Wesley J. Smith

The second international Symposium on Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide will begin in about 2 hours. I don’t speak until this evening, so I think I will try to “live blog” here about some of what the very fine lineup of speakers have to say. “Live blog” might be a . . . . Continue Reading »

This is pretty exciting. Adult stem cells placed on contact lenses may be able to effectively treat a form of blindness. From the story:COATING a common contact lens with stem cells could help restore a person’s sight, Australian scientists have found. University of New South Wales medical . . . . Continue Reading »

Environmentalism is mutating from a movement organized around conserving resources, maintaining proper standards of environmental cleanliness, and protecting endangered species, as it promotes human prosperity, into a quasi-earth religion that seeks to “save the planet”—from us. . . . . Continue Reading »

One of the myths about the assisted suicide movement is that it “only” wants “terminally ill people for whom nothing else can be done to alleviate suffering” to have a “right to die with dignity.” That is a false premise, but beside that point, it is a blatant . . . . Continue Reading »

Few doctors take the Hippocratic Oath anymore. But many still believe in its maxims, including not to perform abortions, assist in suicides, or otherwise harm patients or other human life.Conscience clauses are controversial. President Obama said at Notre Dame that he believes in them—but his . . . . Continue Reading »

President Obama said at Notre Dame that he supports conscience clauses for doctors who don’t want to perform abortions, but he is seeking to revoke the existing Bush conscience clause. How can we protect doctors who believe in the Hippocratic Oath from being driven out of medicine when they . . . . Continue Reading »

An unsurprising report finds that terminally ill people often procrastinate in entering hospice, and as a result, don’t receive the full benefit of this beneficent form of care. From the story:Americans tend to procrastinate when it comes to matters involving death and dying, but a Harvard . . . . Continue Reading »

Hollywood loves assisted suicide, with pro PAS themes often featured in some of the most popular television shows and in movies. Now, Al Pacino is going to star as Jack Kevorkian in a HBO movie based on a fawning book by a Kevorkian acolyte. Check out my blog Secondhand Smoke for more details of . . . . Continue Reading »

The culture of death is being pushed from many quarters, perhaps most harmfully by the purveyors of popular culture.Jack Kevorkian assisted the suicides of at least 130 people—most of whom were not terminally ill and five of whom were not sick according to autopsies—and murdered one. He . . . . Continue Reading »

There is nothing these days that can ever be safely considered to be permanently beyond the pale, unthinkable, flat-out undoable—and that apparently includes cutting off healthy limbs of patients with BIID. When I first heard of body integrity identity disorder—BIID—in which . . . . Continue Reading »