(10/20/23, Boston, MA) Nationally renowned disability activist Anita Cameron testified at a hearing this morning before the Joint Committee on Public Health of the Massachusetts legislature in opposition to a proposed bill to legalize assisted suicide. Witnesses were given only two minutes each. This is her testimony:
Testimony against H. 2246/S. 1331 End of Life Options Act
I’m Anita Cameron, Director of Minority Outreach for Not Dead Yet, a national disability rights organization opposed to medical discrimination, healthcare rationing, euthanasia and assisted suicide.
I am here in opposition to H. 2246/S. 1331, the End of Life Options Act
I live with intractable pain. I have multiple disabilities. Two are degenerative. One will take my life. One of my conditions, though chronic, can become terminal if I lose access to treatment.
These laws are dangerous because though they are supposed to be for people with six months or less to live, doctors are often wrong about a terminal diagnosis. My mother, while living in Washington state, was determined to terminal and was placed in hospice. She didn’t die, but lived almost 12 years!
This law will put sick people, seniors and disabled people, especially, at risk due to the view of doctors that we have a lower quality of life, therefore leading them to devalue our lives. Now add race and racial disparities in healthcare to this. Blacks, in particular, receive inferior health care compared to whites in the areas of cardiac care, diabetes, cancer and pain management.
What’s especially dangerous is that in states where it’s legal, if you lose access to healthcare, turning your chronic condition into a terminal one, you can request assisted suicide. It’ll be cheaper to kill you than to care for you.
As long as disability discrimination and racial disparities in healthcare exist, assisted suicide laws have no place in Massachusetts.
Lonnie VanHook is also one of the plaintiffs in this case which was brought under the Americans with Disabilities Act to overturn this law as a deadly form of discrimination. Everyone who dies by assisted suicide is disabled, even if they don’t think of their impairments that way. Moreover, data shows that disability issues are their reasons for requesting assisted suicide. Making assisted suicide part of the healthcare system is a danger to us all.
Please watch Lonnie tell his story and consider signing the petition supporting his case.
A letter to the editor from Diane Coleman was published in the New York Times recently. Published September 25th, it was sandwiched between two letters in favor of legalizing assisted suicide. All three lettersreacted to A Lawsuit Aims to Expand Aid in Dying by Paula Span which first appeared in the NYTimes and later in “The New Old Age” column, Science Times, Sept. 19. Here is Coleman’s letter:
To the Editor:
This article assumes that physician-assisted suicide is acceptable health policy. However, there are two significant questions that states should address when considering its legalization: Should it be a medical treatment, and what are the harms of legalizing it?
On the first, many in the medical profession oppose physician-assisted suicide, including the American Medical Association, which holds that it “is fundamentally incompatible with the physician’s role as healer, would be difficult or impossible to control, and would pose serious societal risks.”
On the second question, major disability rights organizations oppose physician-assisted suicide because it increases the risks that people with disabilities face in receiving medical care, as they are already too often subject to unequal treatment.
Adding physician-assisted suicide as a medical treatment exposes people with disabilities to systemic pressures to end their lives in the context of life-threatening illnesses. Before adopting physician-assisted suicide, or any extension of it, we need to ask, answer and understand the implications of such a step.
Diane Coleman Rochester, N.Y. The writer is president and C.E.O. of Not Dead Yet, a disability rights group that opposes legalization of assisted suicide.
It’s very rare to see even lengthy articles about assisted suicide include more than relatively brief acknowledgement of opposing voices from the disability community and rarer still from other progressives. Therefore, we were impressed to see the Yale University student newspaper, The New Journal, publish an extensive pro/con article by Anouk Yeh featuring substantial discussion with Connecticut leaders Joan Cavanagh and Cathy Ludlum representing Progressives Against Medical Assisted Suicide and Second Thoughts CT, respectively. Short excerpts from The Debate for Dignity‘s segments opposing assisted suicide laws are below and the whole article can be read HERE.
Progressive Opposition
When I meet Joan Cavanagh, she makes two things very clear. First, her concerns about aid in dying aren’t religious. Second, while she has always been opposed to aid in dying, or assisted suicide, as opponents of the procedure call it, she only started “militantly fighting” against its legalization after her mother’s passing.
Long silver hair and a pair of black, rectangular glasses frame Joan’s face. The first time we meet, I’m intimidated by her incisive, no-frills demeanor—she’s terrifyingly articulate and emails without exclamation points. Throughout our meeting, though, I find myself warming up to her vulnerability and occasional jokes.
Joan is one of the founding members of Progressives Against Medical Assisted Suicide (PAMAS), a Connecticut-based grassroots organization fighting SB 1076 and variations of the bill that have come before it. PAMAS opposes aid in dying on the basis that its legalization would inevitably lead to its weaponization against economically, socially, and racially marginalized individuals.
It, along with other organizations, has been fighting to “provide a path for leftists and progressives who have social justice concerns” about aid in dying and to disrupt the notion that the opposition is exclusively religious and conservative….
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Disability Rights Opposition
According to Cathy Ludlum, a disability rights activist, there is a long history of the medical industrial complex turning to assisted suicide to avoid accountability for bettering palliative care for terminally ill and disabled individuals. Cathy, a longtime Manchester, CT resident, founded Second Thoughts Connecticut, a disability rights organization fighting against the state legalization of aid in dying.
After a few back and forth emails, the two of us finally hop on a video call together. Cathy uses a wheelchair and joins our conversation clad in thin-rimmed glasses and a toothy grin. In the middle of exchanging introductions, Cathy turns from the Zoom camera and directs her voice towards her computer.
“Computer, wake up. Mouse click. Mouse 5…674.”
Refined by years of practice, Cathy navigates her computer exclusively using voice commands. When I ask Cathy how she started organizing against medical aid in dying, she jumps in and asks me to use the term “assisted suicide” instead.
“Medical aid in dying as a term, really, is misleading,” Cathy says. “If someone is assisting someone in their transition [to death], that would be hospice—assisting the person to be comfortable in their health, alleviating anxiety, existential concerns, and clinical concerns.”
…I look at Cathy, who’s sitting in her wheelchair, and her implicit argument becomes clear: If assisted suicide is legalized, my life and right to live become at risk.
I’m onto the next adventure! A quick video to let you know why I’m leaving my current position at NDY, what I’ve learned, and where I’m going next. Don’t be a stranger! Follow me on Instagram and Threads @djenderbender . See you around!
Transcript
Hello, and welcome back to the Not Dead Yet vlog. My name is Jules Good, I use they/them pronouns, I’m a white person with short blonde and brown hair, I have a nose piercing and I’m wearing a plaid button-down shirt. And behind me, perched on the back of my chair, is my bird, Chompers. He is a gray cockatiel with a yellow head and orange cheek circles . And for one last time, I am the assistant director and policy analyst at Not Dead Yet.
That’s right, my friends, as of October, I am stepping down from my role to pursue other opportunities. I’d like to tell you about what I learned, why I’m leaving, and where I’m going next. This role has been an incredible learning and growing experience for me. I came to Not Dead Yet with a piecemeal background in community organizing, policy advocacy and analysis, assistive tech, and accessibility consulting. Since then, I’ve had the privilege to be a part of advocacy against assisted suicide in several states and the opportunity to reframe discussions around assisted suicide to get a younger and more diverse array of people and organizations involved in this fight. I have learned so much from people who have been doing this work for longer than I’ve been alive , and I am eternally grateful for all of the knowledge, mentorship and care they have passed on to me.
So why am I leaving? Well, to start, not many people know this, but I’m only 23 . I am at the wee beginnings of my career and longing to sink my teeth into a wider variety of issues. I’d also be lying if I said a year of doing this work full time hasn’t taken a toll on my already not so great mental health. Being surrounded by murder and suicide and constantly pleading for the basic needs of vulnerable people is not for the faint of heart, even with the support of an amazing team of colleagues. When I really sat and thought about my ability to engage with this crucial work for the foreseeable future, I realized I needed more balance between focusing on this issue and the myriad other issues that impact it, like health care, racial justice, and societal ableism. That’s why I’ve decided to work with Not Dead Yet in a small part-time capacity until someone takes my current role, at which point I will continue to advocate against assisted suicide in my personal capacity.
My next adventure is as the programs associate for the Autistic Self Advocacy Network, which I could not be more excited about. I have looked up to ASAN for years and the opportunity to help grow their grassroots organizing work is super exciting. I am so thrilled to work with a team of fellow autistic people approaching this work with an intersectional lens.
Before I close out, I have several people to thank. John Kelly, thank you for your incredible work fighting against assisted suicide in Massachusetts. Your intellect, zest, and humor have taught me so much about how to effectively organize around this issue. I am so grateful for your leadership. Ellen, Pam, Brian, and Mary from Second Thoughts Massachusetts. Thank you for welcoming me with open arms to your meetings, for cheering me on, and most importantly, for constantly showing up to do this really difficult work. I look up to you all. Anita Cameron, thank you for being the most badassed organizer I know. You do this work from a place of deep love and passion, and you have touched so many people through your advocacy. You have made me a more thoughtful activist and I appreciate you deeply. Diane Coleman, oh, thank you, thank you, thank you , for your mentorship over this last year or so. When I first told people I was working for Not Dead Yet, they gushed about you, and I absolutely see why. You are so brilliant and your intellect and passion shine through in everything you do. You have taught me so much about strategy, policy analysis, and the power of community organizing. I know I will use everything you’ve taught me in my work for the rest of my career.
And lastly, to the faithful hundred or so folks who watch these videos, thank you. Your feedback and discussions about the content have given me so much to think about. Knowing that I’m not just shouting this information into the void has given me hope on darker days. Please continue to share these videos far and wide, talk to your people about disability justice, and follow Not Dead Yet on social media to stay up to date on how you can get involved with advocating around the crucial issue of assisted suicide.
I would really love to stay connected with y’all as I move onto the next big thing. You can find me on Instagram and Threads @djenderbender, and that’s spelt D-J-E-N-D-E-R-B-E-N-D-E-R. I’m also hoping to start making video content about disability issues on my own YouTube channel. if you follow my other social media, I’ll post links there. Thank you so much for watching and for all of your support over this last year. See you soon.
