Life support has been withdrawn from Alfie Evans

Rest in peace, little Alfie. Unfortunately the ECHR failed you because they're fools who shouldn't hold judicial office. This wasn't about Alfie, it was about a power struggle between his parents and legal representatives, and judges who were determined to prevail, and I curse the latter.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/apr/23/alfie-evans-european-court-human-rights-life-support

 

good...poor sod can rest in peace now.

 

What are you talking about? Judges don’t “prevail” in this kind of case. They calmly assess all of the evidence presented to them by all parties and reach decision on the basis of the law.

I’ve endless sympathy for his parents but what they naturally really wanted was never going to happen and keeping him on life support indefinitely in the hope of some impossible miracle was never realistic and never in the child’s best interests. There is a distinction between existence and life.

 

This has not been about 'the child's best interests', it's about the perverse judicial refusal to allow the parents to decide what they think is best for him, not effing power-obsessed strangers who've forgotten about the lad by the time the c***s have taken off their wigs. 'they calmly assess all of the evidence presented to them' - get real ffs!

 

The law does not grant parents unconditional right to do anything they believe is best for their children. After all, if the situation was reversed and parents demanded life support was turned off even though doctors said the child could be successfully treated, would you still be supporting the unquestionable parental rights?

You also do a gross disservice to all the judges who have rules in this case and all the ones who rule in similar ones (including ones in cases where they rule in favour of the parents). Your vicious emotive attack on them all as a whole does you no credit. There doesn’t always need to be a bad guy in situations like this. It’s perfectly possible that everyone is honestly doing what they believe is best for the child.

 

Well it damn well should!!!! What the hell gives strangers the right to prevail over the rights of parents, whether those parents be right or wrong; and remember that the parents in the abduction of the little boy who had cancer (and hasn't got it now?) were right and the effing judges, whom you seem to have so much admiration for, and faith in, were wrong big-time? There was a thread recently about the difference between intellect and intelligence, and this matter exemplifies the question exquisitely. In other words, judges aren't necessarily intelligent. In fact some are as thick as ****, and only got there because of who they know, rather than what they know!

 

I never realised you were a judge!

 

You’re seriously suggesting parents should be allowed to do anything they want to their children without any legal question or challenge? I don’t think you’ve thought that through in the slightest.

The same thing that gives them the rights over the rest of us. It’s illegal for me to punch you in the face for the same reason it’s illegal for a parent to punch their child in the face. Obviously parents have specific rights (and responsibilities) in relation to their children but like all of our rights, they’re not unconditional.

Nor are parents. This isn’t about playing them off against each other though and it isn’t about either having an unconditional and unquestioned say in these matters. This is primarily a disagreement between the parents and the doctors and the judges have to find a conclusion to that disagreement within the law. It isn’t about one judge either, there have been countless judges making countless decisions during this process, generally all reaching similar conclusions.

Can you even accept the possibility that all those judges and all the doctors are right while the parents, in their justifiable grief, anger and desperation, are wrong?

 

They might be right or they might be wrong, but that's immaterial; the fact is they should not involve themselves in family relationships. If it turns out the parents were wrong then they alone will have closure and grieve; but those judges will just add to their misery, then as I said, they'll take off their wigs, go home and forget all about the pain they caused. This is the second most important human right - the right to have autonomous care for your children above and beyond everyone else's interference.

 

sorry...what caring did they achieve...prolonging the agony of their child counts as caring...!!??

 

So if parents wanted to treat their child by making it drink acid, amputate healthy limbs or let them die from entirely treatable conditions, nobody should be permitted to stop them and they should never face any criminal charges as a consequence?

Again, you’re blindly attacking all judges with absolutely no justification. You have no idea how much they care and how much their rulings are about preventing further suffering of the child. It isn’t about the parents – their grief is sadly inevitable – it’s about what is best for the child. If you true want a world where parents are free to make their children suffer, even out of honest ignorance, you’re in no moral position to attack the judges for not caring.

 

He wasn't 'in agony' because he was, and still is, comatose.

 

No it is about medical ethics

Should we allow children to be experimented on when there is no hope? Should we put children who cannot make determinations for themselves though pain and suffering for no gain?

If we say yes to the Alfie's then we also open up use of very questionable practices by everyone with a dingbat idea

And before you tell me that does not happen we had a case here of someone who died following "beatharianism" which maintains you can live on light

 

As I've just said, Alfie was/is comotose, therefore in no pain. But to resume: There's an aphorism which goes 'Necessity is the mother of invention', and the same ethos can be extended to 'Experimentation was and still is the progenitor of medical science and its progress.' After all, the lad I mentioned who had cancer had been written off by English doctors, but he is now in rude health, so who's to be the arbiter as to who should live and who should die, the child's parents, or doctors who might be not up to standard, or, as has been known on more than one occasion, are 'playing god'?

I know it sounds trite, but 'miracles do happen', so who are you or I to deny the chance of life to another human being? And especially to have the ignorance to refer to such the matter as 'a dingbat idea'.

Well there are wackos everywhere and in every walk of life, aren't there; and anyone who believes that is most certainly one of them. So it's a non sequitur. The bottom line is that this is the concern of nobody else on this planet other than the parents, and the judges involved have made a disastrously immoral and perverse decision.

 

excellent..priceless!!!...to paraphrase the words of the Firm...

It's life, Cerb, but not as we know it, not as we know it, not as we know it;
it's life, Cerb, but not as we know it, not as we know it, Cerb.

 

The courts have all the information, you do not.

The judge said the toddler's continued life was a "shaft of light" and a "special opportunity" for his parents to spend time with him - not the time for more legal manoeuvres.

The judge rejected claims that Alfie's health had improved and he was breathing on his own and said: "The sad truth is that it is not."

"With little, indeed no hesitation, I reject that. The brain cannot regenerate itself and there is virtually nothing of his brain left."

Only the ignorant can believe they can know better than the medical team caring for Alfie.
I don't know what to call that bunch of morons making trouble outside Alder Hey hospital.
Dingbats seems quite restrained to me.
Thankfully, Alfie has his own legal representative firmly on his side.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-merseyside-43883865

 

However you dress it up, the decision is his parents' and nobody else's. That is the only issue I'm interested in.

 

No, it isn't and nor should it be. Parents do not own their children. Alfie has rights that should never be overridden.
His parents. as his legal guardians, certainly had the right to challenge the decision made by Alfie's medical team in a court of law.

They've done this many times and have lost every time, because what they want is not ,and never was, in Alfie's best interests.

 

and this where the sad fiasco is now heading.....

I would imagine that palliative care teams up and down the country are in despair.

Indeed....unless of course lawyers/advocates are using this poor kid for an agenda of their own....

IMHO any dignity this poor lad had has been shredded by his parents and their poor judgement and minimal grasp of reality.

 

I'd call it 'their instinct to protect their young' - all animals have that instinct. Your stance is no different to the superficiality of the pro-life thickos demonstrating outside the hospital. The poor kid's brain has gone and he can't possibly live, but his parents have more right to him than anyone else, especially the ****ing doctors. And especially the ****ing judiciary. **** them all! The parents have been mercilessly bullied by those who are abusing their power for no other reason than their determination to prevail.

 

Not neccessarily

One of the most moving interviews I have seen in my life was a couple whose daughter had died suddenly of a cerebral haemorrhage at age 11. Despite the heart wrenching sudden death these parents consented to donate thier daughters organs.

No greater love..........

 

Is it?

Is it being fuelled not by an interest in Alfie's recovery but some sense of guilt on the part of the parents? A real "If only we had acted sooner to get him to hospital"

Emotions this strong are often guilt driven rather than love driven

 

Really? And if the "experimental treatment" involved 2nd hourly enemas with acid - would you concede to that?

This is about the fact that Alfie, the essential Alfie, has already gone - left no one home. He has a semi functioning body but he is no longer within it

 

Well said.

 

I totally agree mate but at some point one has to concede to nature and accept the inevitable with courage and dignity. They are young people and can, I assume, have other children to nurture and protect. It’s time to let this wee mite go.