Friday, July 28, 2017

When even Melanie Phillips understands it's a case of the Right hyperventilating in ignorance...

Gee, it's one of those one in a hundred days on which a link found via a Catallaxy thread is actually worth reading.

The very conservative Melanie Phillips, who is a climate change denialist and therefore of routinely unreliable opinion on anything, is actually quite correct in her take on the Charlie Gard case.  The Right wing campaign, largely emanating from America, in support of the grief stricken parents of Charlie, was entirely ill conceived in virtually every respect.

Of course, the great majority of threadsters at Catallaxy sided with the American Right too, because ignorance and bad judgement loves company.  

11 comments:

not trampis said...

Sorry but I am in favour of Parents making decisions for their children over courts every day of the week

Steve said...

Homer, as I pointed out in a previous post, the cases of JW parents wanting to prevent their children getting blood transfusions, and the doctors going to court to over-rule them, are presumably cases where you do not have a problem with the courts involvement.

The reason for the courts intervention is both cases is the same, regardless of the outcome (one results in prolonging life, one doesn't): that the doctors believe the parents are not acting in the interests of the child and cannot be persuaded to be reasonable.

There is plenty of evidence suggesting the parents of Charlie are beyond being reasonable, as with their complaining now that the hospital should go along with their request that Charlie be brought home in a ventilator to die there - when you need staff to care for the kid on a ventilator, as well as the cost of getting the big machine into the house, all just so the inevitable happens in a room of the parents choosing.

If you don't want courts to be involved, then to be consistent, you should be saying they shouldn't intervene to preserve life, too, in the JW cases.

Steve said...

I should add: the request of the parents is reported as being that Charlie be in the house for a perhaps a few days before the machine is turned off, not just that it would be over within a few hours. Their expectations are just not reasonable, and haven't been for months.

not trampis said...

sorry but these parents wanted the boy to live. They did their utmost to see that occurred but the courts intervened.

A lot of difference with JWs IMHO.

The boy was going home to die with his parents and now that cannot even be done!

Steve said...

Homer, the courts should have the right to intervene, at the hospitals request, if relatives are being completely unreasonable in terms of either wanting treatment to be withheld, or life support being sustained long after any medical hope for any sort of recovery. What the doctors wanted here was completely consistent with Catholic doctrine, as the first Vatican statement indicated. (Yeah, the Pope later seemed to be hedging his bets slightly, but I also quoted at you a conservative Catholic priest from the Catholic Herald who took the hospitals side too.)

As I said - if you can't always expect parents to be reasonable about withholding treatment (and you can't), you can't always expect them to be reasonable about maintaining life support either.


John said...

The irony being that the child is being kept alive by the State and public monies, not the parents. I find it strange the Right is ranting so much about this. The USA thing was pure publicity because the child may well not survive the journey, the treatment was never tried on that type of mitochondrial disorder and had very little chance of improving the child's condition and the doctor proposing is probably more interested in raising his profile than saving the child.

Steve said...

Yes, hearing the wingnut American Right talking about how this showed the evil of single payer healthcare was just so gob smackingly stupid. And equally strange is that someone like Melanie Phillips, who I thought had gone stupid on most topics, was actually sensible and right on this one.

John said...

BTW Steve I thought Catallaxy had descended into nuttery years ago but in these days they've taken it to a whole new level. The comment rate is also falling off but still that tendency to ramble on with the same stupid obsession for days. Catallaxy is an excellent advertisement for the Left. That's what they cannot understand, their vitriol and the way the pile on people like Monty speaks to very angry malcontents; possibly because they know their worldview has already been left behind by the Right. Davidson has presided over the destruction of once was the best political blog in the country. Just like his economics: in ruins and all they can do is lash out at the world that has left them behind.

Steve said...

Yes, yet poor old JC just can't let it go. The thing is, he's got no where else to go where he can be obnoxious. (Although I will let him comment here, as long as no swearing.)

The other irony about Catallaxy is how about 90% of the commenters think he is an absolute idiot for supporting Turnbull over Abbott, and often tell him in stark terms. He's basically had to modify his banning of people who disagree with him rudely because otherwise there would only be about 6 commenters left.

Steve said...

"He" in that last comment being Sinclair, of course.

Anonymous said...

not trampis said...

Sorry but I am in favour of Parents making decisions for their children over courts every day of the week


I'd agree except in your case.