Wesley J. Smith

The forty-five-year-old twin brothers had not contracted a terminal illness. Nor were Marc and Eddy Verbessem in physical pain. Both had been born deaf and were progressively losing their eyesight. As the Telegraph reported, “The pair told doctors that they were unable to bear the thought of not . . . . Continue Reading »

Thanks to tremendous advances in biotechnological prowess, living human bodies”or rather their constituent parts and biological functions”are increasingly being looked upon as valuable commercial commodities. Human eggs (oocytes) are a prime example. Ounce for ounce, ova are surely the most valuable product in the world … Continue Reading »

When twenty children and six adults were gunned down at an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut, in December, it rightfully made huge news. Since the killings, the media have worked energetically to keep the atrocity front and center in the public consciousness”as a story still important in its own right, to be sure, but also as a way to lend support for gun control laws … Continue Reading »

Sen. Rob Portman (R-OH) made national headlines last week when he flipped from opposing to supporting same-sex marriage. I found the whole thing disheartening”and not because of Portman’s new position; people of good will and heart come down on both sides of that controversy. No, it was the how and why of Portman’s switch that bummed me out… . Continue Reading »

Thirty years ago, who would have dreamed that a 490-page book by a Russian Orthodox monk would sweep Russia and sell millions of copies around the world? But that has been the deserved publishing history of Everyday Saints and Other Stories, recently translated into English… . Continue Reading »

When a social movement must rely on euphemisms to obfuscate its goals, it is a good bet that there is something wrong with its agenda. From its very inception, euthanasia advocates have euphemistically bent language as a means of convincing society to endorse killing”an accurate and descriptive term that simply means to end life”as an acceptable method of ending human suffering… . Continue Reading »

For the last decade, some social scientists have been arguing that “happiness measurements” should replace or supplement established economic standards to judge a society’s “success.” Many environmentalists also support the idea as a way of putting lipstick on policies that could slow down economic growth. And now, the idea is deemed ready to leave the ivory tower for implementation as government policy… . Continue Reading »

David Attenborough”famous for hosting BBC’s The Living Planet and other nature documentaries”has recently drawn headlines for lambasting humans as a “plague on the Earth.” That someone of Attenborough’s stature (he has been knighted, among other official honors, and is so popular in the U.K. that he was named one the One-Hundred Greatest Britons in a 2002 BBC poll) would compare us to cholera evidences how mainstream anti-humanism has become within the environmental movement… . Continue Reading »

This week, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear a last-ditch legal challenge to federal funding of embryonic stem cell research (ESCR). Ten years ago that decision would have generated celebratory headlines and heated public debate. Instead, the news came and went with barely a whisper. Why did this issue age and fade so quickly? First, I’d submit, the public no longer believes the stem cell hype… . Continue Reading »

When I was a child, I was terrified of polio. Even more, I feared the disease’s vivid icon: the iron lung. I still remember my horror at the thought of being encased in metal looking at the world through an angled mirror installed above my head. I was an early recipient of the vaccine, and stopped fearing polio while still quite young. But I never fully lost my iron lung queasiness”which was why I was nervous one July day in 1996 as I knocked on the door of the Berkeley apartment of an anti-assisted suicide activist I was to interview. The man’s name was Mark O’Brien… . Continue Reading »