| On this, the week of March 21, 2005, there is much madness. There is madness in the message, madness among the masses, and madness in what we are missing.
Mass media, and public media are in a frenzy; each is covering the Schiavo situation in greater depth than any other story. Those that study the media and the message note that the networks have devoted more airtime to this narrative than those covered in the past. This saga dominates; in the last five days, each of the twenty-two minute news programs has devoted a full sixty-minutes to this accounting.
We the people are absorbed in words of wisdom. There are words of warning, words of woe, and of course, there are those words that tout the need for living wills. We are speaking of death, of dying, of deliverance and yet, we are barely speaking of dropouts [or a number of other important subjects.]
If you desire A Loving Perspective on Pain and Passing you may wish to reflect upon,
Making End-of-Life Decisions for a Mother |
| Yesterday, a disturbing report was released. The Civil Rights Project of Harvard University stated that the high school graduation rate in California is a mere 71 percent. The Los Angeles Unified School District [LA Times March 2005] was among the worst sited in this study. In 2002, 39 percent of Latinos, 47 percent of African Americans, 77 percent of Caucasian, and 84 percent of Asian students graduated from high school. More than half of the Asian Pacific students drop out of high school before receiving a degree. [MSNBC March 2005]
Numerous young people in our society feel devastated, distraught; they have little hope. These adolescents are not disabled or facing the possibility of death; they are facing life, a life of desperation.
Many students feel invisible, misunderstood, discouraged, and disheartened. Consider the recent reality of a quiet young man, one who "walks into his high school and methodically commits mass murder." After this agonizing action, he then takes his own life. While it is true that many and thankfully most do not engage in such extreme expressions of despair, many, even those that are part of a close-knit community, or a seemingly supportive family, feel disconnected, distressed. Often young people feel a deep sense of desolation. When they assess the quality of their lives, they feel none.
Our youth are looking for answers, looking for their life, and essentially searching for quality within their lives. Yet, we, as a people, are focusing on death. There are some are speaking of birth, for there are those equating the removal of a feeding tube to abortion. However, few are discussing what lies in-between.
I hear people speak of "playing God." They speak of it as it relates to life, as it relates to the taking of life, and I wonder. How often do we, as a society, "play God" with those that are living life? We seem to decide who and what is worthy of our attention, how, when and where we are going to attend to the needs of the living and in doing so, we "play God," and we leave many behind.
We do not tell their stories, see their pain, experience their struggles, or concern ourselves with their existence. We ignore the living in deference to those that are dying. We are fascinating beings; we build and we destroy. We give birth and we die. We celebrate these milestones; we cover them in the news, and yet, lives and living pass with little fanfare.
You may be interested in . . .
Maureen Dowd Discussing "DeLay, Deny, amd Demagogue"
Media Matters For America writes of
"Conservatives Claim that Liberals "want" Schiavo to Die"
John Leland asks, "Did Decartes Doom Terri Schiavo?" |
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