Opinion: Trajectory of the Culture of Death - Compulsory Euthanasia?

An Australian ABC television show The Gruen Transfer, featured marketing agencies tasked with a nearly impossible responsibility.  The assignment: to make compulsory euthanasia at the age of 80 marketable. Though the ads were not to be taken seriously, they show us the Utilitarian roots of anti-life thinking.

WASHINGTON, DC (Catholic Online) - An Australian ABC television show The Gruen Transfer, which focuses on advertising, recently featured marketing agencies tasked with a nearly impossible responsibility.  Their assignment: to make compulsory euthanasia at the age of 80 marketable. 

Two marketing agencies went at it and presented their proposed television ads to an expert panel.  The first ad shows an elderly man in a hospital bed slowly unhooking himself from monitors and tubes while talking about rising healthcare costs and the limited resources available for the young.  He walks down the hall of the hospital and sees a newborn baby with her mother and finishes with, "The time is fast approaching where we have to make some tough decisions; perhaps that time has come."

The other ad, which won, shows a variety of different people talking about an elderly loved one who has passed away.  They tell how, if they had more time, they would have invested it in getting to know and care for their deceased loved one more.  They then explain that if they had known when their loved one would have passed, they would have made better use of time when he or she was alive.  The panel said that this argument made more sense and almost seemed plausible.  Although the competition was not attempting to actually justify compulsory euthanasia, the panel somewhat coldly spoke about the benefits presented in each ad. 

As outrageous as the concept of compulsory euthanasia might be, our culture is not far from accepting it. In fact, Oregon, Washington State, and Texas all have one form of euthanasia or another.  Another form of unnatural death is assisted suicide, which is sometimes confused with euthanasia. Assisted suicide, which is legal in Oregon, Washington State, and Montana, is different from euthanasia which is death inflicted by another person. Assisted suicide takes place when someone is given the means to take his or her own life.The person involved in providing what is called "assistance" is still committing a morally evil act.  

Most of us still vividly remember the most publicized case of involuntary euthanasia - the death of Terri Schiavo on March 31, 2005. Terri's feeding tubes were removed after her husband petitioned the right to deny her "healthcare" on her own behalf. Terri was not dying. She was simply disabled. The delivery of food and water to someone in need is charity not "extraordinary medical procedures". Terri was starved to death. 

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The philosophy that each advertisement and the Terri Schiavo case embrace is Utilitarianism.  Utilitarianism teaches that a "moral" action is doing the greatest good for the greatest number of people based on the idea that the end justifies the means. Though this seems logicalto some and plausible, this philosophy rejects the fundamental truth of the dignity of every human person. It degrades people. Their value and worth is defined by their "use" to society.

Rather than offer palliative care, helping them and loving them, we either euthanize them or pressure them to take their own life. "Moral" and "immoral" behavior is determined according to perceived "good" or "bad" results based on immoral criteria. Since all pain is "bad", the "greater good" is to euthanize the patient - anything else would be immoral. 

Under Utilitarianism, good and bad is never defined in any sort of satisfactory or universal manner.  While atheists might perceive pain as strictly bad, Christians see it, when joined to the sufferings of Christ,as purifying, perfecting and strengthening. When Utilitarianism is accepted by those in power (doctors, government officials, etc), they inflict their perception of "the good" upon others.  The result is often that whether you like it or not, others might decide for you when you must die. 

Under Utilitarianism, function trumps the inherent value of every human person. The elderly might not "produce" as much good as young people. So, if tax dollars are limited and we live under a universal healthcare system, the government has the freedom to kill off the elderly for the perceived "benefit" of the rest of us.  These advertisements have done nothing more than expose what culture has been championing for years: relativism. 

In a homily given by Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger (now Pope Benedict XVI) in St. Peter's Basilica, he said, "We are building a dictatorship of relativism that does not recognize anything as definitive and whose ultimate goal consists solely of one's own ego and desires."

The advertisements that were presented on this program merely feed the beast of relativism.  Our culture does not recognize people as having immutable rights and value, so the natural inclination when times are tough is to do away with the least valuable.  Hitler referred to the Jews in Mein Kampf as "useless eaters" because he saw them as a drain on Germany's scarce resources.  He reduced them to their perceived value.  Euthanasia is subject to the same, deplorable philosophy.

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Euthanasia, whether compulsory or not, is permanently bound to the idea that some people deserve life while others do not.  The elderly man in the first ad has been brainwashed into thinking his life is less valuable than that of the baby.  The people in the second ad cared not for the life of their loved one, but for their own ability to learn and love that person. 

But what about the value of every person?  Is our culture abandoning the idea of life being valuable in virtue of their creation as a gift from God? 

What goes through your mind when you see life treated this way?  And more importantly, what can we do to restore a Catholic worldview on these issues?

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Billy Atwell contributes to Catholic Online, and blogs for The Point and the Manhattan Declaration. From the perspective of a two-time cancer survivor he encourages those afflicted with pain and struggling with faith. You can find all of his writings at For the Greater Glory.

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