The Passion According to Terri

For a captivating Where's Waldo adventure, try imagining the picture above with the following captions:

--> War in Iraq, 2003
--> Budget, 2005
--> Iran, Syria, maybe Sudan, 2005
--> Social Security, 2006
-->Our Mothers and Children of the Holy Rescinded 14th (Protection Clause) and 19th Amendments, 2007
-->Nukes for Dead Enemies Trade Pact, 2008


It's interesting how the 24-hour news networks have transformed the debate of Terri Sciavo's removal from life support into a single gesture: gazing, we will watch her die on television. I see it as a form of absolution. For a long time there was talk of putting public executions on television, not only as a potential(ly bullshit) deterrent to aspiring criminals but also as a further revenue stream for the increasingly privatized prison and law enforcement markets.

Perhaps a more humane death would in fact be an important television moment. The White House's refusal to allow the full effect of the war in Iraq to be broadcast in the mass media has created a vacuum of sorts, in which the ever-voracious gaze of the viewing public -- the paying public -- is left unfulfilled while simultaneously docile. Death permeates the breath of many people during times of war. The Rodney King Trial, followed by the LA riots, were a similar antedote to public outcry against media censorship during the 1991 war in Iraq. It seems as though America is ready for its next tributary. If Terri is to die in public, hopefully it is through attentive paliative care and not the give and take farce of life support that has been the norm of late. What has been occuring in the courts over the past few years should have itself been the focus of the news media, but soundbite revenues ensure a lack of concrete analysis.

Hopefully, Sciavo will be allowed to die within the confines of her family, but the media has provided more of a renewal of her life support systems than any governmental policy on the matter. If we aren't careful and this poor woman is allowed to vindicate conservative values by being a televised martyr, she might end up as a Java-enabled video ticker in the corner of many desktops: a CNN new$ presentation of the highest order.

***UPDATE 29/05 *** I've seen footage of an attempt by some children to bring water to Terry in small cups. Oh. Holy. Martyr.

The Christians who are pleading for the renewal of life support might benefit from a little bit of science: SHE CAN'T SWALLOW WATER WHEN SHE IS NOT ON LIFE SUPPORT. That means that the little bit of charity that you are ritualizing for the news cameras is in fact an implicit mockery of her actual condition.

Real nice, you Saints of Misplaced Benefaction.