Double euthanasia in the Netherlands

This article was published by Wesley Smith on August 14, 2017

R

Wesley Smith

emember when society considered it a tragedy when old people killed themselves? 

Now, apparently, it is celebrated as a splendid “death with dignity” choice. From the Telegraph story: 

An elderly couple died holding hands surrounded by loved ones in a rare double euthanasia. 

Nic and Trees Elderhorst, both 91, died in their hometown of Didam, in the Netherlands, after 65 years of marriage. The couple both suffered from deteriorating physical health over the past five years, with Mr Elderhorst left with reduced mobility after a stroke in 2012. 

Walking had also become increasingly difficult for his wife, who had also suffered from memory loss. 

“It soon became clear that it could not wait much longer,” the couple’s daughter told The Gelderlander [translated]. “The geriatrician determined that our mother was still mentally competent. However, if our father were to die, she could become completely disoriented, ending up in a nursing home. 

“Something which she desperately did not want. Dying together was their deepest wish.”

There you go again, Wesley “slippery sloping away!” 

No. Facts on the ground. Joint euthanasia or assisted suicides of elderly couples have also taken place in Switzerland and Belgium. 

This is the thing: Once a society accepts killing as an acceptable answer to current and feared future suffering, then what constitutes sufficient difficulty to qualify to be made dead becomes very elastic. 

Et voila, before you know it, the children of elderly parents attend and celebrate their joint euthanasia killings–instead of urging them to remain alive and assuring them that they will be loved and cared for, come what may. 

Euthanasia corrupts everything it touches, including the perceptions of children’s obligations to aging parents and society’s duties toward their elderly members. 

Don’t say you weren’t warned.