The Growing Appeal of Euthanasia
Canada’s Mounting Addiction to “Humane” Death Takes a Cruelly Efficient Turn
From its earliest emergence in Victorian England, euthanasia—whether performed by a veterinarian or a trained wildlife professional—has been defined as intentionally ending an animal’s life to relieve suffering. It was widely accepted as a humane practice for animals when done correctly, even though it spurred growth in taxidermy, which enabled the prominent, if not ghoulish, habit of attaching dead animals to clothing, costumes, and hats.
In the context of wildlife and taxidermy, “humane dispatch” became a key ethical requirement: a quick, painless death that minimizes suffering. Now we live in what Hannah Arendt calls the dusk, if not the gathering gloom, of the Western world. This gathering gloom has prepared many of us for modern liberal democracies’ willingness to embrace revolutionary ideas. The ground beneath us has become fertile soil for expanding euthanasia to humans, including children, adults with mental illnesses, and those suffering from seasonal allergies.
This move forecasts an expanded role for state-sanctioned euthanasia despite Kathleen Stock’s argument that governments should be denied any institutional role in facilitating the death of their citizens.
Professor Stock—who is not a full-fledged opponent of the assisted dying enterprise–contends that a formal government-run system crosses moral grounds that give government an incentive to encourage patients to solve an ever-expanding list of woes by abandoning life altogether. This move, if robustly embraced, would give government an active role in assisting and encouraging people to kill themselves.
However immoral this idea may be, news reports in Canada indicate that a euthanasia practitioner met with a patient outside a Tim Horton’s donut shop. The patient was evaluated briefly by the physician, driven to an off-site location within a few days, and received a fatal dose of a drug cocktail.
In another case, a Canadian man pleaded guilty to assisting 14 suicides by simply selling poison online. It is estimated that Kenneth Law sold lethal substances that resulted in the deaths of at least 150 people worldwide, including people in Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, and China. Beyond these two cases, some doubts have been raised concerning whether euthanasia is actually a peaceful death as opposed to a horrific demise.
The breadth and scope of the death industry can be exponentially expanded when the government profits from marketing and assisting in the business of death. The Journal of Death and Dying recently published an abstract and an article that appear to make the case for expanding economic savings via promoting Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID). MAID is now the leading cause of death in Canada.
This study shows that if the number of people eligible for MAID is expanded to include vulnerable groups—essentially those that cost the government more than they contribute in taxes—the Canadian government could pocket $1.273 trillion by 2047. Whether this brutally efficient calculus was taken directly or indirectly from a NAZI pamphlet or not, it contemplates an expansion of both voluntary and involuntary scenarios.
As the study concedes, a utilitarian approach to MAID could (would) shift healthcare priorities away from providing necessary support to the vulnerable toward an approach that would foster a reliance on assisted death as an economic solution to Canada’s economic woes.
In considering Canada’s headlong rush toward national suicide, it is useful to recall the words of Clay Jones, who wrote a book titled “Why Does God Allow Evil?” Jones observes that demented psychopaths did not advance most genocidal activities. Instead, ordinary people committed genocide—mums, dads, and sweet old grandmothers—looking to improve the nation’s efficiency and apply a utilitarian calculus to society's health care needs. These are people who can be found at Tim Horton’s or a Krispy Kreme Donut shop.
Before judging Canada too harshly—a country in which vulnerable babies have become or are becoming candidates for extinction—all of us should look within our own hearts. To the extent that we are committed to a pro-life agenda, we will find that efficiency is a candidate for expulsion.