Monday, October 25, 2021
The Culture of Death Kills Alta Fixsler
Alta was alive and breathed on her own for 90 minutes after her breathing tube was removed," Rabbi Elisha Greenbaum wrote, stating the key fact as clearly as possible.
The United Kingdom wanted two-year-old Alta Fixsler, a severely disabled Hasidic girl, dead. The powers-that-be may not have put it that baldly, but they decided to end her life. Fixsler's parents wanted to bring her to Israel. There were offers from American and Israeli hospitals to try experimental treatments. But the medical establishment and the judiciary decided they knew best.
"According to Jewish law, everyone has the right to hydration, nutrition, and respiration, and the removal of that breathing tube was tantamount to murder," Rabbi Greenbaum wrote. "I can accept that others might have different views, yet how could contemporary society not reciprocally respect another perspective on what constituted Alta's best interest?"
And this is exactly the problem. We are living in a supposedly tolerant era — but tolerant only of the views that are trending.
A friend recently told me about an abortion in her family. The doctor advised it because the baby had many problems and was expected to die right away. But who are we to say that shouldn't happen naturally? Let the parents hold their child in their arms, if only for hours or minutes. The baby already is and always will be a part of their lives. It's a fear of suffering and sacrifice that makes abortion and physician-assisted suicide palatable, maybe even desirable. It's economics and ideology that drive a hospital and a court to decide — to insist — that a child be killed against the wishes of her parents. Alta was treated worse than we treat hardened criminals.
What was just done to Alta is a grave sin according to the Jewish law by which Abraham and Chaya Fixsler, Alta's parents, live their lives. By what authority does a court or a doctor negate their religious freedom and Alta's right to life? A judge reasoned that we don't actually know whether or not Alta would agree with the way the Fixslers chose to keep her alive.
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