Assisted suicide is eevil, I tellz ya

We have an appalling story here, folks. Sir Edward Downes, one of Britain's most distinguished orchestra conductors, kidnapped his wife (or did she kidnap him?) and they hightailed it up to Switzerland where they both took part in assisted suicide. This is yet another blatant example demonstrating just how horrible, unethical and inhumane assisted suicide is.

Although friends who spoke to the British news media said Sir Edward was not known to have been terminally ill, they said he wanted to die with his ailing wife, who had been his partner for more than half a century.

Okay, so they went up there willingly, fully expecting what was going to take place there. But they were accompanied up there by their very own children!

The couple’s children said in an interview with The London Evening Standard that on Tuesday of last week they accompanied their father, 85, and their mother, Joan, 74, on the flight to Zurich, where the Swiss group Dignitas helped arrange the suicides. On Friday, the children said, they watched, weeping, as their parents drank “a small quantity of clear liquid” before lying down on adjacent beds, holding hands.

Poor children. They are undoubtedly traumatized from witnessing his horrible event:

"Within a couple of minutes they were asleep, and died within 10 minutes,” Caractacus Downes, the couple’s 41-year-old son, said in the interview after his return to Britain. “They wanted to be next to each other when they died.” He added, “It is a very civilized way to end your life, and I don’t understand why the legal position in this country doesn’t allow it."

[...]

“After 54 happy years together, they decided to end their own lives rather than continue to struggle with serious health problems,” the Downes children said in their statement.

... Okay, so they agree with their parents' decision to end their lives and fully support the practice of assisted suicide, even questioning its illegality. But obviously they have to be unsettled by their father's insanity in choosing to kill himself when he was perfectly healthy (or healthy enough not to warrant assisted suicide):

Friends of Sir Edward said that his decision to die with his wife did not surprise them. “Ted was completely rational,” said Richard Wigley, the general manager of the BBC Philharmonic. “So I can well imagine him, being so rational, saying, ‘It’s been great, so let’s end our lives together.’ ”

Jonathan Groves, Sir Edward’s manager, called their decision “typically brave and courageous.”

... So they were both completely sane and rational, and the man chose to die rather than spend his remaining years without his soul mate. That's so sweet ...

Err, NO – evil! It's evil! Even if it's two aging, rational and loving companions who chose to die together rather than live battling heavy health problems, and did so by ingesting a simple, completely painless barbiturate drink and died by each other's side in bed, and whose children and friends are absolutely understanding and supportive of what they did – it's still wrong! (And evil!)

At least the two children who accompanied the couple to Switzerland and provided mental support to the consenting lovers will be harshly prosecuted and likely imprisoned for choosing to do what's right over what's legal. 'Cuz ignoring obsolete and immoral rules – that's such a liberal thing to do.

Stephen Colbert, eat your heart out.

(via The Agitator)