Wednesday Morning Rant

There are many reasons that naysayers looked at the prospect of state-sponsored "assisted suicide" with everything from trepidation to open horror. These reasons range from the religious to the moral to the pragmatic, but there have been many objectors wherever such notions have been floated. In this country, it's a state-level consideration. In other countries, like Canada, it's national. More states and countries every year enable it, and the naysayers now have the records of places where it has already been done to point to.

One thing that state-sponsored "assisted suicide" has demonstrated is that on this particular topic, the goalposts aren't merely mobile, they have wheels and powerful engines to propel them down the field. Yesterday, Ace posted an ad from Canada, encouraging that country's flavor of euthanasia (called MAID) by extolling the virtues of offing yourself. In his Morning Rant yesterday, CBD mentioned the legal battle over what became Spain's youngest person killed through its euthanasia program.

In Canada, MAID's goalposts have been moving rapidly. It took just five years for Canada to mash down the accelerator on MAID. When passed in 2016, MAID required a 10-day "reflection period" before a person could be eligible. This was repealed for terminal patients in 2021, and they installed a MAID express lane. There is still a waiting period for MAID's "Track 2" participants - which is for those without "forseeable death" - but it can also be waived. From "death as a mercy" to express-lane, state-sponsored killing in five years. Impressive.

But it doesn't stop there for MAID. MAID still doesn't kill citizens suffering only from mental illness. That is changing. It was supposed to change last year, but there was enough objection that it's been deferred until 2027. But they will get there, and open a whole category of people who can be killed by the state. Sure, it requires consent - but as we see reported frequently, MAID is enthusiastically offered to those seeking medical treatment and - unlike many other medical treatments in Canada - MAID acts fast. The slope is slippery indeed.

Colorado also passed its euthanasia law in 2016. Unlike Canada, it took longer to start moving the goalposts. It wasn't until 2024 that they cut the waiting period in half and added a waiver process to skip the waiting period if the prescriber thinks death is imminent. That same year, Colorado also expanded who can prescribe the drugs to include Advanced Practice Registered Nurses in addition to doctors. This latter change was made specifically to cover doctor-scarce rural areas. Vermont passed its euthanasia law in 2013 and also took longer to start moving the goalposts. In 2022 they "expanded access" by eliminating one of the two waiting periods, allowing remote diagnosis ("telemedicine") and opening eligibility to non-residents. In neither state is it available for mental illness, nor can the doctor administer the drugs - but I will be surprised if it takes more than five years to get there under the banner of "expanded access." After all, neither state made it even a decade before hitting the accelerator.

Then there is Spain. Spain was comparatively late to the party, not legalizing state-sponsored euthanasia until 2021. Spain does still have a waiting period, but also permits it for mental illness. That permission is not explicit, but it is nonetheless permitted. A mere three years after the law's passage, the Spanish parliament attempted to make it explicitly permitted. The attempt failed - probably because it wasn't necessary - but many in Spanish government wanted to make it very clear that they will help you off yourself for mental illness. They learned from their forbears to be expansive, but wanted to make it explicitly expansive just in case they can help shuffle more people into the grave by doing so.

The reason I looked into this further is the same case that CBD discussed yesterday. In that case, a mentally-ill young woman named Noelia Castillo Ramos became the youngest person in Spain to die by assisted suicide, and it was for mental illness that was exacerbated by sexual assault. Her family sued to prevent it, citing mental incompetence. The court ruled that she was competent, and so it proceeded. That makes sense as far is it goes, but I was curious as to why the lawsuit was about competence rather than diagnosis, why the argument was that Ramos couldn't make that choice, rather than because it was for a non-terminal illness. That is when I learned that it needn't be for a terminal - or even physical - illness in Spain. Competence was the only avenue available to fight it.

The press and politicians happily ignored those who objected to these laws. The press wrote off the moral and religious objectors as atavistic cranks, and declared that the pragmatic objectors were arguing in bad faith. The pragmatic objectors to state-sponsored euthanasia are perhaps the most interesting, because they feared exactly this ratcheting expansion even if they didn't have moral or religious objections to the idea of a "mercy killing." The pragmatists were proven correct as everywhere such laws have been implemented, the requirements are subsequently loosened. Wait less. Make diagnosis easier and faster. Expand the list of eligible conditions. Once permitted at all, the steady march toward expansion, acceleration, popularization or - G-d forbid - a mandate immediately began.

Encouraging citizens to die is too great a temptation for the state. Once that door has been opened, it not only can never close, it can only open wider. Whether through misplaced empathy, financial considerations or simple malice, the standards and restrictions always decline and - like abortion - what started as "safe, legal and rare" becomes the heavily-encouraged first choice.

Also, I hope that our Jewish Hordelings have a good Pesach (which begins tonight) and that our Christian Hordelings have a blessed Good Friday and a happy Easter!

posted by Joe Mannix at 11:00 AM

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