Asking again, Who won World War II?

Answering again, Secular Humanism.

At least the Nazis stopped euthanizing the disabled when the Catholic bishops protested.

At least there was German public opinion against euthanizing the disabled.

//The euthanasia of Nancy Fitzmaurice, a severely disabled child who was not dying, has made international waves with disability advocates especially outraged. Nancy’s mother had requested that her daughter be killed and was granted approval by the British legal system. While the 12-year-old Nancy had significant disabilities, she was able to breathe on her own and did not require life support.

Following the starving of Nancy through the withholding of fluids, the Autism Self Advocacy Network [ASAN] has released a statement slamming this decision, calling it “troubling” and “concerning”.

They said that:

The decision constitutes an extremely troubling legal precedent, representing the first time the British legal system has allowed a child breathing on her own, not on life support and not diagnosed with any terminal illness, to be killed by the medical system.

Euthanasia of people with disabilities is an extremely dangerous and wholly inappropriate solution to inadequate pain management. In cases where painkillers are insufficient, a number of alternatives for pain management exist. A policy of euthanasia targets vulnerable people, particularly when it is applied to children. People with disabilities who experience chronic pain should have same access as others to life-sustaining medical treatment.

When parents and physicians have the ability to authorize the killing of disabled children, we see serious abuses. Recently, ASAN and twelve other disability rights groups filed an amicus brief in a case challenging the University of Wisconsin Hospital’s practice of counseling parents to withhold care from children with disabilities for treatable but life-threatening medical conditions. In one such instance, a child with developmental disabilities died after a hospital doctor advised his parents that they could withdraw his feeding tube – which provided fluids and nutrition – based on his supposedly low “quality of life.” The medical condition supposedly justifying this measure was treatable pneumonia. The child died the next day, after administration of morphine. Such actions demonstrate the results of a policy that allows families and clinicians to discriminate on the basis of disability in the application of life-sustaining treatment.//

For some people, it seems that their first thought when they see a child with Down's Syndrome is: "Why was that child allowed to live and spoil our perfect diner at Appleby's?

Check out this story:

A waiter at a restaurant near downtown took a stand for a special needs child. Now, support is flowing in from all over, thanking the waiter and the restaurant, Laurenzo's on Washington. The waiter has been working at the restaurant for about two years, and the family members at the heart of the story have been regular customers about the same length of time. But it's what took place two days ago that has a lot of people talking.

Michael Garcia loves serving his customers. On Wednesday night he greeted two groups of regulars -- Kim Castillo and her family, and another group who sat in the adjacent booth.

"So we were sitting there and all of a sudden I noticed that the family across from us got up and moved to the back of the restaurant," Castillo said. "I thought, I wonder if they're moving because of us?"

The Castillo group included five-year-old Milo, who has Down syndrome. But neither Milo's mom Kim nor Garcia could have imagined why the other family moved.
Garcia recalled, "I didn't think much of it until I heard him say, 'Special needs children need to be special somewhere else.'"

After hearing that, Garcia just reacted.

"It was very disturbing," he said. "My personal feelings just took over and I told this man, 'I'm sorry, I can't serve you.'"

That family quickly left. But it wasn't until later in the evening that the Castillo family found out that their waiter had stood up for their son.

Kim Castillo said, "What went through my mind was that I was just so impressed and felt so good that somebody would stand up for another human being."

Garcia said, "It upset me because he's a five-year-old little boy. He's an angel. He's precious!"

Since then support has poured in, from the Internet and from regular customers.
Customer Bill Baker said, "I think he did the right thing -- there's the door."
And most of all, he earned the thanks of a grateful Castillo family.

Kim said, "He's good in our book!"

Garcia says if the other customers return, he will serve them just like anyone else. As for the Castillo family, they plan to remain loyal customers.
 

It's nice of the waiter to stand up for the family with the Downs Syndrome Child, but the reaction of the other family fascinates me. Is it the case in our Brave New World - where those with chromosomal abnormalities like Down's Syndrome are routinely aborted - that a societal expectation is developing that such children do not/should not be permitted to exist? Or is it that people simply don't get the exposure to these children, such that they haven't developed the habit of charity and empathy?

This kind of attitude slipped the leash in the past several years - here is an example and here is another one and another one - but those were in situations where people felt "entitled" because they were assaulting a much hated public figure.

And, yet, there is the ugliness of the Wonkette post which underscores that Trig Palin is "life unworthy of life": 

Little baby Trig must be so glad he wasn’t aborted for this, his first Halloween, because his parents dressed him up like a political party symbol to be carried around at snarling political events. Aww. Isn’t life just grand?
 

For some people, it seems that their first thought when they see a child with Down's Syndrome is: "Why was that child allowed to live and spoil our perfect diner at Appleby's?"