Mark Pickup, a Canadian living with multiple sclerosis commented on the impact of the legalization of euthanasia and assisted suicide on Canadian society. Mark was interviewed by documentary filmmaker Kevin Dunn. Mark said:
“…by definition, civilized, and enlightened societies never endorse or support killing its citizens — especially those who have despaired of life and are vulnerable to suicide. Civilized people certainly don’t help the suicidal kill themselves. Autonomy is a myth. If I choose suicide, it doesn’t affect me alone. It will affect my wife, children and grandchildren. It will affect my physician because I will ask her to stop being my healer and become my killer. And in a small way it will impact my nation by helping to further entrench the notion that there is such a thing as a life unworthy to be lived. No matter how sick I become I still have a responsibility to others, the Common Good and posterity.
You can’t have unfettered autonomy and interdependent community too. They are diametrically opposite ideas. You can’t have both. You must choose which it shall be.
Canada post-2016 will not only kill its sick and disabled, it may well kill the collective conscience of a nation and gut its soul.”
Mark blogs at http://www.humanlifematters.org/.
