We will decide which people we will kill, and the circumstances under which we kill them*
- Iraqi child killed by US bombing campaign
While John Paul Young’s euphoric pop-disco classic “Love Is In The Air” could’ve been the theme song for the Greens’ election night success, it seems that the Liberals and the right-wing media have latched onto Bob Brown’s push to allow the territories to legalise euthanasia as a reason to suggest the party would prefer the air to be filled with the stench of death.
Much of the euthanasia debate is driven by statements about abstract absolutes like “the sanctity of life” and “the right to die (with dignity)” which may help guide personal choices but have little purchase in the field of social decision-making. Clearly in our society there is no absolute commitment to the sanctity of life as Christopher Pyne unwittingly demonstrated last night on the ABC’s Q & A when he followed anti-euthanasia statements with strong support for the bloody invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan (where estimates of lives lost in the two wars together come scarily close to one million).
21 Sep
Comments Off