End of life versus the end of death

The Schiavo catastrophe was everyone in a hissy fit, and rightly so. A woman is starving to death and the executive and legislative branches of the federal government and of the Florida state government are powerless to do anything because the fact of the matter is that Terry Schiavo's husband is the only person who can make the decision that he made. Now, we can disagree with it, we can despise it, we can scoff at it, we can admire it, we can come to any conclusion that we want to about what's going--the federal government should never have so ineptly intervened--the issue shouldn't be broadcast all over the news--yadda yadda yadda--but the fact remains that Terry Schiavo will probably die today, and if not today, sometime in the next few days. She will die, but life will continue, minus one, and about eighty thousand other people, too. For the discussion that would have to ensue were it not for the already written one by John Podheretz, but the basic breakdown is between people who view human beings as individual miracles and people who view human beings as simply human beings, a "wonder, not a miracle." Now, the divide between these two opposing views seems cavernous--a basic ideological disagreement about how we should define humanity, and it's a question that is never going to be answered, settled or agreed upon. But it isn't something that is just going to go away, indeed, the questions that arise between such differences of opinion are only amplified by the media and the attention that such cases get. EJ Dione points out that:

There are countless decisions made every week when a family member removes someone they love from life support. Just over a week ago, a 5 1/2-month-old baby named Sun Hudson died after doctors at Texas Children's Hospital removed the breathing tube that had kept him alive. It was removed over his mother's opposition under the provisions of the 1999 Texas Advance Directives Act signed by then-Gov. George W. Bush.

The Schiavo case is not the only case, it's just the one that seems to have gathered all the momentum. Basically it was time to have this debate, and no one was really prepared for the gravity of the emotions felt across the spectrum. There is only one pragmatic answer to this quandry--require everyone by law to have a living will. There would never be a question then of what to do, the individual would have already made that decision. If Terry Schiavo had done so, we wouldn't be having this national conversation, the executive and legislative branches wouldn't have made asses out of theirselves and we wouldn't have a media circus focus on what is truly a pitiable situation. We aren't involved in the situation and thus shouldn't draw conclusions based on an afternoon of Google research into Michael Schiavo--or into Terry's parents behavior, or into Terry herself and the eating disorder that led to her heart stopping for fifteen seconds. We simply cannot pass judgment upon a situation that we aren't involved in. But we can learn from it, and one of the first things that we can learn is that everyone should have a living will. The second is that really, marriage as it has been defined up to this point has reached a breaking point. Were Michael Schiavo not the only person who could legally speak for his wife's wishes, than in all probability, she would still be blissfully unaware of the world and happy as a pea in pod. Were Michael Schiavo not economically motivated, in other words, were his assets and monies not also his wife's, and vice versa, then he probably would have divorced her a long time ago and allowed her parents to take care of her. It has become blatanly apparent that the tens of thousands of year old institution of marriage, an institution that probably arose as one of the first pillars of nomadic and primitive agricultural societies, a solution that was fairly market based in its innovativeness--one man, one woman and that's it--no longer serves socieities interests fully. Now I'm not saying that people should be forced into accepting some radical changes to how marriage is viewed, i.e., by allowing members of one gender to marry each other, but clearly, society has changed and we cannot ignore that. We cannot just hope that it will go away, because if we ignore a problem, and sweep it under the rug, sooner or later it becomes the elephant in the living room. I think that the federal government should pass a constitutional amendment to the Constitution concerning marriage, but it should read as such:

1. Marriage, civil unions, group associations and such shall be defined by the states

2. No state shall be forced to recognize another state's marriage, civil union, or group association license.

We can talk about whether or not there should be any other planks to this amendment can be debated, but essentially, by allowing the states to decide how they want to deal with marriage, we can allow the miracle of federalism to work its magic. Thus, the Southern states could all define marriage as they wanted to, ignoring civil unions and group marriages (see Robert Heinlein, especially The Cat who could walk through walls and Time Enough for Love) while simultaneously recognizing the marriages from states that follow similar rules, while the rest of the country could define marriage, civil unions, etc., as they wanted to, and everyone would be happy. Interestingly enough, Heinlein tackled both the modern problem of marriage and the modern conundrum of life extension at the same time. The main character in Time Enough for Love is a mutant who has lived for two thousand years and is close to death at the beginning of the novel when through regeneration techniques he is revived and ends up living pretty much as long as he wants to. Aubrey de Grey, who I admit, looks more like he belonged during the Civil War period with that beard, has probably done more work in a synthesis of what needs to be done to finish off the greatest disease of all--aging. I may have to dig for it, but Glenn Reynolds said something last something while talking about taking his grandmother to a hospice for physical therapy after she had hip replacement surgery--all he could think was that once all of the people in that hospice had been healthy, vital, people, and now, they needed others help. But the thing is that, a century ago, everyone pretty much looked like that when they reached their forties or fifties, and few lived beyond that age. And so on and so forth back into the dawn of human history--more people have been living longer than ever before--sure, a few of the people who enjoyed all that life had to offer at any point in history were more likely to live toward the end of our "natural" lifespan--but now we have thrown natural lifespan out the window and can't close it either. We are almost required by the dictates of science and to marvel at our ingenuity to conquer physical death, and I certainly think that we ought to take the possibility of extending our lives by a hundred, five hundred, a millenium, an aeon, an epoch, very seriously because the one thing that the human race has never had are truly long term thinkers and planners. And by long term I mean many, many thousands of years. Now, there are some logistical problems with all of this, the most important of course that if people do live longer, than what about the younger people, what about each new generation, will there be an inclination to no longer procreate, and instead simply tinker with our DNA individually instead of throwing caution to the wind and practice good old fashioned sperm to egg mix and match? What will happen to people who live for hundreds of years? Will they lose something of their humanity because they are no longer really mortal? I think that yes, something of their, and hopefully my humanity will be lost, and we will finally be able to begin to escape not only this tiny protective shell, the Earth, but also, our even tinier and less protected shells our bodies and define our own existence without being defined by it. And that's really the greatest tragedy for Terry Schiavo--she no longer has the ability to define her existence--she is defined by it and thus trapped by, trapped by the conventions of society and the cruelty of the law and of our marriage custom and now, because she cannot feed herself, she is starving to death, a death that no criminal would ever be sentenced to, a death that is probably the most terrible death imaginable, a death with an empty stomach and a confused mind, a death that serves no purpose but to remind us of the urgency to bring about the end of death.