What gives us the right to play God? And just how far are we going to take this new charade of ours?
Recently a hospital in the Netherlands started carrying out mercy killings of terminally ill newborns and those deemed incompetent of making their own decisions. The hospital has guidelines set for this procedure, which includes euthanizing babies who doctors feel either suffer from incurable pain, are born with extreme deformities or whose parents think it is best, with large doses of sedatives.
Right off the bat, a hundred questions should come to mind. With such flimsy guidelines as these, are parents soon going to be able to commit post-labor abortions because they claim it’s in their and the child’s best interest?
Also, how can a doctor actually know what the patient is feeling?
Being a patient numerous times myself, I can assure you doctors rarely know the severity or lack of pain one feels, so how can they commit these killings based on pain or deformities? With our technology today, many of these can be corrected, and for those that cannot be, it may still be possible to live a fulfilling life.
Yes, there are guidelines set to prevent the murder of healthy children, but why should those who have no say in the matter not be given a chance? Also, they allow the mercy killings of those who they say are incapable of making any decisions for themselves, such as the severely mentally handicapped and coma patients.
Miracles are always possible, and with the way medicine continually advances, a cure could always be just around the corner.
If we allow these killings to happen now, based on assumptions, where could this take us down the road?
Will we one day be able to end the lives of our family members because that would be easier and less expensive than going through life-saving procedures?
Where will we draw the line?
There are currently thousands of life-debilitating diseases and defects, yet many living with them would much rather wait out for hope than to see their family choose to end their lives. Euthanizing those who cannot speak for themselves is jumping the gun, not allowing one to see what could be.
This new legislation is just one more example of how our society is continually loosening its morals. We have become so “tolerant” of each other, and this is not meant in racial or cultural terms, simply different beliefs of right and wrong, that we have driven ourselves into a moral black hole.
On an even smaller level, in some public schools around the country, children are no longer allowed to celebrate Christmas in the classroom for fear of religious persecution to those who do not celebrate this holiday. Yet, is it not persecution to silence those who wish to express their joy for the birth of their savior Jesus?
Christians are asked to tolerate different religions and most do without any remorse, yet oftentimes their beliefs are not tolerated in return. This idea can be expressed into even broader terms. Many people who still hold onto what are considered “old-fashioned” morals are often harassed because they do not embrace what appears to be the new culture, but how is this in and of itself not prejudice?
Our world is in a fragile state now and continues to become ever more fragile as we allow more and more activities to go unchallenged. It is time for all of us to reevaluate our moral stances.
We have become scared to tell each other that certain activities are just plain wrong for fear of being deemed ignorant or prejudiced, but if we continue to not stand up for what we believe in, what will our world look like in 30 years?
S. Kyle Pauly ([email protected]) is a pre-med sophomore majoring in biology.