Issue date: 4/6/05 Section: Opinion

Will Lloyd - The Battalion

It takes a lot to be a person these days. According to some bioethicists, just being human does not cut it.

Some of the greatest inhumanities in history have been committed against individuals who were considered non-persons by those in power.
This alone proves that the difference between being a human and being a person is not just for philosophy classes.

If the civilized world wants to avoid future atrocities such as slavery and the Holocaust, it is imperative that all humans be considered persons based on their intrinsic value, not their cognitive abilities or mental status. Failure to do so will only prove that the world has learned nothing from the brutal lessons of the past.

For more than 200 years, slavery in this country was permitted because those enslaved were considered worthy of being bought and sold. Solely by virtue of their race, they were deemed to not be full persons. Some even relied on scientific explanations to justify their beliefs.

More recently, Europe suffered the consequences of condemning certain groups to the status of non-persons. First singled out were the mentally and physically disabled. Unfortunately, it was doctors and professors who paved the way for the extermination of "valueless lives," "useless eaters" and other non-persons before any Jews were killed.

The process was gradual. In 1920, two German professors wrote "The Permission to Destroy Life Unworthy of Life." In 1933, a New York Times headline read, "Nazi Plan to Kill Incurables to End Pain; German Religious Groups Oppose Move." In 1938, the legalized murder of a handicapped baby took place at the request of his father.

The parallels in America are chilling. Today, university professors and bioethicists openly claim that some people are not persons. While this version of the personhood debate centers on the mental status or cognitive abilities of the individuals rather than race or appearance, it is no less dangerous.

Peter Singer is considered the most influential philosopher alive by the New York Times and by other philosophers. A professor of bioethics at Princeton, Singer said, "Killing a defective infant is not morally equivalent to killing a person. Sometimes it is not wrong at all."

Singer recently elaborated on his position. He said it is time to consider actively ending the lives of disabled babies, even if they "no longer might be dependent on intensive care." Literally, not let them die but make them die.

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