Walkouts Welcome
Years ago I passed by a clinic with a big sign that announced Walk-ins Welcome. “Walk-ins” denotes an open door policy allowing someone to get services at the clinic without having an appointment. I immediately thought, Walkouts Welcome, envisioning a future type of clinic where those people who want medically assisted suicide can just walk-in to literally walk out.
Like many Canadians, I welcomed the choice afforded to those people with a foreseeable death, to make the very personal choice to end their own suffering. My friend, the artist and Animal Slave founder, Elizabeth Fischer made that choice, when living with end stage cancer became unbearable. Canada did not have MAID then, so she went to Switzerland, and ended her life there.
I miss her acerbic wit and dark humour. Her first band was called the DPs, an acronym for Displaced Persons. She was a child of a Holocaust survivor. She carried an enormous sadness, but also a fierce strength and anger. I didn’t always have the best relationship with her, but I never lost my respect for her brilliance and vision as an artist. Ending her own life in a measured way, like MAID, seemed like the right choice.
For many people, Medical Assistance In Dying ( MAID) is a slippery slope. Current law sets out the parameters where this option becomes a legal choice, as opposed to suicide which is a personal choice.
A Life Is Lost
A stone is thrown into the pool, ripples spread out from the impact, concentric rings push back.
In time, the ripples become stillness.
Sometimes the ripples just keep pushing, spreading wave upon wave.
We stand at the edge and wave good-bye.
The other day I read the following:
New York City Will Hospitalize More Mentally Ill People Involuntarily
For their own good. Frontline police will decide if you are mentally ill, and whether you meet the criteria for involuntary treatment. As we all know, treatment is open to definition. And we can agree that public medicine is underfunded. The definitions of what constitutes treatment will vary. Treatment will not be readily available.
As Lou Reed said, “ The first thing you learn is you always have to wait.”
But wait. Our frontline public servants ( the Police) have come to a conclusion that you are mentally ill, and so you are hospitalized involuntarily. Now what? For a few days there is food, warmth, and drugs. Now what? There will be panels of medical professionals who will come to the conclusion that you are in pain, that you are suffering, and that you are experiencing severe untreatable mental pain.
As such, we have been afforded the ability to offer you our Premium Solution.
Out of sight. Out of your mind. Decisions will have to be made. Clearly you are not able to make your own decisions. And we know that any further help will cost a lot. Remember as a non-productive member of society you have no rights, but we have your back. Your best interests will be served.
You will not hear much about this. When it happens. If it happens. Things get lost. Difficult decisions will need to be made. We have seen how public opinion is influenced by unreliable narratives. We have experienced the feeling of being played by power.
What I am foreseeing is not that far fetched or conspiratorial. It is numbers. There are too many people. Everyone has to pay their own way. If you are not part of the solution, you are part of the problem. The answer to the social chaos is not a reordering of priorities. I do not envision a massive awakening. The answer is staring us in the face.
I visited New York in the eighties and again in 2007. A few times after. In the eighties there was lots of crime, low rents and great music. In the 2000’s, the crime had been contained, for the most part, it had disappeared. Where were all the homeless people we had seen in the 80’s?
Rudy had cleaned up the city with his Broken Window policy. But where precisely had they put all the people who had filled the streets in the 80’s? One way bus tickets? Farms, prisons? New Jersey? Out of sight. Out of mind.
20 years on, fresh troops are arriving. In NYC, in Vancouver, in Portland, Seattle, San Francisco. Everywhere. More and more and more people who are homeless, helpless, addicted, and mentally ill. “Normal” people do not feel safe. And in some cases, they are not safe. It is a class war, and these are the casualties. We have lived with this rising problem for decades now. The epidemic is endemic. The pandemic taught us many things. It showed the power of governments and how media manufactures consent. How effective scapegoating is as a re-election strategy.
Anti-social media had defined our world.
Thumbs up or thumbs down.
Likes or dislikes.
Super rich and super poor, and the rest of us in between.
Intolerance and division are the inflationary currencies. More. More. More. And it’s corollary Less, Less, Less. And the constabulary No, No, No.
CODE ORANGE- the infirmary is closed for repair.
The ER is shut down until morning.
And even mourning is broken.
A young “ friend” on social media is unable to move, in a paralysis of grief. He is young. Perhaps in his 30’s. 100+ friends dead, he says. Drugs and overdoses for the most part. He is in recovery with an addictive personality, surrounded by a personal wall of grief. Somedays are better than others.
Another friend had an injury at work, had to fight the system for help, everything went toxic. The issues keep dragging out, and now his injuries have morphed into aN immunity crisis, where his own body and mind are his enemy.
A friend at work has been off for almost a year with mysterious stomach pain. Is it an ulcer, an immunity issue, or a combination of mind and body disfunction? It seems like any semblance of a healthy outcome is more and more remote. He is a young guy, wife, young child. Very smart and kind. Like the the folks in the street, they are our friends, family, not just strangers.
I’m not sure anymore where this post is going now.
It is depressing to write and most of you have probably moved on to something more cheerful.
How to end this on a high note?
