Paraplegic Christian Rossiter died today of a chest infection. He had recently won a court case demanding the right to refuse food. In other words, he wanted to die and he wanted the right to allow himself to die.
He was in a lot of pain and wanted to end his own suffering. Today his wishes were granted.
Euthanasia advocates are all over the story, with people like Philip Nitschke, Australia’s own “Doctor Death”, declaring it a win for their cause. It’s not, and here’s why.
First, Mr Rossiter’s wishes were granted within the existing legal framework. What’s the point in reforming the law when the law is already delivering the desired result?
Second, Mr Rossiter exercised a personal human right to not eat or be fed. While it was a sad and tragic situation, we can respect that right, and the state did respect it. That’s not the same as a social worker submitting a report to a bureaucrat recommending that a health official give a doctor permission to give him a lethal injection.
Those two things are not the same at all. One is an expression of freedom of choice by an individual. The other is an example of the state sticking its long nose into the business of intimate, personal decisions.
But besides all that, it’s just tacky to exploit such a situation for political purposes. The guy got what he wanted. Let him rest in peace.