Mercy killing

The Canadian media are all agog these days in promoting mercy killing. Ethicist Margaret Somerville urges restraint and some safeguards against abuse by the victim's family and doctors. My letter to the Globe and Mail. Unpublished.

Margaret Somerville deals with deep truths while outlining ethical problems in the matter of doctor-assisted dying (Why judges should have the final word, May 4). We can discuss ethics, legalities, rights, demands, conditions, immunities, and safe guards as much as we wish with regard to mercy killing as we once termed it. It will in no way affect the ultimate application of the proposed legislation. 

Human rights tribunals have the authority to override Bill C-14. They have the final word, not our legislators, not our judges. Someone refused a hastened death by the courts need only petition with a sufficiently heart-rending plea to one of these tribunals to qualify for death on demand. The history of these unregulated agencies in dealing with the vulnerable, as they themselves define the word, points in only one direction.

It's curious that the final arbiter of this issue is not even mentioned in the debate.

Self-serving questions

In a recent interview on CBC Radio One, Anna Maria Tremonte, asked why the interviewee's
opponents acted in the they did. I informed my favourite interviewer that such questions invite self- serving answers, and it did -- "I simply cannot understand why they would do that" or some such biased reply was the result. The proper answer is, "Ask them."

Similarly, hypothetical questions tempt self-serving answers. On April 19, the Canadian government avoided the issue all together. Globe and Mail journalists reported that Chrystia Freeland, "would not say whether she would have sold the weaponized armoured vehicles to the Saudis were it in her decision in 2014" (when the deal was originally approved by the previous government).

The Minister of International Trade wisely replied, "It's important not to engage ... in hypotheticals ... not to engage in what-might-have-beens."

A third type of question to be shunned is the negative interrogatory. As the question contains the sought-for answer, it is self-serving of the questioner.  Examples:  Do you not think the Toronto Maple Leafs should quit hockey?  Don't you want this job? You really don't want to do this, do you? 

You do agree with me, don't you?

Race to the Bottom Revisited

At the height of the Great Depression, Pope Pius XI issued the encyclical Quadragesimo Anno  in which he advised that " the right ordering of economic life cannot be left to free competitive forces."  

The recent disaster in a garment factory in Bangladesh should cause Western nations to re-examine their overseas purchasing policies. Chinese coastal factories are moving menial labour westward into the nation's interior. The workers in the eastern factories went on strike, got raises, then saw their jobs move inland in a kind of insourcing the outsourced.  

This story appeared in an 800-word report in The Globe and Mail, but nowhere did it mention "outsourcing."   In the spirit of euphemism, it's now "manufacturing movements" or "moving operations offshore."

China, the world's largest recipient of outsourced business, is itself outsourcing to even lower-wage nations such as Bangladesh, Vietnam and Cambodia.  One can imagine the leaders of these nations making their presentations to rich Western corporations: "Our people are poorer, more plentiful, and more exploited than the other guy's people."

Vying for poor country status constitutes a race to the bottom.  The result is seen in that November 2012 fire in Dhaka, Bangladesh sweatshop that killed 112 women working in unsafe conditions.  They are part of the 300 workers who have died in garment factory fires since 2006 in that country.

Tazreen Fashions made Mickey Mouse sweatshirts for Walt Disney, Faded Glory children's shorts for Walmart, and items with the ENTCE label for Sears.  These corporations claimed ignorance of conditions in the source of their products. Of course, if one closes one's eyes, one cannot see.

The Institute for Global Labour and Human Rights stated that nothing will change unless clothing companies protect workers as vigorously as they protect their brands.  "The labels are legally protected," a spokesperson said, "but there are no similar protected rights of the worker."   That might increase the price to the Western merchants by an estimated 25 cents per garment.  Cheap clothing comes at a high cost.

The Globe and Mail Issues a Zinger

This post has been sent to The Globe and Mail editor and Kelly Grant.

For the  April 24, 2010, issue of The Globe and Mail, the newspaper's city hall bureau chief, Kelly Grant, wrote a piece about Toronto's Kensington Market.

After a brief history of the area, this zinger: "But a turning point came in 2007, when Yonathan Musse, a 19-year-old Alex[andra] Park drug dealer beloved for protecting kids and helping his neighbours, was fatally shot . . ."

By what stretch of the journalistic imagination can a drug dealer be considered "beloved" for protecting kids and helping neighbours? He was simply waiting until these same kids were old enough to become addicted to his products. That was his livelihood. His very existence in the neighbourhood endangered the lives of all.

Is this what The Globe and Mail considers helping one's neighbours?

Only what the media want us to know

On March 17, 2009, Pope Benedict XVI opined that condom distribution in Africa was not the total solution to the scourge of HIV/AIDS, in fact, might worsen it. Neither the Toronto Star nor The Globe and Mail reported his reasons, preferring to adopt their usual stance of mocking anyone, especially a religious person, who disagrees with them. Neither newspaper printed letters critical of their stand. Neither printed letters detailing the reasons for the statement. Neither wants its readers to have the whole story to judge for themselves. These are the same people who proclaim the public's right to know, that is, to know only what they want readers to know.

Unpublished letter to The Globe and Mail:

Rather than taking the simplistic approach (as in today's cartoon) to the debate over condom use and HIV/AIDS, The Globe owes its readers the complete story.

Edward C. Green is the director of the AIDS Prevention Research Project at the Harvard Center for Population and Development Studies. In claiming the condom distribution exacerbates the AIDS problem, Green states, "The Pope is correct, or put it another way, the best evidence we have supports the Pope's comments."

Protestant minister Martin Ssempa of Uganda's abstinence and faithfulness anti-AIDS programs: "Condoms have not reduced HIV-AIDS anywhere in the world... Higher condom (use) across Africa has resulted in higher HIV... In countries where the Catholic Church is strong, there is lower HIV than places where the Catholic Church is not."

Sam L. Ruteikara, co-chair of Uganda's AIDS prevention Committee: "Profiteering has trumped prevention...AIDS is no longer a disease. It has become a multibillion-dollar industry. Meanwhile, effective HIV prevention methods, such as urging Africans to stick to one partner, don't qualify for lucrative universal-access status. Our wisdom about our own culture is ignored."


Unpublished letter to the Toronto Star:

Re Papal blind spot on HIV, editorial, Mar. 19

There is much to agree with in this editorial, but it paints a lopsided picture. While the debate over condom use in Africa rages in the Western media, mostly at the expense of the Catholic Church, these same media make scant mention of Catholic work combating the HIV/AIDS scourge.

The Church is the largest single contributor to the treatment of HIV/AIDS patients. One out of every four sufferers in the world benefits from Catholic initiatives, hospitals and clinics.

If the easy availability of condoms has not controlled HIV/AIDS in Canada, how can it do so in the Third World? Condoms may or may not be a quick fix for Africans, but experience indicated the long-term solution lies elsewhere.

We must also be wary of manufacturers, advertisers, distributors, foundations and other "charitable" organizations which have financial interests in the promotion of certain products.

The Anti-aging Racket

Letter to The Globe and Mail, January 14, 2009, in reaction to an article on aging. Published.

We want our wine to age, but whine when we age (The quest for the test tube of youth, Jan 10). We describe this futile quest by that anti-human, insulting word "anti-aging." This makes us prey to every faker, charlatan and snake oil salesman on the planet. Aging is not a disease.

The film of each life ends. That's all folks. The Book of Life has no sequel, not even a second edition. The quest for long life begins in youth by the proper care of the body. The only effect an elixir, nectar, ambrosia or potion will have is to decrease one's estate.

Rather than waste energy putting on the trappings of the young, a better option is to make the most of every day (and night) "before we too into the dust descend" when the world will hear "no more talk of thee and me." The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam offers an inspiring place to begin.

Letter to the Toronto Star. Unpublished.

Re Facing end of road the hardest part of living, Nov. 15

Pardon me if I detect a dab of condescension in Judy Steed's comments on aging. If Ms. Steed be "haunted by the eyes of old people," and "touched by their courage in growing old, in revealing their vulnerability," then she has not looked into my eyes or the eyes of other septuagenarians, octogenarians and nonagenarians whom I know. Yes, some people our age have shut down their life's horizon. That's a personal decision. It is not for others to judge, or even comment on.

Hardly is it "the bravest thing to continue to live." Its acceptance acknowledges that the parade of life one day will move on without us. And we move elsewhere. Frankly, that's not a bad idea. All required is a sense of maturity, a maturity younger people do not have, and will not understand until the sand of their hourglass has shifted into life's lower chamber. "At my age, I don't even buy green bananas," jokes a truly mature person.

Yes, older people sometimes become dependent on others. We are always dependent on someone, only in different ways at the different stages of life.

Those truly fearing time's passing may find solace in The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Among other things, this 12th century Persian advised:

So when at last the Angel of the Drink
Of Darkness finds you by the river-brink,
And, offering his Cup, invites your Soul
Forth to your Lips to quaff it --- do not shrink
.

The Globe and Mail and democracy

What is it that The Globe and Mail does not understand about democracy?

The issue in certain states in the recent U.S. elections was whether or not marriage was exclusively something between a man and a woman. Voters in most states affirmed their belief that such is the case. California made this affirmation for the second time when a majority voted for Proposition 8.

In a Globe and Mail editorial one can charitably describe as sniveling and churlish, this newspaper decried an exercise in democracy as backward, the work of social-conservative Republicans, a message of exclusion, et cetera.

In a most egregious and unforgivable statement, the editorialist observed that the California proposition was supported by 70 per cent of black voters. In a 19th century mind-set, the editorial opined, "That is not surprising, given higher rates of religiosity." My dictionary defines "religiosity" as sanctimonious. In Globe parlance, it is code for uneducated, backward African Americans.

This type of narrow thinking has provoked outbursts of racism in California. Homosexuals attacked, insulted and swore at black people for the democratic expression of opinion homosexuals describe as hate. The world awaits the Globe's expression of disapproval of: church invasions and vandalism by gay protesters, a gay theatre owner in California black-balling a director who supported Proposition 8, people being thrown to the ground, urinated on, shouted at and swarmed. And disapproval of mailing packages of white powder. The Director of the Los Angeles Film Festival was forced to resign because he donated to the Proposition 8 campaign. All this because homosexuals disagree with traditional marriage. And when one defends marriage, it is called hate speech.

Had the vote gone the other way, the Globe would have chastised complainers for not understanding that the people have spoken. Democracy is good only if one agrees with its results.

In Canada, the dilution of traditional marriage was imposed on us by a mere handful of activist judges across the country, cheered on by the common media. In Ontario, three judges purported to speak for all of us. The daughter of one of them, Chief Justice Roy McMurtry, was living in a lesbian relationship at the time her father signed the judgement. The obvious appearance of bias did not register on McMurtry. He  refused to withdraw from the case. Two weeks later, the Chief Justice of Ontario attended a party where he danced with the litigants who earlier had appeared before him.

The next step in this tawdry process will be jurists declaring unconstitutional laws against polygamy.