Voluntary euthanasia, like voluntary abortion, is supported by a majority of Australians. Euthanasia may even be better supported, as a recent Bulletin Morgan poll indicated. In the September 7 poll, 76% of the of the 611 respondents surveyed said a hopelessly ill patient who asked for a lethal injection should be given one.
Also like abortion, this sort of community support for euthanasia won't be allowed to interfere with law making by the precious individual consciences of Australian parliamentarians, state and federal. Despite the poll registering 65% opposition to Liberal backbencher Kevin Andrews' private members bill in the federal parliament to overturn the Northern Territory's 1995 Rights of the Terminally Ill Act -- the first legalisation of voluntary euthanasia in Australia -- it may pass both houses.
It comes as no surprise that the staunchest opponents of the right to choose to die are also the staunchest opponents of the right to choose to terminate a pregnancy -- the religious right. Andrews, according to Bulletin journalist Kerry-Anne Walsh, is "a strong Catholic, a family man ... the perfect anti-euthanasia advocate". His bill will probably be seconded in the House of Representatives by Labor's Leo McLeay and enthusiastically supported in the Senate by Brian Harradine -- both religiously motivated social conservatives. John Howard is reportedly "stridently" opposed to voluntary euthanasia.
During the original debate over the NT voluntary euthanasia legislation, the Catholic Church weighed in heavily with the same enthusiasm for "the sanctity of life" that it normally reserves for anti-abortion statements -- but not capital punishment or homosexual life.
Adding its voice to those against is the Australian Medical Association, despite the fact that significant numbers of doctors -- perhaps 14% or 7000 -- have performed active euthanasia on willing patients. The AMA supports legal access to abortion as a basic health issue, but its national president, Keith Woollard, said the NT legislation was "simply legalised killing".
The Doctors Reform Society, by contrast, expressed support for the NT law and is opposing the bid to overturn it. Many doctors, the DRS says, would support voluntary euthanasia after the exhaustion of all palliative care options acceptable to their patients, if it was legal.
Those opposing voluntary euthanasia for patients who make an informed, free and enduring choice obviously don't support people's right to control their own lives, just as anti-abortionists don't support women's right to control their reproductive lives. While many religionists assign this right to a god, in reality they are supporting the dominant ideology of a social system that favours an elite at the expense of the majority.
By Jennifer Thompson
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