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Notes -
Following up on the surrogacy story shared by @MollieTheMare last week, I present to you yet another man-made horror beyond our comprehension:
https://www.lifenews.com/2026/09/14/netherlands-euthanizes-disabled-2-year-old-child/
Another link if you think a pro-life website isn't a trustworthy source: https://nltimes.nl/2026/09/09/first-ever-case-euthanasia-young-child-2-handled-well-dutch-committee
"The doctor and the parents decided to actively end the child’s life after concluding that the supposed suffering could not be relieved, according to the Assessment Committee for Late-Term Abortion and Termination of Life in Newborns and Children Ages 1 to 12."
My first thought while reading this article, apart from general horror at what was done, was "The WHAT committee?" My second thought was to Philip K. Dick's now officially prophetic short story, The Pre-Persons. That's right, if you didn't know, the father of cyberpunk and author of Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep (i.e. Blade Runner) and We Can Remember It for You Wholesale (i.e. Total Recall) was anti-abortion (emphasis mine):
Infanticide is nothing new in human history. And while Christian societies haven't been free from killing infants en masse via exposure, abortion, and other means, they have been (as far as I can tell) effectively the only societies in human history to even attempt to abolish the practices. Philip K. Dick, for example, was Episcopalian (though he shifted towards a more Gnostic view of Christianity towards the end of his life).
I guess I'm mostly curious to see everyone's reactions to this story, but also to my assertion that opposition to these things is almost exclusively a Christian thing. I'd be curious to see some secular humanist or other arguments against them, though I strongly suspect that they will be smuggling in some very Christian assumptions without realizing it. After all, to quote Leon Trotsky: "We must rid ourselves once and for all of the Quaker-Papist babble about the sanctity of human life."
Euthanasia is a solved problem and the only explanation for its advocates call for it is that they have insufficient care for the lives they're ending. There is no circumstance, NONE, where it is necessary to actively end a nonthreatening person's life. Not when you can just give them the fun drugs in quantities sufficient to render their suffering moot. This kid should have been on fentanyl, not murdered. (If the drug kills the patient as a side effect that's unfortunate, though predictable. At least they had the best available time beforehand.)
What about people who are functionally dead (like brain death) or people who were functionally never born (as is arguable in this case)?
Well the fentanyl isn't going to make things any worse for them, then. It's a little more expensive for the parents or society that keeps them alive, but not THAT much more expensive. Drugs is cheap yo. Especially as they wouldn't be alive for that much longer in proportion to how much fun they're having.
Pleasure causing drugs don't fix all problems, and for people who functionally don't have brains they aren't really doing much.
It's not about fixing problems, it's about giving the sufferer the a quality of life better than being dead. And I feel like that shouldn't be a super high bar because people regularly persevere through absolutely horrible circumstances instead of choosing death
If the person is truly braindead, then the drugs aren't any WORSE than euthanasia. The point is to avoid deliberately killing someone who would have otherwise preferred life-- even in the meanest sense.
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