Killing Us with Kindness: How Liberal Compassion Hurts
by Don Feder
Heritage Lecture #574
January 13, 1997
The quality of mercy is not strain'd. It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven upon the place beneath. It is twice blest -- It blesseth him that gives and him that takes. ' Tis mightiest in the mightiest. It becomes the throned monarch better than his crown.
Eloquent as always, Shakespeare expressed the value our Western tradition places on kindness, empathy, and charity. Along with justice and faith, compassion is one of the pillars of our religious heritage and is woven into the very fabric of our civilization.
But in the closing years of the 20th century, we are encountering a disturbing phenomenon -- compassion run amok, compassion divorced from its spiritual roots and politicized to advance an ideological agenda. The liberal left has become particularly adept at playing the compassion card, which increasingly trumps every other consideration, including common sense, decency, and social stability. Political compassion is never cost-free. Frequently it is paid for in the coin of social decay.
The same is true of political compassion. Its humanity is held up for our admiration. Its dark side is only gradually revealed.
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And there's more compassion on the horizon, in the form of the current crusade for assisted suicide. Last week, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments in two cases, Washington v. Glucksberg and Vacco v. Quill. The high court is being asked to overturn federal appellate court decisions striking down state laws against doctor-assisted suicide. Both cases were originally brought by a Seattle-based nonprofit organization deceptively designated Compassion in Dying.
The argument of the movement (variously called right-to-die and death-with-dignity) is that terminal patients who are suffering should be offered a dignified, painless way to end their lives, that physicians should be allowed to give these victims peace through lethal prescriptions. Assisted suicide is presented as the humane alternative to months of fruitless suffering, the dissipation of family savings, and the agony of watching a loved one waste away before our eyes while we are helpless to relieve their pain.
On the other hand, there are troubling questions and a slippery slope that seems to beckon. Terminal is a relative term. Doctors have been known to make mistakes in their diagnoses. There's always the very real possibility of coercion by unscrupulous relatives or health care providers.
If assisted suicide is granted to terminal patients, how can it be withheld from those who are nowhere near death's doorstep but whose distress is every bit as real? What of patients who can no longer consent, or administer a lethal dose themselves, but whose existence is equally (as the movement would have it) devoid of meaning? As Justice David Souter remarked in the course of oral pleading, assisted suicide can easily progress into active euthanasia or mercy killing.
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All of this leads one to speculate that self-interest, as much as dispassionate concern for others, has a lot to do with the public's susceptibility to compassion appeals. The average American isn't a homosexual or (by definition) an illegal immigrant. It's highly unlikely that he'll ever be on welfare or death row.
On the other hand, he reasons, he could become a terminal cancer patient and experience excruciating pain. He might want an escape from the burden of caring for a dying relative. He could contract glaucoma or another aliment whose symptoms are said to be relieved by lighting up a joint. This is compassion geared to the me generation.
In the case of abortion, whose continued legalization is said to be favored by a confused and fractured electorate, our pragmatic altruist reasons that he might end up with an inconvenient pregnancy on his hands.
Abortion is a grotesque example of compassion's unintended consequences. Twenty-four years ago this month, it was sold to the nation generally (and the Supreme Court specifically) as pure benevolence. Here's a woman -- single, poor, and pregnant. How can we not sympathize with her plight? Why should her life be ruined? Do we want her to court death through one of those fabled back-ally abortions? We were assured that, when every child is wanted, abandonment, neglect, and abuse would be things of the past.
The Court and a significant segment of the public bought the compassion argument here. A quarter-century later, we have more premarital sex (with all of the consequences thereof), more illegitimacy, and soaring rates of child abuse, neglect, and infanticide.
We also have one-and-one-half million abortions a year in this country, most for convenience, many as de facto birth control. Our national conscience is scarred by such horrors as partial birth abortions, where all but the head of a late-term child is extracted from the womb, surgical scissors are inserted at the base of the skull, the brains are suctioned out, the head crushed and the now lifeless body removed -- an atrocity defended by the President of the United States, a man who can shed tears with greater ease than any previous occupant of that office. And we have a pro-choice movement driven by its demented dogma to deny the humanity of a fully-formed child minutes away from birth, solely because of its location in the mother's body.
There is an inexorable logic to pro-choice advocacy. If an unborn child in the seventh month of gestation is a thing to be disposed of for convenience, why not a newborn? According to the FBI, in 1994, 207 children younger than a week were murdered, a 92 percent increase since 1973. If this is the mercy of liberal compassion, God save us from more of such loving kindness.
In light of this, we should survey the latest attempts to inflict benevolence upon us skeptically, to say the least.
http://www.heritage.org/Research/PoliticalPhilosophy/HL574.cfm
The Dutch Cure.
Consider the Dutch experience with euthanasia. While it's not legal in the Netherlands, medical murder is tolerated in certain circumstances. The Dutch medical society even has guidelines for the procedure. It's supposed to be voluntary, for terminal patients in the final stages of their illness who are in severe pain.
In practice, neither the nearness of death, unmanageable pain, nor consent is necessary to set the Dutch killing machine in motion. An article by Leon Kass and Nelson Lund, in the December 1996 issue of Commentary, mentions a 1989 survey of 300 Dutch physicians, in which 40 percent said they had performed nonvoluntary euthanasia and over 10 percent claimed they had done so five or more times.
Kass and Lund tell us that the most cited reasons for nonvoluntary euthanasia were "low quality of life," "no prospect of improvement," and "relatives' inability to cope." Patients' pain and suffering was mentioned only 30 percent of the time. A 1983 study showed requests for euthanasia came most often not from the patients themselves but from family members.
Last, yet another report, this one commissioned by the Dutch government, showed that in 1990, besides 2,300 cases of voluntary euthanasia and 400 instances of doctor-assisted suicide, there were "more than 1,000 cases of active nonvoluntary euthanasia performed without the patient's knowledge or consent, including 140 cases... in which the patients were... totally competent." Kass and Lund note that "comparable rates of nonvoluntary euthanasia for the United States would be roughly 20,000 cases per year."
In his book Seduced by Death: Doctors, Patients, and the Dutch Cure, Dr. Herbert Hendin notes the case of a man in his early 40s who was HIV-positive but showed no symptoms, whose doctor assisted in his suicide. He also mentions a physically healthy but emotionally distraught 50-year-old woman who was escorted to the grave by her psychiatrist. Hendin remarks: "The Netherlands has moved from assisted suicide to euthanasia, from euthanasia for people who are terminally ill to euthanasia for those who are chronically ill, from euthanasia for physical illness to euthanasia for psychological distress, and from voluntary euthanasia to involuntary euthanasia (called 'termination of the patient without explicit request'😉."
If assisted suicide is legalized here, how many terminal patients would feel a responsibility to kill themselves to lift a financial or emotional burden from their families? How often would terminal patients request aid in dying while in the throes of severe depression? (The information that you have months to live is not conducive to calm reflection.) Would managed health care persuade physicians and hospitals that they have a vested interest in a terminal patient's speedy demise and thus incline them not to be overly scrupulous here?
How many George Delurys would be licensed to be compassionate? In July 1995, Delury mixed a Kevorkian cocktail for his wife, Myrna Lebov, who was suffering from multiple sclerosis. Last March, the Manhattan editor pleaded guilty to attempted manslaughter in her death.
Delury's lawyer said his client accepted the plea bargain of a lesser charge fearing how the jury would react to excerpts from his diary, in which he wrote of his stricken spouse, "You are sucking my life out of me like a vampire" and referred to her "meat loaf" existence. Lebov's sister, Beverly Sloane, said her brother-in-law was guilty of "psychological coercion." "He made her feel like a burden who was exhausting him."
"I tried to get her to concentrate on what she had, grit and heart and spirit, and her mind. I tried to give her hope. He concentrated on her limitations and emphasized them," Sloane says. With the legalization of assisted suicide, multiply the Delury case by thousands or tens of thousands.
Abuse aside, once the killing starts, where do we draw the line? Isn't it unfair to those who suffer from debilitating, long-term illnesses, who are years or even decades away from death, not to offer them the same quick release provided to those who, in the opinion of two physicians, have less than six moths to live? Most of the clients Jack Kevorkian has buried were not terminal.
What of the chronically depressed, many of whom suffer as much as patients in severe physical pain? What of those who are simply tired of living, whose lives are devoid of most of what makes living worthwhile? A society that embraces medical murder will soon find irresistible arguments for extending the practice.
If the road to hell is paved with good intentions, here is a four-lane, interstate highway under construction. If the Supreme Court buys the equal protection/due process arguments advanced for assisted suicide, and Medicare and Medicaid get into the act, the sign at the side of the road will read "Your tax dollars at work."
Recall that legalized abortion was initially sold by arguing the hard cases said to make bad law (rape, incest, extreme youth, and poverty). Now that it's a venerated right, its practice is nearly unlimited -- any time, any place, for any reason, by any means, regardless of the stage of fetal development.
The danger lies in severing compassion from its religious roots. Shakespeare alludes to the fact that the Western ideal of charity comes directly from our spiritual heritage. The first recorded case of kindness is Abraham's. The Bible tells us that the patriarch would sit in the entrance of his tent, in the heat of the day, waiting for visitors to approach. He would run to greet them, lead them to his dwelling, wash their feet and hands, and feed them. .....
Is it compassionate to give the terminal cancer patient a lethal drug, or to sit with her, hold her hand, and let her know that she's not alone and that her life still has meaning?
Is it compassionate to facilitate a society in which the weak, the sick, and the handicapped can be disposed of for convenience or economy?
http://www.heritage.org/Research/PoliticalPhilosophy/HL574.cfm
No danger lies in severing compassion from it's religious roots. I know plenty of people who have compassion for their fellow man, and are firm atheists. That a society must have religion in it to function is not true. I respect people who have their own beliefs, no matter the creed, but to state that severing anything from it's religious roots is dangerous, ignores the many wonderful things that don't come from religion. Incidentally, isn't the US system supposed to be free from the influence of religion?
Three comments:
1) That the author speaks of "compassion divorced from its spiritual root" - this implies that he believes that compassion has "spiritual" roots. To take that as a granted, as something that everyone would obviously agree with is arogant; I'd dare to say that most if not all of us who don't believe in the supernatural would say that compassion has very natural roots in the evolution of a social species. What the author says also insinuates that people that are not religious are also not compassionate, or at the very least that their compassion has no foundation, that it's more of a fluke. This, of course, is completely false.
2) The argument of the author is faulty, for reasons I have previously explained in connection with a similar argument - that euthanasia may be abused or misused is not a valid argument in the discussion of whether allowing euthanasia is morally correct. To say that euthanasia should not be allowed on the basis that it may be misused is similar to saying that the legal system must be dispanded and legal practice stopped on the basis that the innocent may (and do) occasionally get wrongly convicted, or that criminals might stage evidence to frame an innocent for the crime they commited.
Just as this kind of an argument against the legal system is absurd, so is the simiar argument against euthanasia. Does this mean that the violations of the ideals and reasons behind the idea of euthanasia aren't important, or should be disregarded? Of course not, quite the contrary! The violations to use euthanasia for anything else than it's intended purpose, just as the abuse of the legal system to convict the innocent, are crucially important to note, but instead of being arguments against the principle of the practice, they should invoke questions like "How can we minimize the chance of abuse?". The argument the author offers doesn't work for the purpose he tries to use it for, but rather underlines the importance of vigilant regulation to avoid abuses as much as humanely possible.
3)
"Last, yet another report, this one commissioned by the Dutch government, showed that in 1990, besides 2,300 cases of voluntary euthanasia and 400 instances of doctor-assisted suicide, there were "more than 1,000 cases of active nonvoluntary euthanasia performed without the patient's knowledge or consent, including 140 cases... in which the patients were... totally competent."
If this is true, it is a gross violation of the idea of euthanasia - it's labling murder "euthanasia". The killing of an unconcenting person is murder, no matter how you try to lable it. But again, this is not an argument against euthanasia - it is an argument that the Dutch practice of euthanasia is too lax, too poorly regulated and controlled. And it does underline the need for careful regulation in countries that consider legalizing euthanasia. Misusing euthanasia to kill an unconcenting patient should be handled by the legal system as murder, and the participants charged with this offence.
-Jarno
Jarno: "That the author speaks of "compassion divorced from its spiritual root" - this implies that he believes that compassion has "spiritual" roots."
There are different attitudes towards compassion. There are different interpretations. The word itself means "suffering with". Of course the Christian concept of "suffering" [and "suffering with"] has its roots in Christian teachings. If you do not (anymore) accept the Christian teachings this will necessarily affect the substance of the terms in question.
I've already mentioned the inability of modern man to give meaning to suffering especially when this suffering does not seem to get us anywere, the secular "senseless suffering".
I have looked for a serious essay on the meaning of human suffering from a Roman Catholic viewpoint and I've found something that is really worth while reading, I hope.
I haven't read it myself yet, but I know from experience that you'll have to get used to the sort of idiom that is being used in such documents. I wish you strength. The increase of knowledge will surely be worth the suffering .......
It is an apostolic letter from pope John Paul II himself, "Salvifici Doloris" tranlated into English:
http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/apost_letters/documents/hf_jp-ii_apl_11021984_salvifici-doloris_en.html
A quote:
"For this reason Saint Paul writes: "Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake". The joy comes from the discovery of the meaning of suffering."
Originally posted by garyminfordGaryinford: "No danger lies in severing compassion from it's religious roots."
No danger lies in severing compassion from it's religious roots. I know plenty of people who have compassion for their fellow man, and are firm atheists. That a society must have religion in it to function is not true. I respect people ...[text shortened]... the US system supposed to be free from the influence of religion?
Well, that remains to be seen. Of course religious roots has to be understood here as Christian roots.
You will find some answers in the apostolic letter "Salvifici Doloris" tranlated into English:
http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/apost_letters/documents/hf_jp-ii_apl_11021984_salvifici-doloris_en.html
If you have reasons to assume that, if you throw Christian religion overboard, nothing changes in the attitude towards and in the meaning of human suffering and compassion, I will be more than anxious to hear those reasons from you.
Hey there Ivanhoe. I must confess I did not read all of your link that you sent, I got about half of the way through and had to stop. There was there seemed little relevance to what we were talking about, and it was crashingly dull! There were a couple of interesting points made, but not I suspect, the points that you thought would be made.
Christianity is a path chosen by many, and I wish the people that choose that path all the best, but it is not the only way. As an atheist (something I have avoided mentioning in the forums before to avoid the mud-slinging that goes on), I believe in the equality of all people. I also believe in the equality of all religions, as to me they all possess equal validity. There are many paths in life, and because someone does not choose the particular one that agrees with you, does not disqualify their suffering or compassion. Suffering and compassion are HUMAN things, they existed when the first man was mortally wounded on a hunting trip, or when the first man shared his meat with another tribesman who had failed on his hunt, and they will exist in perpetuity. (I believe the original point of this thread was to talk about liberalsim, but anyhow). Religion and state should not go together, I'll say it again, Religion and state SHOULD NOT go together. While many religions have many strong recommendations about the way that people should live, once people gain power, they ignore the ones that are inconvenient. George W Bush is a devout christian, yet he executed more people as Governor of Texas than anyone for over 100 years. THOU SHALT NOT KILL. Surely the tensions in the middle east are based on religion and intolerance of anothers religion, which is now practically government policy. Religion obstructs rational thinking in debates on such things as gay rights and abortion, and surely these are topics that require seriously rational thinking, whichever side of the fence you sit on.
Anyway, to answer your question, my reasons for thinking that religion has no bearing on suffering are very simply that;
1 People suffer all over the world, for whatever reason. Your suffering is made no less valid if you are not a christian.
2 Compassion from a christian is what they are instructed to do under their religion. Compassion from an atheist is because they know it is the right thing to do.
I really hope that this does not turn into a screaming religion/atheism match, because we clearly will not change each others minds and there are enough of these threads about already.
Hope my arguments do not offend.
Gary
Originally posted by garyminfordI appreciate your contribution Garyminford.
Hey there Ivanhoe. I must confess I did not read all of your link that you sent, I got about half of the way through and had to stop. There was there seemed little relevance to what we were talking about, and it was crashingly dull! The ...[text shortened]... threads about already.
Hope my arguments do not offend.
Gary
Reading your post I was wondering what meaning do you attribute to human suffering in the light of the atheist approach you have chosen ?
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Originally posted by garyminfordGaryminford:
Hey there Ivanhoe. I must confess I did not read all of your link that you sent, I got about half of the way through and had to stop. There was there seemed little relevance to what we were talking about, and it was crashingly dull! There were a couple of interesting points made, but not I suspect, the points that you thought would be made.
Christian ...[text shortened]... and there are enough of these threads about already.
Hope my arguments do not offend.
Gary
"I also believe in the equality of all religions, as to me they all possess equal validity."
Do you also believe in the equality of all political ideologies, convictions or ways of thinking ? Do they also posses equal validity ?
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I am slightly confused by the question, 'the significance of suffering'
I think you are asking me 'what purpose does suffering hold if there is no god to make it all right at the end', so I will answer that question. Please let me know if I am wrong.
I don't believe that the levels of suffering that we are talking about hold any worth, famine, war, terrible injury etc. they are just things that happen. I don't believe in the redemptive power of suffering (as you probably already guessed from my atheism) on that scale, I don't believe it fits into any grand plan, I don't believe that everyone will get what they deserve, sometimes people who live a life of lying, stealing, cheating, philandering or any of the worse catalogues of crimes against your fellow man, will live long and free and be happy with what they do, and will not be punished by any 'god' in the afterlife. It is up to us now to punish those who break the law, it is up to mankind now to try to make a better world for ourselves and our children, rather than blithely sit and wait for it all to come good in the next life. It is the responsibilty of everyone, to try and leave the world a better place than you found it.
On the other hand, a small amount of suffering can be character forming (I'll always remember my first hangover), we can learn from heartache or other disapointment, not to wallow in self pity, and to try again to make the world and our own condition better.
I hope that answers your question, let me know if that is not what you were asking (I know how frustrating it is to have to wait for ages to get an answer on the forums and then it's not to the question you asked)
As to your second question about the political ideologies, yes, I believe that evryones point of view is valid, but it is also up to everyone else to subscribe or not to the political theories put forward. To believe in free speech like I do, means that everyone has the right to their own opinion, and to voice it. It is then up to the individuals concerned wether or not to follow those beliefs, in many ways like religion.
I think I see where this is going to lead, in that you may be about to ask me if Nazism should be allowed etc. To reply to that, I think that the number of people who subscribe to those beliefs (while I find them morally repugnant and hideously inhuman) should be allowed to hold them, if only so that the majority of people may see what how beliefs can disfigure a character so.
Originally posted by garyminfordGaryimford: " .... so I will answer that question. Please let me know if I am wrong."
I am slightly confused by the question, 'the significance of suffering'
I think you are asking me 'what purpose does suffering hold if there is no god to make it all right at the end', so I will answer that question. Please let me ...[text shortened]... y of people may see what how beliefs can disfigure a character so.
No not at all. It's all right. You're on course.
Garyimford:
"On the other hand, a small amount of suffering can be character forming "
This is what I was looking for. Suffering does have a meaning in this case. It teaches you something. It will make you a better person if you've learnt your lesson well. Isn't this a positive result of suffering ? Yes of course. Maybe now it is understandable why we should be glad to discover the MEANING of suffering. Of course suffering should NOT be searched in order to learn something. This would not be wise but plain stupid. As you can see from your examples it isn't a matter of God punishing you. That would be silly because God does not exist in your view, but it is also silly in my point of view.
In your example there also is a redemptive aspect of suffering. You are being freed from wrong ideas, wrong thinking, wrong attitudes and wrong actions that will make you unhappy. It builds your character in a positive way. It has a place and meaning in your life. It has value (oops!) in a certain way.
The Christian meaning of suffering goes much deeper of course as you can read in the (difficult to understand) Pope's apostolic letter "Salvifice Doloris". However your post is a very good start to try and understand what the Christian meaning of suffering is all about. It is NOT a fairy tale to comfort or even to silence people. It has its roots in understanding reality and man. In the end it is meant to free people from suffering.
Originally posted by garyminfordGaryimford: "To believe in free speech like I do, means that everyone has the right to their own opinion, and to voice it. It is then up to the individuals concerned wether or not to follow those beliefs, in many ways like religion."
I am slightly confused by the question, 'the significance of suffering'
I think you are asking me 'what purpose does suffering hold if there is no god to make it all right at the end', so I will answer that question. Please let me know if I am wrong.
I don't believe that the levels of suffering that we are talking about hold any worth, famine, war ...[text shortened]... m, if only so that the majority of people may see what how beliefs can disfigure a character so.
I agree with you. In this sense every conviction is equally valid. But that is not what I'm aiming at. What I find interesting to know is why you've chosen the convictions that you're holding. Apparently you were attracted more to one than to the other. What were your criterions to accept the views you're expressing ? For what reasons did you choose them ?
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Look at the world of today versus the world of yesterday. Each year we spiral downward with more crime and irrational behavior. Separation of how this America was founded from it's roots has sparked this behavior. The victim syndrome. We're all victims. Our father caused it. My mother caused. It's never MY fault. It's someone elses. The following of religeous tenets regardless of the faith helps many people to be better persons. Frivolous lawsuits, because I burnt my crotch with coffee. If I'm stupid enough to put a hot cup of coffee in my crotch and I get burned, it's my own damn fault. Free speech is well and good until the music community thinks it's alright to make rap music degrading women, and inducing you to kill a cop. Jeez....