Seems like a win-win situation right? Locker dies and his family gets millions in life insurance and impoverished Minor gets to finally bring home some decent money for his family.
WRONG!
When you find someone uneducated enough to actually agree to an "assisted suicide," such as the one in this case, then you have probably found someone who doesn't know NOT to use your ATM card. Now Minor will be spending 20 years in jail on murder in the second degree charges, which is defined as "a killing caused by dangerous conduct and the offender's obvious lack of concern for human life." Does this count when that human is not concerned about their own life?
This was a bizarre "assisted suicide" case, most debate in the United States has involved "physician assisted suicide" or PAS. PAS usually involves a prescribed euthanasia drug of some sort.
FYI: Dr. Kevorkian served eight years in prison for assisting over 130 patients die. While his methods were questionable and some of his patients did not fit this definition, kevorkianism has become a term referring to the assisted suicide of terminally ill people. These are people who are dying, will die soon, but want to stop making their families suffer, or stop being a financial burden, or are just tired of being in pain. These are people who have lived long lives, or substantial lives, and are mature enough to decide when they want to stop living. Some of these are people whose families will get needed life insurance money if they wait it out, but will not if they take their own life. Some just want to end their suffering. Either way PAS or kevorkianism is illegal in the United States, except in Oregon, Washington, and Montana.
The United States is run on a certain set of values, primarily Christian based values. While I do consider myself Christian by faith, I have a hard time supporting political decisions based on some of these values because there is too much contradiction.
We live in a country that values LIFE so much that we blow up abortion clinics; we judge & reject suicide attempts and condemn those who succeed to hell; we defame stem-cell researchers and science that uses embryos, while hundreds of women pump their bodies with fertility drugs to produce multiple embryo's only to have one child; we make laws that prevent a person from deciding their own death, leading to their suffering at the cost of their family and the healthcare system; and we elect congressmen/women who spend more time arguing over abortion than solving issues like unemployment, childhood obesity, failing education, and increasing national debt.
Meanwhile, we have the death penalty that knowingly takes the lives of men and women. Last time I checked JC was not so keen on capital punishment:
"Do not repay anyone for evil, but take thought for what is noble in the sight of all. If it is possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceable with all. Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave room for the wrath of God; for it is written, "Vengeance is mine, I will repaym says the Lord."' (Romans 12:17-19)
"Do not repay evil for evil or abuse for abuse; but, on the contrary, repay with a blessing. It is for this that you were called - that you might inherit blessing." (1 Peter 3:9)
If we are living based on Christian values who are we to judge one's crimes punishable by death or not? Who are we to decide that another human beings life should end, if we are not allowed to decide our own? Who is the government to decide how a person can or can not die? Since when was dying such an awful thing, especially for Christians?
I am not saying I am in favor or disfavor of PAS, death penalty, abortion, etc. But if we as a nation are going to base our decisions and our politics on a set of values, lets make sure they line up first.
"In the end, Mr.Locker is where he wanted to be - can't take that back now," Minor said. "But I ain't no animal."
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