This is standard operating procedure in the MSM these days, but it is always worth pointing out: The media are so wildly biased on some issues, they report about them as if there were only one side to the debate. Assisted suicide is fast becoming one of those monochrome issues from which opposing views are airbrushed out of the big picture as surely as Trotsky was erased from old photos of the Bolshevik Revolution by Stalin.
In Washington, where many doctors and hospitals are refusing to cooperate with the killing agenda—as is their right under the law—pro assisted suicide campaigners are ramping up the pressure to coerce complicity. The Seattle Times, byline Laura Kate Zaichkind dancing a jig to the tune fiddled by Compassion and Choices (formerly Hemlock Society), has written a second story about pressure being placed on doctors to write lethal prescriptions. True to form, no contrary opinions are included. From the story:
The organization [C and C] distributed a letter signed by six physicians Friday to all doctors in the state who have practices treating patients who might be terminal or deal with end-of-life decisions and care. The letter urges them to support patients who decide to use Death With Dignity…
Compassion and Choices urges physicians statewide who are willing to participate in the act to contact the organization so patients struggling to access the service can be referred. The nonprofit also is encouraging the state medical association and county medical societies to use Compassion and Choices to help provide education about the act. “There’s clearly much work to be done,” said Dr. Tom Preston, Compassion and Choices’ medical director.
And what about letting readers know the reasons why doctors might want to say no? Perhaps an interview with a non cooperating physician or views from an assisted suicide opponent? Not on your life: Just like Zaichkind’s story last week reporting on one man’s inability to receive assisted suicide presented only one side of the issue, she apparently can’t comprehend that there might actually be reasons for the non cooperation campaign.
It used to be that reporters knew that there were two (or more) sides to controversial stories. Apparently they don’t teach that in journalism school anymore.
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