Editor,
I feel compelled to respond to Carolyn Johnson's letter regarding the Final Exit Network.
While I share her confusion as to how an organization which endorses and apparently helps people practice euthanasia can operate in a state which regards assisted suicide as a felony, I am happy to say that her obvious confusion over the wider issue of euthanasia is all her own.
Her letter seems to blend the word of God with some woolly thinking. I am no biblical scholar, but I think Christians believe our creator was God, and Jesus died for our sins.
So from what I gather from Johnson's letter, God decides when people should live or die - we have no right over anyone's life, including our own. That is what is written in the Bible, and Johnson is entitled to her beliefs.
What really puzzles me is the end of the letter, when she has a stab at independent thought.
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She points out that medical science already plays God in its continued endeavors to prevent people from dying - true - but goes on to say that people who would otherwise die if they had not been connected to machines should have been left to die naturally. That's a bit of an arbitrary distinction to make, isn't it?
Does that extend to people who use dialysis machines? Does it extend to premature babies who have to be put on life support? Would you care to explain to a dying patient and his or her family that God wants them to live, but only if no machinery is involved?
Falling back on the literal word of God is a good way of avoiding having to really think about the issues involved in something as complex as euthanasia, but it becomes dangerous when you blend the intentions of our creator with poorly thought out, primitivist sentiments.
Matt Whitaker
UNM student
