Politics
Wednesday January 25, 2006
See today's LifeSiteNews stories
Doctor’s Assisted Suicide a “Disgusting Publicity Stunt” say Life Advocates
BBC complicit in euthanasia advocacy
by Hilary White
ZURICH, January 25, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – A British doctor, Anne Turner, suffering from a degenerative brain disease and accompanied by family members and a BBC crew, traveled to a Zurich euthanasia “clinic” to commit suicide on Tuesday.
Among Dr. Turner’s last acts in life was to write a letter to her MP asking for the legalization of euthanasia and physician assisted suicide. She had made a previous attempt to kill herself using drugs and a plastic bag.
Dr. Turner's son Edward said that although the family was against their mother’s wish to die, that they supported her decision to go to the Swiss facility. He told the BBC, “It's one thing dying from a terminal illness, but to actually choose to leave this world, and leave your family behind is an added complication to cope with.”
“It was only when she went ahead with the failed attempt that we thought there is no point in messing around, let's do it properly because it is just too cruel to do it any other way,” Edward Turner said.
Dr. Turner, described by the BBC as a “family planning expert,” was able to walk with the help of a stick, but, “faced with a future in a wheelchair” decided that slurred speech and an inability to drive and take a bath unassisted were sufficient reason to end her own life.
Alex Schadenberg, head of Ontario’s Euthanasia Prevention Coalition called Dr. Turner’s act “an attack on people with disabilities.” He said “The reality is that this is how a lot of people look at people with disabilities. What she is saying and asking the British Parliament to agree on, is that life in a wheelchair is not worth living, that you’re better off dead.”
Calling Dr. Turner’s media-assisted suicide a “disgusting publicity stunt” Schadenberg told LifeSiteNews.com that the BBC is complicit in the act. “This is not the first time the BBC has promoted the anti-life euthanasia agenda.”
Josephine Quintavalle, spokesman for the British ethics-watch organization, CORE said that as a publicly funded broadcaster, the BBC had no business promoting one side in a political fight over euthanasia. “It is clear that in return for a squalid journalistic scoop the BBC have been prepared to play the game of the euthanasia lobby.”
In an email to LifeSiteNews.com, Quintavalle wrote, “On their 24 hour news coverage they only showed Dr Turner and her smiling family, providing no voice of formal opposition. Euthanasia is, thank goodness, a criminal act in the United Kingdom and it is extraordinary to see the BBC taking sides in this overt way, shamelessly promoting the agenda of the Voluntary Euthanasia Society (deceptively renamed this very week as Dignity in Dying) with only token gestures towards objectivity.”
Back to TopSHARE THIS STORY: E-mail Print Newsvine Digg Reddit Del.icio.us Facebook
Latest Headlines
- Texas Bishop Repents Publicly for Catholic Hospital Which Was Doing Sterilizations
- Poll Shows a Solid Majority of Canadians Want Legal Protection for Unborn Children
- Interview: Bishop Explains Why a Bishop "Would Consider It a Privilege to Die to End to Abortion"
- Christian-Founded Dating Website eHarmony Forced to Cater to Homosexuals
- Italian Government Must Act Fast to Define Food and Hydration as a Human Right to Save Eluana: Prominent Italian Lawyer
- Brazilian Christian Censored and Fined for Making "Homophobic" Remarks in Book
- Grandmother's Account of Traumatizing Experience with Abortion Moves Jamaican Parliamentarians to Tears
- Bush Pushes Ahead with Regulations to Protect Doctors’ Conscience Rights
- Levant Acquitted after Republishing Letter by Pastor Previously Found to Be “Hate Speech”
- The Death of Catholic Culture and the Election of Barack Obama
- Brazilian Psychologists Prohibited from Helping Catholic Church Screen Out Homosexual Priesthood Candidates
- Letters to the Editor for Friday, November 21, 2008
- US Election Message to Catholic Bishops Part III: The Broken Window Strategy
Most Read this Week
- Italian Nuns Refuse to Kill Eluana
- Lawsuits Proliferate Demanding Proof of Obama's Natural-Born Citizenship before Electoral Vote Count
- Christian Prayer Group Sexually and Physically Assaulted by Homosexual Mob
- Mormons, Knights of Columbus Face Chilling Threats and More Vandalism for Prop. 8 Support
- Vatican Cardinal: "A New World Order is Gaining Ground"
- The Coming "War" Between the Obama Administration and the Catholic Church
- Arnold Schwarzenegger's Wife: I'm "a Catholic in Good Standing" But Also Pro-abortion and Pro-Homosexual
- Obama Fortifies Administration with Team of Anti-Life, Anti-family Radicals
- Martin Luther King's Niece: Obama Election Heals "White Guilt" at the Cost of Life and Family
- Cardinal Stafford: Obama’s Anti-life Policies are “Aggressive, Disruptive, and Apocalyptic”
MORE NEWS: 
LifeSiteNews.com Home Page Last 10 Days Archives Special Reports
Copyright © LifeSiteNews.com. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivatives License. You may republish this article or portions of it without request provided the content is not altered and it is clearly attributed to "LifeSiteNews.com". Any website publishing of complete or large portions of original LifeSiteNews articles MUST additionally include a live link to www.LifeSiteNews.com. The link is not required for excerpts. Republishing of articles on LifeSiteNews.com from other sources as noted is subject to the conditions of those sources.