[Marxism] Re: Award for Judge in Schiavo case... (and more on

[davidquarter@xxxxxxxxxxxx]

> Message: 13
> Date: Mon, 09 May 2005 02:46:51 -0400
> From: "Fred Feldman" <ffeldman@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> Subject: [Marxism] Re: Award for Judge in Schiavo case... (and more on
>       the "right of privacy")
> To: <marxism@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> Message-ID: <000001c55462$e1f7d190$6401a8c0@fredpc>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
>
> Jose, as he has usually done on this case, has made another valuable
> contribution on the facts. Looking back on it, with few exceptions, he
> started with the facts and made few sweeping generalizations of any kind
> -- even if some of the latter weren't 100 percent sound, this was
> generally a good example.  (I'm leaving aside the hoo-ha about
> "papists".)
>
> His description of Mr. Schiavo's case is very clear.  Mr. Schiavo did
> not claim the right as her power-of-attorney representative to decide
> whether she lived and died.  He had a clear opinion about what should be
> done, based on the wishes she had expressed to him (when, of course,
> there was no real expectation that this would arise) and also of her
> actual condition which he had tried extensively to reverse.  But he did
> not claim that he had the right to decide to terminate life support. He
> asked the court to approve his judgement, and, after an extensive and
> repeated examination of the facts, the court did so and was upheld by
> higher courts.>>>>

  How it is "very clear" when it's all falling back on the husband's 
testimony/words?
Of course what is he to say: "I want to remove my wife's tube b/c she's an 
annoying
b**tch getting in the way my self fulfillment"?, which btw, is a paraphrase 
attributed
to him both from a former nurse of Terri's hired by the husband and one of the
husband's previous girlfriends. They are both quoted in a A and E documentary 
that
aired a day after her death.

>
> And when the feeding tube was removed, the test of events confirmed his
> and the court's judgment.  There was no response at all from Terri
> Schiavo.  She was "calm," as the parents said.  I.e., she was not there.>>>>

Show me these tests and then dissect the info. _in your own words _showing how
it's so clearly "confirmed"?

> She was already gone.  Demagogues like Nat Hentoff, carry on about the
> refusal to "slake her thirst.">>>>>

What are you arguing? That she expired immediately after having her tubes
removed or that she was dead all along?



 But there is no evidence whatever -- not
> a shred -- that she experienced either hunger or thirst in any way,
> shape, or form.>>>>


Again, where is this "no evidence whatever" of yours?

 No evidence of any suffering. No change of any kind in
> her responses, i.e., her lack of responses. >>>>

It seems like you're drawn to making sweeping judgements. No questions asked.
The facts aren't IN FACT as "clear" as you puport them.
To begin with there were doctors arguing she wasn't responsive and there were 
also
doctors arguing that she *was* responsive.
One doctor, quoted on the said A and E documentary,
specializing in the rehabilitation of severely brain damaged patients,
 stated that he had seen instances of patients far worse off than Terri
recovering from their injuries. And he showed a videotape of one of these 
patients.
Following her injury, she was barely (if perceicably non-) responsible and yet 
after
rehab, is shown in the video to have regained many of her functions. Another
patient interviewed in the documentary states how she was also unable to
communicate verbally or through body  motions and, as it was also obvious by the
interview, regained much of these functions.  I am citing two examples. There 
are
undoubtedly others. Needless to say, different then " no evidence".

 There was nobody home.
>
> Note that Mr. Schiavo never claimed the right to do this as a "right of
> privacy."  The "right of privacy" has always been about the control of
> one's person and personal property, not of the right of family members
> to make decisions about other family members -- such as whether they
> live or die.
>
> I keep stressing this because the Militant and many other radicals have
> insisted that the "right of privacy" is the source of a general right to
> die for individuals and, even more broadly, a right for families to
> determine the medical treatment of their members without court
> challenge.  But neither side in the Schiavo case were opposed to
> "intervention by the courts." Both called for it.  And the decision
> favored Mr. Schiavo.
>
> A right of privacy clearly implies the right to be free of any
> interference by the police and courts.  It is appropriate to such issues
> as birth control, many sexual practices, homosexual activity, and
> similar things. Abortion is a woman's right to control her own body.  It
> is the right of any woman, for any reason, and no woman has to justify
> her act to anybody.  It is not the right of a "woman and her doctor,"
> but the right of the woman which the doctor should be obliged to
> facilitate.  It is not the right of a woman and her parents or a woman
> and her husband.  It is the right of the woman.  (It is also not the
> right of someone with power of attorney, rather than the woman.) It is
> not the right of the fetus to be saved from an "unwanted" or "disabled"
> life, but the right of the woman to control her body. This is her
> decision, not subject to legal challenge by anybody. And this also
> applies to women who carry fetuses but fail to meet the current
> standards of care (drinking, smoking, taking drugs).
>
> This has never been extended to death, and certainly has not and should
> not be extended to the right of family members to terminate medical
> treatment or deny medical treatment to family members. That has to be
> subject to law, legal and medical standards, judicial challenge, etc.>>>>

 Like Carlos, you imply that law, medical institutions and the judiciary operate
according to impartial standards. The Nazis cited the law and "medical 
standards" to
justify their atrocities. Anthropologists and Psychiatrists pointed to the 
"laws of
nature" to argue the case for European domination over Africans and others. And
now psychiatrists  resorts to all sorts pseudo-medico arguments to justify the
drugging and incarceration of individuals labeled "mentally ill.

Should we disengage ourselves from a critical analysis of the role of the state 
and
law as oppressive instruments of the capitalist class because doing so might
somehow pore a grain of doubt on our argument(s)?


> And I believe the same applies to the "right to suicide," although an
> argument here could be made, I guess.  I don't believe that cops who
> keep a man from jumping off a building ledge are violating his right and
> privacy, and not even if they break into his apartment and stop him from
> shooting himself.
>
> And I also don't believe it was wrong to stop Kevorkian's travelling
> "suicide" circus.>>>>

 I often find myself agreeing with some aspect of an argument you're advancing, 
but
I also tend to miss the consistency in your arguments.

DOQ


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