Jeb Bush Is a Tool of the Religious Right
Mood:  don't ask
Let's be clear about something very important: people with terminal illnesses and irreversible brain/organ damage are facing an unspeakable crisis of being, whether they know it or not. Necessity gazes into their eyes and does not blink or look away. Necessity says: You must fight now, either to stay alive for the sake of others and yourself, or you must fight to achieve a good death (which is what euthanasia means in Greek). Let no one dare question your choice. The outcome isn't changed, but the way there is yours. That is the whole of human dignity.

Some people choose to fight so long as they have some hope and something to fight for. They pursue any and all medical options and, if need be, go into tremendous debt. That is their choice. But others may choose to let go and not endure any more pain or incur any more debt. That, too, is a dignified choice ---and one that ought not be questioned or precluded by the meddling of others.

Thus, I am utterly offended by the actions of the Florida state legislature and their governor, Jeb Bush. For political purposes, they have singled out a woman who has been in a vegetative-comatose state for over 12 years whose husband last week won the right to pull her feeding tubes to let her finally die. They passed a bill specifically to allow the governor to order that her feeding tubes be restored. And that's what he did. Ridiculous.

It is outrageous enough that a law be passed and signed to allow the intervention of the state in the affairs of a particular individual, but it is worse that the issue at hand is this woman's life and dignity. What do those pro-life religious fundamentalists know about her? It's sickening that she could be used this way. Wouldn't her husband know better than anyone that she would never have allowed herself to have lingered in a coma and be a useless vegetable had she known in advance what fate had in store? She's condemned by the Florida state legislature to remain in her own physical hell because the religious right believes that euthanasia is against God's will?

Fuck that shit. Don't presume to dictate terms for political gain, you sorry bastards. You got into her family's heads and made them think they were doing right by this woman. But it's her husband who knows the truth. Who would choose to be a vegetable? Human dignity is greater than any notion those stupid miraculists could possibly conceive.