Doctor Kills Canadian Man Whose Wife Asked Court to Prevent Euthanasia
Original at National ReviewI wrote a bit ago here about the Canadian woman legally trying to prevent her husband from being killed in a euthanasia homicide. The courts rejected her appeal and now the man is dead.
The case highlights the cultural tensions and incompatible value systems that are tearing the West apart, about which euthanasia is only a serious symptom. From the CBC story:
The Sorensons had known each other for more than 60 years and were married for 48. After Katherine Sorenson launched her legal efforts to stop her husband from accessing MAID, he moved out of their shared home and the couple stopped speaking.
In an interview Tuesday, Katherine Sorenson said she last spoke to her husband on Aug. 15, when she called him and learned he had made a suicide attempt. At that time, a temporary injunction was legally preventing him from MAID.
She learned of his death when the funeral home called to tell her they had his body.
She said that after months of separation, his passing was not a shock and she was doing “pretty well, considering.”
“I’ve had a wonderful life with Jack. There have been, as with any marriage, lots of varying opinions between the spouses and I thought we did a pretty good job of reconciling two pretty opposite views,” she said, referring to their difference of religion. She is a practising Christian and he had been an atheist since his early adulthood.
She said they dealt well with their differences “until this issue came up of end of life.”
At least she can have the cold comfort of knowing she did her best to save him. Alas, his society didn’t think his life worth saving if he didn’t.
Meanwhile, the Canadian government is set to expand the killable categories of people who can qualify for euthanasia by deleting any reference to being terminally ill.
Once euthanasia is legalized, being dead becomes the imperative rather than preserving life and preventing suicide of the sick. As Canadian journalist Andrew Coyne once wrote:
A society that believes in nothing can offer no argument even against death. A culture that has lost its faith in life cannot comprehend why it should be endured.
For those who think it can’t happen here, Canada is our closest cultural cousin.