Wesley J. Smith

Jet lagged from my recent journey to Ireland/UK, where there is an 8 hour time difference, and up at 3:30 AM, I decided to see what I had missed at The Corner and ran across an entry by Jonah Goldberg discussing a debate between two philosophers, Alvin Plantinga and Daniel Dennett. Plantinga . . . . Continue Reading »

I have been following various aspects of the FEN activists’ arrests. But this aspect of the story really caught my attention. SHSers will recall that I mentioned the book A Chosen Death in a previous post, and how its author Lonny Shavelson watched a Hemlock operative kill “Gene” . . . . Continue Reading »

Jack Kevorkian, who painted the delightful picture above, helped kill people—other than Thomas Youk, who he lethally injected—via an assisted suicide machine in which the client flipped a switch opening the valve of a canister containing carbon monoxide. Yet, he has come out against the . . . . Continue Reading »

Compassion and Choices (formerly the Hemlock Society) has played a crafty game of pretense about the ultimate goals of its assisted suicide campaign. In debates (including those in which I have participated), in media interviews, in press releases, etc., its representatives have claimed that C and C . . . . Continue Reading »

In the wake of the arrests of four assisted suicide activists from the Final Exit Network, I believe an effort will be made to cast them as fringe characters within the movement.Don’t believe it. One of the four is Ted Goodwin, who is the head of the FEN. Goodwin has been a stalwart in the . . . . Continue Reading »

Right is right and wrong is wrong—regardless of legality: Another hospital has opted out of Washington’s assisted suicide law. From the story: Sunnyside Community Hospital will not participate in the state’s new Death With Dignity Act that takes effect next week, a decision likely . . . . Continue Reading »

I wrote earlier today about the arrest of Final Exit Network operatives. I mentioned in that post about the Phoenix case in which a mentally ill woman—it was contended—was assisted in suicide by a group representative. I had reported that matter previously here at SHS, and now search . . . . Continue Reading »

Day after day we are assaulted with the idea, fundamental to the assisted suicide movement, that some lives are not worth living and hence, not worth protecting from suicide. This advocacy, I believe, does not really promote liberty and freedom, but rather, endangers lives—of the elderly, . . . . Continue Reading »

The Final Exit Network is dedicated to assisted suicide. More honestly than some in the euthanasia movement, its members openly acknowledge that the “ultimate civil liberty” should not be limited to the terminally ill.It has long been suspected that some members of the FEN are not . . . . Continue Reading »

I am back in California sinking with my fellow citizens beneath the waves of red ink, jetlagged and scratchy from a persistent chest cold, but gratified that the speaking trip to Ireland and London was (I think), quite successful. Here are a few photos I took for your (hoped for) enjoyment. Thanks . . . . Continue Reading »