Now that the media and the politics have blown this into a national debate, nothing will be resolved adequately. The country will (or has already) divide their judgement of what to do with Terri Schiavo along the political lines based more on who's arguing for, or against, keeping her alive, rather on a rational, medical decision...based on the facts...of what's best for her. We either believe the doctors and lawyers of her parents, or those of her husband, rejecting any evidence from the "other side" as tainted.
This case shows that the US laws concerning life and death are woefully inadequate. Look what it's done here:
1. As I understand it, Terri Schiavo's husband, Michael, is unable to divorce her because Florida law doesn't allow it in these cases.
2. In absense of a living will, there exists no method of mediating the conflict between Michael Schiavo and Terri's parents. The court battles have all been characterized by dueling doctors, with no overarching medical authority whose independent analysis represents the final word in the case.
3. US law still has not adequately delineated the boundaries between legal and biological rights and responsibilities.
Michael Schiavo doesn't want Terri alive, but her biological parents do. Who has a claim on her? The husband that she married or the parents who made her? The law is, as evidenced here, unclear at best, especially when legal rights (Michael's) conflict with biological (her parents).
The Schiavo case is not adoption, but the same precedents could apply. Except that, even in adoption, the law is similarly muddied. Who has a claim to a child whose parents have legally signed him/her away? Courts often decide that the biological link trumps the legal one, even when it is not in the best interest of the child.
Terri Schiavo will live or die on the basis of a court ruling. But the polarization that's coming from all the media attention legal posturing and political gerrymandering (for all parties involved) will do nothing to resolve the inadequate laws that allowed the situation to arise in the first place. |
