Unsung

"Look at all the people with their heads down in their hands, when everything I’m feeling makes it hard to understand that what I need to miss, it’s what I need to miss, it's you."

Now that Jennifer has departed for sunnier climes, and I'm feeling somewhat cold and lonely here in The Darkened Room, I think we need a change of pitch. You see, I've had one eye on the news for most of this week, and I've been watching with no little interest as the twin sagas of Terry Schiavo and Pope John Paul II have drawn to a conclusion. And to be honest, each passing day has left me wondering what extremes our callous disregard for human life can possibly reach.

No, I'm not talking about Terry Schiavo's life. Not knowing the scientific facts of her condition, I - like everybody else involved in this numbing 'right to life' debate - am in no position to pass comment. But personally, I'm of the belief that if someone does not want to live, then that is their choice, and the business of any court in any land should be to uphold that right. Of course, that's just a personal opinion. But for the record, and so it's down in black and white, if anything should ever happen to leave me in a condition anything like the state that poor woman was in, I want to be allowed to die.

I'm not talking about John Paul II's life, either. He's had a good innings, and it's always nice to see the world's media taking to talk of love and compassion with nary a whisper of hate and bigotry. After all, this is the man that was brave enough to apologise for the past wrongs of the Roman Catholic church. That he did this shortly before ensuring that homosexuals would remain ostracised and demonised by the fine organisation he is the titular head of is, of course, neither here nor there. After all, when it comes to prejudice, there's a very definite pecking order, and any social grouping worth its salt needs folk devils.

So no, we're not here to talk about the callous disregard for the brain-damaged young woman or the old man in the final hours of a life in which he was respected, loved, and worshipped. Instead, we're here to ask a question, and that question is this:

"In terms of the amount of money, effort, and media coverage that has gone into bringing us the stories of a woman who almost certainly wanted to die and a man who is dying peacefully and in luxury of ailments bought on by old age, how many unnecessary deaths could we, as a race, have prevented this week?"

Answers wherever the fuck you like, it won't make the blindest bit of difference.