The real key to winning political battles is to have your interests defined as disinterested. That has clearly been achieved by the pro-euthanasia side.
The judge considered dis-interested. The supporters of Schiavo are said to have interests or, worse, ideological/political motivations. The parents have personal interests which lead them astray, make it impossible to see the truth that is so obvious to experts. They are to be pitied but not respected in their judgments. The pro-life people are ideologically motivated. This is the big no-no. But those who want life redefined as a bundle of goods to be weighed as plusses and minuses are the dis-interested voice of reason. They do not have an ideology. Thus a judge who goes to perverse lengths to ignore or not hear evidence that might work against his ideology’s preferred conclusion.
A judge, a real judge, has decided not once but twice that she has no hope and would want to die. People actually say this as if it should convince anyone. Would that cut any ice if it were a murderer we were talking about killing?
It is very important and little remarked upon that the debate has shifted from the husband’s right to speak for the wife to a simple question of what would Terry have wanted. Apparently this had always been the basis for the judge’s ruling. How did attention come to be shifted to this aspect of the case, or, rather, why was it on the ‘husband’s’ authority issue before?
Polarity of the fork. The other key to ideological hegemony is the polarity of forks. Every fork cuts both ways, has two heads, so to speak. In this case the two sides face the federalism fork. Pro-life people are forked between federalism and their preferred policy outcome. They are usually in the position of wanting state autonomy. The pro-euthanasia forces are facing the opposite fork. They are usually in the position of federal supremacy. They are forced to choose between their preferred policy outcome and federal supremacy. The fact that the pro-life forces are the ones routinely forced to account for the tension in their principles while the pro-euthanasia forces are not is a good indicator of which side is hegemonic.
An alternative hypothesis is that the side that is asking for a change in the status quo is the one that has to face this sort of question. A possible answer to this hypothesis is that defining one side or the other as changing the status quo is itself part of the powers of ideological hegemony. Maybe any policy involves changes in the status quo. In the Schiavo case there is a change—taking out the feeding tube for starters. What is considered a “change” of the sort that must give an account of itself is itself socially constructed.
Isn’t this a lot like those cases where the guy is convicted of murder on the strength of the testimony of a jailhouse informant? The guy claims that his cellmate one day just admitted to the murder. This is bad because the informant has an interest—he gets his sentence reduced. In the case at hand he gets a million dollars that he can think of a better use for than therapy for an invalid wife.
And I am so sick of the “how can we waste time on this while the ________ problem goes un-addressed?” comment. Some problems are important because of the value conflicts they involve, not the dollar amounts or number of persons immediately effected by their outcome.
And how bad were the Romans, anyway? Terri has a lot more going on than the average newborn. So we don’t starve babies because they are going to get better. But is it that far away?
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