Yours presumably. When I saw her on tv over the last couple of weeks, She clearly recognised her mother/father and had a significant capacity to communicate using her eyes. She also moves her head and seems to follow what's happening around her. This woman isn't brain dead and she is not in a PVS (in my opinion).
I'm sorry, but the_leander is correct as far as it is possible to be. That she is in a PVS is not his diagnosis, its the neurologists that have studied her. That her brain is not functional and so much dead tissue is not his diagnosis, its again the neurologists that have studied her.
Your description of her cognitive ability is completely subjective. We have seen only a tiny amount of footage. Even then, my opinion on what I have seen in that footage is different from yours. Absolutely nothing in the footage I saw suggested she was remotely cognitive.
Of course, this is a deeply sensetive issue. There rarely is any agreement where emotion is in conflict with rationality.
-
@karlos
"Of course, this is a deeply sensetive issue. There rarely is any agreement where emotion is in conflict with rationality."
Even rationally I don't like it. I don't like who made the decision. The government decided she is to die, not that she would be allowed to die, but actively killed. It's not an option that's graciously being extended to someone with no hope, it's an ultimatum that not only extinguishes all hope, but removes all options as well. On top of this, it's in direct conflict with the wishes of her parents, who I cant understand why are not the legal guardians after the husband remarried.
I don't believe the husband is a bad man, I don't necessarily think he's murdered her or in any way wanted any of this to happen, and I understand this would give him closure, but I don't really think he NEEDS this closure after having moved on already. At this point in time, he really should not be considered her guardian.
She's going to die, it's inevitable, and she's probably not going to know one way or the other, but the precident this sets is just bad. If the government ever ordered one of my children to die, and decided I had no say in the matter, I don't know what I'd do, but it's possible they wouldn't let me post here anymore from prison.
If I were the judge, I would have stayed away from the issue altogether, after giving guardianship to her parents. The way things are happening now are too messy.
-
T_Bone wrote:
@karlos
"Of course, this is a deeply sensetive issue. There rarely is any agreement where emotion is in conflict with rationality."
Even rationally I don't like it.
I don't like it either. The entire legal case stinks, turning the unfortunate victim of a tragic, irrecoverable injury into a legal/media circus. Any shred of dignity she may have had left has been completely leeched away.
She's going to die, it's inevitable, and she's probably not going to know one way or the other, but the precident this sets is just bad.
Looking at it rationally (and this might sound a bit cold, so apologies there), this lady is already dead. She has been dead for over a decade.
Death does not mean the cessation of all biological function. Indeed, when you die the cells in your body continue to function for some considerable time (depending on their tolerance to oxygen deprevation). Ultimately death is the cessation of all coordinated metabolic function - the processes that seperate you from an equivalent mass of slowly dying individual living cells.
We can prolong the life of any tissue artificially by ensuring it receives nutrition and oxygen, but nobody would consider a person as being alive because their heart, donated for transplant, was now beating in someone elses chest cavity.
In this case, the basic biological functions of an entire human body are being sustained artificially. However, the single most critical function that seperates her as a person from her as a mass of living tissue has already been lost.
-
Aw crap. Here comes Jesse Jackson. Oh no, aw crap. Oh damn, he agreed with me, damnit, I must be wrong. I'm getting out.
:lol:
-
There's a good reason I did that, I don't quite recall what it was, but it made sense at the time.
...
-
Karlos wrote:
There's a good reason I did that, I don't quite recall what it was, but it made sense at the time.
...
:-P
Once the vultures show up, you know the issue is dead.
(heh, wonder what took him so long, wonder if he was perched on a cactus somewhere waiting for the republicans to leave)
-
Leander is right.
This poor unfortunate woman is existing solely because the reflex functions of her central nervous system (which are housed in the spinal column) are intact and still sending nerve impulses to her lungs, heart and digestive system. If you move, her eyes will follow because it's a reflex response.
It's a terrible tragedy for all those concerned, losing a wife and daughter must be truly devastating, particularly when her body continues to exist.
If it were me, I certainly wouldn't want to continue in that state and would wish that my loved ones would respect my wish to pull the plug.
-
T_Bone wrote:
Once the vultures show up, you know the issue is dead.
(heh, wonder what took him so long, wonder if he was perched on a cactus somewhere waiting for the republicans to leave)
?
-
@Karlos:
Perhaps Jesse Jackson is the vulture?
-
@Wilse
Ah, I see. I was confused as T_Bone had quoted me then said it.
-
The government decided she is to die, not that she would be allowed to die, but actively killed.
Now tell me Mr Conservative fiscal policy.
Who's paying for the medical care for a BRAIN DEAD woman?
Is it ok for the state to pay for SOME PEOPLES medical care when they are at deaths door, but not ok to pay for everyones basic medical care?
Which is more expensive I ask you, and which is more beneficial to society?
-
mdma wrote:
and which is more beneficial to society?
Somehow I do not think this point affects a conservative conscience. :lol: :-(
-
Speelgoedmannetje wrote:
mdma wrote:
and which is more beneficial to society?
Somehow I do not think this point affects a conservative conscience. :lol: :-(
I didn't know there was even such a thing as a "Conservative Conscience"!
-
Och away! Surely you've heard of compassionate conservatives?
-
Wilse wrote:
Och away! Surely you've heard of compassionate conservatives?
Oh, you mean that bunch of prats obeying Tony Blairs every whim ? :-)
-
Doobrey wrote:
Wilse wrote:
Och away! Surely you've heard of compassionate conservatives?
Oh, you mean that bunch of prats obeying Tony Blairs every whim ? :-)
The Liberal Democrats? ;-)
-
mdma wrote:
The government decided she is to die, not that she would be allowed to die, but actively killed.
Now tell me Mr Conservative fiscal policy.
Who's paying for the medical care for a BRAIN DEAD woman?
Easy. It's already been to court, the malpractice suit against the hospital where this condition first developed is paying for it. It was part of the settlement.
Is it ok for the state to pay for SOME PEOPLES medical care when they are at deaths door, but not ok to pay for everyones basic medical care?
"Medical care at deaths door" and "basic medical care" are apples and oranges.
(anyways, money isn't really an issue here anyway)
-
T_Bone wrote:
mdma wrote:
The government decided she is to die, not that she would be allowed to die, but actively killed.
Now tell me Mr Conservative fiscal policy.
Who's paying for the medical care for a BRAIN DEAD woman?
Easy. It's already been to court, the malpractice suit against the hospital where this condition first developed is paying for it. It was part of the settlement.
Is it ok for the state to pay for SOME PEOPLES medical care when they are at deaths door, but not ok to pay for everyones basic medical care?
"Medical care at deaths door" and "basic medical care" are apples and oranges.
(anyways, money isn't really an issue here anyway)
Nice dodge! Ever thought about standing for office? :-D
-
Nice dodge! Ever thought about standing for office?
who do you think votes for the idiots in office now?
anyway, Schiavo has finally "left the building", so the plug can be pulled on the stupid news media (to borrow a joke from The Daily Show) and maybe we can get back to what's important instead of this circus nonsense! :pissed:
and, I hope any of you who were able to saw last nights South Park - satire at it's best! In case some of you didn't see it, i won't spoil the fun. I'll just say it's On Topic!
-
cecilia wrote:
Nice dodge! Ever thought about standing for office?
who do you think votes for the idiots in office now?
anyway, Schiavo has finally "left the building", so the plug can be pulled on the stupid news media (to borrow a joke from The Daily Show) and maybe we can get back to what's important instead of this circus nonsense! :pissed:
and, I hope any of you who were able to saw last nights South Park - satire at it's best! In case some of you didn't see it, i won't spoil the fun. I'll just say it's On Topic!
I'm currently reading the biography of Bill Hicks. I'd love to have heard his views on this Schiavo debacle! :-D