The Importance of Life

Both as a Christian and an adopted child, as well as a rational, kid-loving woman, I am adamantly pro-life. That is why this story, linked by both Hugh Hewitt and Darn Floor really angers me. The story involves the practice of euthanizing terminally ill babies by the Dutch.

Yes. Babies.

From the article:

A hospital in the Netherlands - the first nation to permit euthanasia - recently proposed guidelines for mercy killings of terminally ill newborns, and then made a startling revelation: It has already begun carrying out such procedures, which include administering a lethal dose of sedatives.

"Already begun??" It just turns my stomach. I heard Hugh talking about this on his show last night, but that was the first I heard about it. A nurse called in a said that Yes, we all feel pain in our lives, but who are we to decide how much is too much. Additionally, she said that we are tempted to praise other nations for how "humane" they are with their socialized medicine programs. But now, if we look at the Netherlands, we see that socialized medicine helps to dehumanize the process and make people less interesting in the cares and concerns and lives of the humans involved.

Drew agrees with these views about socialized medicine:

I wouldn't say we're sliding down the slippery slope toward euthanizing any inconvenient lives; I'd say that we're already there. Now it's just a question of who's next. In the Netherlands they will consider euthanasia for "terminally ill people 'with no free will,' including children, the severely mentally retarded and people left in an irreversible coma after an accident."

This is the end result of socialized medicine.

I would also add that if we are concerned about the pain and shock that babies feel, then we shouldn't even allow them to be born! Imagine going from living in a nice warm dark liquid sack essentially, to living in the air and bright lights and cold. No wonder babies cry so much at birth! Children are a blessing, and of course we all hurt when children have to suffer and we should do all we can to keep them from suffering, but we should also do all we can to protect their lives!

Update: Hugh Hewitt writes more today and Mark Sides has links, updates and thoughts about this as well.