Thursday, March 31, 2005

Teri Schiavo. December 3 1963 - March 31 2005

What do I have to say about Teri Schiavo?


May she rest in God's peace.
May there never again be such a three ring circus surrounding the intimate moments of someone's death.
May we stop appointing ourselves experts because we saw 2 minutes on CNN, before supper.


I think this is what bugs me most about the whole deal. I'll let Bob say it:



Jimmy Ray Slaughter was executed Tuesday. There was no hue and cry from conservative Christians. Dawn Eden was silent. As was The New Pantaguel , Media Culpa, Mere Comment , Peggy Noonan , and almost every other commentator now trying to save Teri Schiavo's life.

Slaughter's death went unnoticed, despite the fact that, as Greg Horton points out, the detective who led the investigation against Slaughter thinks he's innocent, Slaughter had an alibi, and DNA evidence that might have exonerated Slaughter was not allowed at appeal, and "all DNA and lab evidence used against him used testing methods that have subsequently been discredited."

"Dennis Dill, a retired Edmond police office and initial lead investigator on the case, also concedes Slaughter may be innocent. He reportedly stated if the state were to carry out the execution, they will be killing an innocent man. 'If they do this, they might just as well take him out and lynch him,' Dill stated. He contends he was taken off the case because he didn´t feel the investigation was being conducted properly and that police had wrongly focused on Slaughter to the exclusion of other suspects."


Thanks Bob for presenting the case for inconsistency.

4 comments:

  1. This turned out to be a really long comment. I apologize. I got pretty worked up in it (or maybe it just feels that way because I'm tired); don't take it personally, Randall. These comments aren't pointed at you. Honestly. I guess my feelings about everything I've been reading on the internet the last little while came bubbling over on your blog. It could have happened anywhere--it just happened to be here. Anyway...



    I like his post. I read it the other day, I think. "Yes, but you did several posts on Terri Shiavo," you might be thinking, "How can you like this post?". I'm comfortable enough (despite my paranoia and my worry about ticking people off) to say that I don't regret posting on it even though I am aware that there are other people dying needlessly elsewhere as well.



    I don't believe in capital punishment. People like Jimmy Slaughter are probably my number one reason for not believing in it. It also doesn't really jive with my understanding of grace and forgiveness. If I had known about Jimmy Slaughter, I probably would have said something about him, too.



    I just don't understand this "mention everything or mention nothing" mentality.



    I don't think it's reasonable to expect a person to be aware of every single tragedy and injustice in the world before they can speak up about any particular one; nothing would ever get done. One would hope that talking about issues like this one in particular would raise our awareness to injustices in the rest of the world, keep our eyes open to what's happening around us, because suddenly we're jolted out of our comfortable lives and we are reminded that while we get rich and fat, there are people struggling, suffering and dying in the world. Did I know all the details? No. Does this mean I shouldn't question what happened? No.



    The fact remains that, right or wrong, the media decided to cover this story, and we bit, and as soon as we bite, the media gives us more. It wasn't just conservatives--it was the right and the left, each with their own opinions, sometimes agreeing.



    At best we had a loving family and a loving husband, each with their own feelings on the issue, both were passionate for their own cause. What do we do? A woman's life was in the balance...for good or ill, everyone with their own take. The family was even divided on it.



    Wouldn't it have been equally troubling if, once we had heard about this on the news, we had simply turned it off and said, "Ah, let them deal with it", no matter how we felt about the issue?



    I don't know. I'm not really speaking coherently about this. I just don't understand how, since we do know about it (whether rightly or wrongly), how people can be so nonchalant about it.



    Bob calls Terri Shiavo's case "a cop out for conservatives. She's easy to love and to champion--she's white, a woman, defenseless. A black man, or a white man, on death row, is not easy to love. Their lives are a mess, and they aren't innocent--they've sinned, been arrested, often been violent." It may have been a cop out for some, but what about those of us who simply err on the side of life? What about those of us who get angry when we hear about the death of the innocent, whether in a hospital bed, on death row, or in a disease ridden, poverty stricken village in Africa? Are we copping out too? And why are conservatives always automatically wrong? What about the "liberals" who didn't appear to bat an eye at the prospect of what, to me at least, appeared to be a very unnatural death? And why are we, once again, framing this in a liberal/conservative, right/left way?



    I don't know. None of this is coming out quite right...forgive me for rambling or preaching or getting on a soap box, or whatever this is.

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  2. I hope my stream-of-consciousness comments are at least marginally coherent and that they have at least an ounce of sense or reason....

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  3. "I don't think it's reasonable to expect a person to be aware of every single tragedy and injustice in the world before they can speak up about any particular one."



    Amen. I've always had trouble with that myself. Thanks for giving me some clarity there. I always question myself when I get particularly upset about some new evil in the world. I always feel like I can't do any good against so many different problems I see on the news. It seems like every day I am left wondering "What's the use? Everything is crap and just getting crappier. There's no evil we humans won't try."



    You've inspired me. I don't need to take up every cause, but I do need to be a person who doesn't turn my back on the causes that I am passionate about. Making a difference doesn't mean changing the whole world all at once. It starts with crying some tears, saying some prayers, and then getting up off the couch and doing SOMETHING to help stop the hurting... who knows where that can take me? Thanks for your ramble.

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  4. 'I just don't understand this "mention everything or mention nothing" mentality.'



    Well said Marc.



    The Terri Schiavo case is a tragedy, and there are so many unanswered questions. Was she truly in a "vegetative state"? What level of brain function is required for a life to have value? Would therapy have led to improvement? Was Michael Schiavo truly a loving husband, or was he just after the inheritance to start a new life with his fiance and two children, as some have stated? I don't know the answers, but I do think that there are sincere people on both sides, and also intolerance on both sides. I am pro-life, which for me includes being against capital punishment, abortion, and active euthanasia. Removing a dying person from life support somehow seems different to me than starving a brain-damaged person to death. The media coverage that I saw tended to focus on the circus performers, certainly not giving the thoughtful message that is conveyed by the Schindler family at their website www.terrisfight.org .

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