In fact it would have been far better on everyone concerned if she had died right then and there. But this wasn't in the cards, and she lived to be 12 years old. And during her entire pitiful life, she was only barely aware and unable to move, speak, think, or do anything but make a few grunts and cry when she was hungry, sick, or needed changing. That was the total extent of Mary Elizabeth's life. Her poor mother had to quit her job and care for her round the clock, full time, as if she were an 80 pound infant. To make matters worse, Mary had epileptic seizures brought on my the brain damage. They were grand mal and very dangerous. In fact during one of these seizures, Mary suffered a stroke, which destroyed what little of her brain that was still working, reducing her to a piece of meat. I wonder if any of you can comprehend the level of suffering, grief, loss, torment, and anger her poor mother suffered every day of her life since Mary's birth. My sister went through a living hell, watching her beautiful daughter lie there a vegetable, with a prognosis of another stroke..then death...

She grew like a normal child and became a beautiful young girl with ivory skin, blue eyes, and long stresses of raven hair. But in her entire life she never left her bed. In time her bones became as brittle as crackers from never moving, and there were several incidents where a nurse broke an arm or even a hip by simply changing her. A lawsuit was filed against the good doctor, and during the pre-trial investigation another six mothers were uncovered with babies this monster had horribly damaged. They formed a kind of grim club and filed a combined lawsuit against him. They won the suit and my sister was awarded millions. The good doctor had his license jerked. It was later learned that he had relocated to Indiana and got a new license, and was practicing his butchery up there now. Nothing could be done to stop him. To make matters worse, my sister made the drastic mistake of accepting an offer for help from the state of California, who placed Mary in a special state home for children like her. This allowed my sister to live a half-way normal life again. It turned out though, that the help was a trap that the state uses regularly on settlement winners. Once she had signed on the dotted line, the state confiscated the entire settlement! Every stinking penny...

Why? They said they deserved it to cover their expenses in taking care of her, though none of the Mestizo mothers were attacked like this. It turned out that this is an old scam that the state has used for years to rake in millions and millions from suffering families. Your loving government at work. And there wasn't a thing we could do about it. So in the end, the doctor was still practicing and Mary was still destroyed, and we were left with nothing but the pain...

So you see, I understand far better than most the need for compassionate euthanasia. Nobody can tell me that leaving Mary like that was better than ending her misery. Nobody can tell me it was better for her to suffer one, final, hideously painful seizure then death, rather than let her pass over in a peaceful, painless sleep. This type of tragedy destroys more than just the child, it destroys families as well. There comes a time when intellectualism falls short, and we have to face the hard realities of dealing with these poor wretches on a personal, one-on-one basis. Euthanasia is not cruel, or selfish, or compassionless. Just the opposite. But for most to really understand this, they need to walk a mile in my shoes...

I have walked the dirt streets and alleys of many third world countries, where they have no state facilities to put these poor people, where instead their families stick them out on the side of the road to beg for money. Sometimes the deformities these creatures were suffering from would make me run around a corner and puke, leaving me deeply shaken and teary eyed. I've seen things that no sane person should ever have to see. Those images still haunt me sometimes in the wee hours of the night, like goblins from an old horror flick. But these were not goblins, they were people. Poor suffering wretches that should have never seen the light of day. Many of them are in constant and severe pain. Others are insane, some retarded, and others so radically deformed that they shuffle along the ground like something out of an H.P. Lovecraft story. This is not life. This is not living. This is evil...

As the fortunate ones on this earth that were born with all our faculties and parts in the proper places, we have an obligation and a duty to make sure that those that cannot defend themselves against a life of horror like this, are saved from it no matter how difficult it is, or how emotionally draining. To spare these poor wretches is an act of selfishness because we're more concerned about our own feelings than about what they're going through. In the end I'd much rather be the one who saved them from such a lifelong fate, than the one that condemned them to it and called it compassion. It takes a high level of maturity and strength to face this fact, but if we don't help them, who will?

Yes, there are those cases that are borderline, such as Down's Syndrome kids. I've heard a great many arguments about these, both pro and con. Personally I believe we should let them live because they are happy. And in the end, that's what life is all about.. being happy. But laws must be passed outlawing all Down's Syndrome births, to prevent anymore heartbreaking cases. We as competent adults also have a duty to make certain that deformities of every type be eliminated from humanity. If they're never conceived, there's no issue. We should do everything in our power to eliminate all deformities around the world. That, to me, is proper eugenics...