THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, September 23, 1996 TAG: 9609200018
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A8 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Letter
LENGTH: 32 lines
With due respect to the author of ``Modern medicine need not be cruel'' (letters, Sept. 15), I also feel compelled to write. It is not only what Jack ``Doctor Death'' Kevorkian is doing, it is also the direction that this is taking the country.
In the 1920s Germany legalized and practiced euthanasia. Later the Nazi party came to power with a smaller percentage of the popular vote than Bill Clinton had to win the oval office. The Nazi party used the legal precedent of euthanasia to justify its genocide program.
I find it ironic that there are members of the gay community that support assisted suicide (euthanasia) as an option due to the AIDs virus. The gay community was one of the social groups that the genocide program was aimed at.
Human beings have a bad habit of ``pushing the envelope.'' History proves that they can be the cruelest living things on the planet. We want to use assisted suicide in the name of compassion to stop the suffering of the dying. This requires a ``quality of life judgment.''
Where does this stop? If it is easily accepted that a dying person's quality of life is no longer high quality, what about the severely mentally retarded? The physically handicapped? The mentally insane? Or those serving life sentences in prison? The Nazi party found all of these people were justifiable targets of the genocide program.
You can cry ``false analogy'' all you want, but ``those who forget the past are condemned to repeat it.'' Goose step, anyone?
PETER V. FARLEY
Virginia Beach, Sept. 15, 1996 by CNB