I remember this image very well. Unfortunately for us, it doesn't matter if the person is loved; when the judge says they die, they die. Another case of when love is not enough...

Sad.

That is what I can't accept.

You can clearly see love in the womans eyes. But you can also see the suffering of the person. It is so sad what do you do?

You respect life, love and the will of God.

I posted that same photo almost two years ago for the same reasons.

I remembered it from a "Top 100" collection of LIFE magazine photos published in huge book back in either 2002 or 2003. It's tough to Google it when you don't remember all of the names. Stupid visual memory...

Anyway, here is my post back in October of 2003 using the same photograph.

In case the HTML doesn't work, here's the link in text:

http://www.geocities.com/captainyoaz/blog/2003_10_01_cyb#107646628047533515

Enjoy.

Who are we to decide when a life should be ended? Against what guidelines do we make that decision? Do we end another person’s life because we assume they are suffering? To what degree of suffering do we end a life? We’re put on this earth for great things; to love and be loved no matter what our physical and/or mental challenges. How can we discard life so quickly as if death is a far better solution than love and compassion?

Nazis had programs for killing “undesirables” regarded as burdens on national resources. Using arguments advanced by some physicians and jurists in the 1920s, the Nazis justified murder in the name of euthanasia—“mercy death”—and enlisted hundreds of asylum directors, pediatricians, psychiatrists, family doctors, and nurses. Many of those who had earlier rejected euthanasia as a eugenics measure came to support murder “for the good of the Fatherland.”

The first victims were German infants and children. The Reich Ministry of the Interior instructed midwives and physicians to register all children born with severe birth defects. Three expert physicians evaluated each case and, usually without seeing the potential victims, selected those to be killed. Officials deceived the children’s families by providing falsified causes of death. From 1939 to 1945, more than 5,000 boys and girls were killed in some 30 special children’s wards established at state hospitals and clinics.

In October 1939, after Hitler authorized “mercy deaths” for patients deemed “incurable,” the murder program expanded from children to adults. Operation T-4—referring to the address of the secret program’s headquarters at Tiergartenstrasse 4, Berlin—mostly targeted adult patients in private, state, and church-run institutions. Individuals judged unproductive were particularly vulnerable. From January 1940 to August 1941, more than 70,000 men and women were transported to one of six specially staffed facilities in Germany and Austria and killed by carbon monoxide poisoning in gas chambers disguised as showers. Growing public awareness and unrest over the killings influenced Hitler to halt the gassing program. Euthanasia murders resumed in other guises; patients were killed by means of starvation diets and overdoses of medication in hospitals and mental institutions throughout the country. From 1939 to 1945, an estimated 200,000 persons were killed in the various euthanasia programs. (Deadly Medicine; Creating the Master Race – United States Holocaust Memorial Museum)

The hubris of the dominant political philosophy, a deviant form of progressive thinking, presumes that it knows what is best and makes judgements and decisions based on this special knowledge and understanding.

Buncha mandarins.

That was a terrific post, Yoaz. I can't get it to link on Firefox, but it works on IE.

I see Love that surpasses all understanding. It is a cosmic thing that most of us are too selfish and cruel to get.