Posted on Friday 18th March 2022 at 1:00am
The Anglican archbishop of Sydney has revealed profound ignorance by revealing he hasn't a CLUE what his own flock think about voluntary assisted dying law reform.
I've written previously about bishops demonstrating their ignorance, as in the example of Catholic Bishop Tim Harris who presumed most or all of his flock opposes voluntary assisted dying (VAD), when in fact a significant majority support it. This time it's the Anglican Sydney diocese archbishop who's loudly flaunting his biases.
Sydney Anglican archbishop Kanishka Raffel (pictured on the diocese website above), has launched a program calling on NSW parliamentarians to reject a bill that, with a large number of safeguards, seeks to make VAD lawful in the state. NSW is the last state in the nation that still outlaws the practice.
Keywords:
Fearmonger |
Fudge |
Fiction |
Faith |
Australia |
New South Wales |
Frank Brennan |
Margaret Somerville |
Religion |
Christian |
Anglican/Church of England/Episcopal |
Legislative reform |
Lobbying: Opponents |
Rhetoric: Slippery slope |
Rhetoric: Suicide |
Rhetoric: The 'vulnerable'
Read more...
Posted on Monday 13th September 2021 at 8:07pm
The Canberra Times demonstrates why the mainstream media can sometimes be the problem in public-square debates publishing misinformation and failing to publish corrections.
Last month, the Catholic Archbishop of Canberra & Goulburn, Christopher Prowse, published an opinion piece about VAD in the Canberra Times. Naturally, Prowse's views were opposed, which is fine. A range of views is always welcome. Misinformation, however, is not.
It would be unreasonable to expect that the opinion editor of the Canberra Times, Andrew Thorpe, would be intimately versed in the empirical evidence about voluntary assisted dying (VAD). So, it was reasonable that he publish an opinion piece on the topic offered by Archbishop Prowse. What is not reasonable, however, is that the counter-opinion I promptly submitted, pointing out several points of significant misinformation, was not published. A month later, still nothing.
Keywords:
Fearmonger |
Flapdoodle |
Filibuster |
Flip-flop |
Fudge |
Fiction |
Faith |
Assisted dying (AD) |
Euthanasia |
Australian Capital Territory |
New South Wales |
Religion |
Rhetoric: Palliative care can always help |
Rhetoric: Slippery slope |
Rhetoric: Suicide |
Rhetoric: The 'vulnerable'
Read more...
Posted on Friday 21st June 2019 at 10:00pm
The Catholic Archdiocese of Sydney has released a grotesque and appalling video that blatantly misrepresents Belgium's non-voluntary euthanasia practices as being 'caused' by their voluntary assisted dying law. They're not.
The Catholic Archdiocese of Sydney has released a video which blatantly misrepresents scholarly research about non-voluntary euthanasia practices in Belgium. The lead author of the peer-reviewed research has slammed the video as "cherry-picked", "scaremongering" and "appalling". His full statement about the video appears below.
Watch the 1 minute video here.
Keywords:
Fearmonger |
Fudge |
Faith |
Assisted dying (AD) |
Non-voluntary euthanasia (NVE) |
Australia |
Belgium |
Catholic |
Claim response |
Rhetoric: Slippery slope
Read more...
Posted on Tuesday 2nd April 2019 at 7:23pm
Anti-assisted-dying ginger group 'HOPE' continues to pedal egregious misinformation to politicians considering law reform: this time to Western Australian MPs.
The Catholic-backed anti-assisted-dying ginger group, HOPE, was represented for years by Paul Russell. He's retired and Branka van der Linden is now at the helm. But its penchant for pedaling egregious misinformation hasn't changed. Van der Linden recently sent an email to all WA members of parliament, containing three points.
Van der Linden's email reads:
Dear [MP salutation],
Did you know that the WA majority report that recommended assisted suicide for WA either dismissed or failed to report on the following statistics?
Keywords:
Fearmonger |
Flapdoodle |
Fudge |
Fiction |
Faith |
Belgium |
Netherlands |
Oregon |
Branka van der Linden |
Claim response |
Legislative reform |
Statistics |
Rhetoric: Slippery slope |
Rhetoric: The 'vulnerable'
Read more...
Posted on Tuesday 19th September 2017 at 10:30pm
Three AMA-Victoria past Presidents fronted the Victorian Parliament and spread misinformation about assisted dying law reform.
As reported in The Age, on Tuesday this week three AMA doctors fronted the Victorian Parliament to spread the word about their perceived horrors of an assisted dying law. Their arguments don’t hold water and politicians should see them for what they are: utter nonsense.
Doctors Stephen Parnis, Mukesh Haikerwal and Mark Yates say they will continue to lobby politicians.
With what?
Here is the ‘substance’ of their arguments — a sticky blomonge of the same old confected and discredited claims.
The vulnerable will be at risk
Dr Parnis said that such a law “puts the most frail and vulnerable in our community — the dying — at profound risk,” pointing to coercion, and patients not getting the medical care they need.
Keywords:
Fearmonger |
Flapdoodle |
Flip-flop |
Fudge |
Fiction |
Assisted dying (AD) |
Australia |
Victoria |
Australian Medical Association (AMA) |
Rhetoric: Slippery slope |
Rhetoric: The 'vulnerable'
Read more...
Posted on Thursday 14th September 2017 at 10:20pm
I expose the misinformation and incoherent arguments of the Catholic church recently published in Fairfax media.
It’s very disappointing that Catholic theologian Dr Joel Hodge’s recent editorial in Fairfax media about assisted dying law reform contained misinformation: the same old tired and discredited story trotted out as though it's true. Dr Hodge also repeated an old and curiously one-sided (Catholic) examination of the hypothetical slippery slope.
Unhappily, the kind of misinformation that Dr Hodge advances muddies the waters and cruelly stands in the way of legislative action, which most Australians want.
Keywords:
Fearmonger |
Fudge |
Fiction |
Faith |
Assisted dying (AD) |
Australia |
New South Wales |
Victoria |
Catholic |
Legislative reform |
Lobbying: Opponents |
Rhetoric: Slippery slope |
Rhetoric: The 'vulnerable'
Read more...
Posted on Sunday 6th August 2017 at 2:31am
Religious leaders have the right to argue for their faith. But they deserve scrutiny when they put forward misleading arguments.
In Monday’s Herald Sun, Victorian Archbishops Philip Freier and Denis Hart, and Bishops Ezekiel, Suriel, Lester Briebbenow, Bosco Puthur and Peter Stasiuk published a half-page advertisement admonishing the Victorian government for its initiative to legalise assisted dying for the terminally ill, an ad similar to the one published by religious figures in 2008.
I have no quarrel with individuals of faith regarding their own private beliefs. However, the bishops’ attempt at public “leadership” through the advertisement is deserving of redress for its multiple fallacies.
The ‘abandonment’ fallacy
Keywords:
Fearmonger |
Fudge |
Faith |
Assisted dying (AD) |
Australia |
Victoria |
Religion |
Catholic |
Legislative reform |
Lobbying: Opponents |
Rhetoric: Palliative care can always help |
Rhetoric: Slippery slope |
Rhetoric: Suicide |
Rhetoric: The 'vulnerable'
Read more...
Posted on Wednesday 21st June 2017 at 3:14am
More empirical evidence from the Netherlands contradicts Professor Margaret Somerville’s ‘suicide contagion from assisted dying’ theory.
I’ve previously published an extensive analysis of how Professor Margaret Somerville, of the Catholic Notre Dame University of Australia, cherry-picked her way through select data that seemed to be (but wasn’t) consistent with her ‘contagion’ theory from assisted dying to the general suicide rate. I provided ample evidence from lawful jurisdictions that comprehensively contradicts her claim. I also published the summary in ABC Religion & Ethics.
Yet Somerville still says despite extensive real-world experience to the contrary, that “I believe that my [suicide contagion] statement will prove to be correct.”
Keywords:
Fearmonger |
Fudge |
Faith |
Assisted dying (AD) |
Netherlands |
Margaret Somerville |
Catholic |
Rhetoric: Slippery slope |
Rhetoric: Suicide
Read more...
Posted on Tuesday 20th June 2017 at 9:23pm
New university research from Germany continues to evidentially clobber Margaret Somerville’s claim about fearful Dutch elderly going to Germany for aged and health care.
I’ve criticised Catholic ethicist Professor Margaret Somerville in the past for promoting misinformation about assisted dying. One of her favourite stories is about supposed non-voluntary euthanasia (NVE) ‘contagion’ from voluntary euthanasia laws.
NVE is where a doctor deliberately hastens the death of a patient without a current explicit request from the patient.
Somerville claims that elderly Dutch citizens fear NVE — a slippery slope claim previously promoted by the Vatican. She stated that:
Keywords:
Fiction |
Assisted dying (AD) |
Germany |
Margaret Somerville |
Catholic |
Rhetoric: Slippery slope |
Rhetoric: The 'vulnerable'
Read more...
Posted on Wednesday 19th April 2017 at 1:39am
Xavier Symons defends fellow Catholic, Margaret Somerville, against a 'bullshit' call on national TV, and spreads a bit of his own in the process.
Last week, Mr Xavier Symons published a defence of Professor Margaret Somerville, whose arguments against assisted dying were called ‘bullshit’ by Patricia Flowers on the ABC’s Q&A program. Symons and Somerville are colleagues at the Institute for Ethics and Society at the Catholic Notre Dame University of Australia.
Mr Symons made an important point: that a law about restricted self-choice for assisted dying is in no way comparable to the Nazi Germany euthanasia (or more correctly, eugenics) programme. While Prof. Somerville agrees that such comparisons are invalid, she nevertheless often mentions Nazi Germany as a ‘question’ when debating assisted dying. That’s a bit of a fudge.
Keywords:
Fudge |
Fiction |
Australia |
Margaret Somerville |
Catholic |
Claim response |
Rhetoric: Slippery slope
Read more...
Posted on Sunday 5th March 2017 at 10:24pm
Catholic Canadian anti-euthanasia blogger Alex Schadenberg is at it again, this time spreading shrill misinformation about a potential Oregon law change.
Catholic Canadian anti-assisted-dying blogger Alex Schadenberg is at it again. This time he’s parading his ignorance and spreading bull about a potential change in Oregon’s assisted dying legislation.
The Bill
Mr Schadenberg correctly reproduced Section 3 of Oregon Senate Bill 893, which states:
Keywords:
Fearmonger |
Fudge |
Fiction |
USA |
Oregon |
Paul Russell |
Alex Schadenberg |
Catholic |
Legislative reform |
Rhetoric: Slippery slope |
Rhetoric: The 'vulnerable'
Read more...
Posted on Friday 2nd December 2016 at 5:34pm
The AMA executive has just concluded an ‘update’ of its policy on assisted dying, confirming its dinosaur status: Its stance against assisted dying hasn’t changed and it utterly fails to represent the diversity of views amongst Australian doctors.
The Australian Medical Association (AMA) executive (policy group) recently concluded a major review of its official policy on assisted dying. The last major review was in 2007. Through a deeply flawed process the AMA executive continues to expressly disrespect the diversity of views amongst Australian doctors — a diversity confirmed by its own review — and hasn’t altered its opposition to assisted dying in any meaningful way.
Unrepresentative of Australian doctors
Keywords:
Australia |
Australian Medical Association (AMA) |
Rhetoric: Hippocratic oath |
Rhetoric: Slippery slope |
Rhetoric: The 'vulnerable'
Read more...
Posted on Saturday 24th September 2016 at 11:31pm
Father John George amply demonstrates that Catholic hubris is alive and well in the modern world, using selective and canonical arguments and resorting to the ad hominem attack.
Against current moves to legalise assisted dying, Australian Catholic Father John George invokes Nazi Germany, resorts to ad hominem attacks to dismiss those who disagree with him, and demands that the Pope’s edicts are binding on everyone regardless of their own faith or world view.
On 24th September 2016, Journalists Greg Brown and Rick Morton published an article in The Australian, Victorian coroner credited with turning tide on euthanasia, summarising recent Australian moves to legalise assisted dy
Keywords:
Fearmonger |
Fiction |
Faith |
Physician-assisted dying (PAD) |
Australia |
Victoria |
Oregon |
Catholic Church |
Religion |
Hindu |
Jewish |
Muslim/Islam |
Atheist |
Agnostic |
Christian |
Catholic |
Buddhist |
Rhetoric: Nazi regime |
Rhetoric: Palliative care can always help |
Rhetoric: Slippery slope |
Rhetoric: The 'vulnerable'
Read more...
Posted on Tuesday 14th June 2016 at 10:22pm
Inga Peulich's minority report to the Victorian Parliament LSI Committee's end-of-life choices report reveals an incoherent and entenched hostility toward assisted dying. I challenge Mrs Peulich to furnish verifiable evidence to support her claims.
Mrs Inga Peulich is MLC for the Victorian state region of South-Eastern Metropolitan and is Shadow Minister for Multicultural Affairs and for Scrutiny of Government. She is a member of the Parliament's Legal and Social Issues Committee, which recently recommended assisted dying law reform.
Mrs Inga Peulich is MLC for the Victorian state region of South-Eastern Metropolitan and is Shadow Minister for Multicultural Affairs and for Scrutiny of Government. She is a member of the Parliament's Legal and Social Issues Committee, which recently recommended assisted dying law reform.
Keywords:
Australia |
Victoria |
Rhetoric |
Rhetoric: Slippery slope
Read more...
Posted on Sunday 8th May 2016 at 9:48pm
Conservative religious blog LifeSiteNews didn't take long to publish outright lies about Dutch euthanasia after the official 2015 report was released.
Well it didn't take long. Recently I posted a fact-based report card on Dutch euthanasia practice, based on the actual data from the 2015 annual report (and all the earlier reports) of the Dutch Euthanasia Commission. Now, just a few days later, conservative religious opponents have begun publishing completely untrue statements about Dutch euthanasia practice.
Catholic blog LifeSiteNews' 'Paris correspondent' Jeanne Smits has bolted out of the misinformation blocks, assertively and categorically stating in respect of the small increase in number of euthanasia cases from 2014 to 2015, that:
Keywords:
Fearmonger |
Fiction |
Euthanasia |
Netherlands |
Catholic |
Rhetoric: Killing |
Rhetoric: Slippery slope |
Rhetoric: The 'vulnerable'
Read more...
Posted on Wednesday 27th April 2016 at 11:36pm
Wesley Smith is consistsent if nothing else. He's opined about assisted dying once again, this time that the USA's national suicide rate is a consequence of assisted suicide law in those few USA jurisdictions that permit it.
Wesley Smith never seems to tire of spreading opinion. In another piece of published nonsense, he's proposed that USA's rise in national suicide rate is in significant part a consequence of assisted dying law in those few states that permit it (up until the most recent general suicide data that's Oregon, Washington state, Vermont and Montana). His claim flies in the face of actual evidence.
Wesley Smith is a Senior Fellow at the Discovery Institute. Remember that? It's the organisation that a USA Federal court ruled pursues "demonstrably religious, cultural, and legal missions," and which comprehensively lost a test case in which it tried to have 'intelligent design' (that's creationism with lipstick) taught as a 'scientific' alternative to evolution.
Keywords:
Fearmonger |
Flapdoodle |
USA |
Wesley Smith |
Rhetoric: Slippery slope |
Rhetoric: Suicide 'contagion'
Read more...
Posted on Tuesday 19th April 2016 at 2:00am
Lyle Shelton tweets misinformation on ABC Q&A. Is this an omen for his upcoming appearance on the program next week?
The Managing Director of the Australian Christian Lobby, Mr Lyle Shelton, is at it again.
Yesterday, he tweeted ABC's Q&A program as thousands of people do while it is on air. His tweet was broadcast live to air as shown above. What did he say as panelists were discussing assisted dying law reform?
"Sadly voluntary euthanasia quickly became involuntary euthanasia in Holland. #qanda" LyleShelton
Mr Shelton's claim is bunkum.
Keywords:
Fearmonger |
Fiction |
Faith |
Assisted dying (AD) |
Involuntary euthanasia (IVE) |
Non-voluntary euthanasia (NVE) |
Voluntary euthanasia (VE) |
Australia |
Netherlands |
Religion |
Christian |
Lobbying: Opponents |
Rhetoric: Killing |
Rhetoric: Slippery slope
Read more...
Posted on Saturday 2nd January 2016 at 12:35am
The Journal of Assisted Dying is launched today, commencing with a fully researched article on how several Oregonian doctors use mistaken information to paint a bleak and incorrect picture of Oregon's Death With Dignity Act.
A new scholarly journal focused on end-of-life ethics, decision-making and practice has just been launched: the Journal of Assisted Dying. In the first article, claims by Oregon lobby group Physicians for Compassionate Care (PCC), including Doctors Bill (William) Toffler and Ken Stevens (and others) are assessed against empirical evidence and found to be completely wrong, or highly misleading as a result of selective use of data.
The new scholarly journal, the Journal of Assisted Dying, is dedicated to careful and holistic analysis of evidence in regard to the various forms of assisted dying that are lawful in a number of jurisdictions around the world... and to practices in jurisdictions where assisted dying remains illegal.
Keywords:
Fearmonger |
Filibuster |
Fudge |
Fiction |
Physician-assisted dying (PAD) |
Assisted dying (AD) |
Oregon |
Ken Stevens |
William (Bill) Sylvester |
Rhetoric: Slippery slope |
Rhetoric: Suicide 'contagion'
Read more...
Posted on Wednesday 25th November 2015 at 8:00pm
The Catholic Archdiocese of Melbourne appeared before the Victorian Parliamentary inquiry into end-of-life decision making last week. A key 'fact' they told the Committee was absolutely false.
On Wednesday 19th November 2015, the Catholic Church appeared before the Victorian Parliament's Legal and Social Issues Committee. Monsignor Anthony Ireland, the Episcopal Vicar for Health, Aged and Disability Care, and Father Anthony Kerin, Episcopal Vicar for Life, Marriage and Family gave evidence about end-of-life decision making. They made a factually wrong allegation about Oregon during their testimony.
Anthony Ireland spoke first, making it clear that they were appearing before the Committee with delegated authority from the Catholic Archbishop of Melbourne (Denis Hart) and with the endorsement of the Victorian Catholic Bishops. He emphasised that "the Catholic Archdiocese of Melbourne does not come to this Committee with fanciful or frivolous arguments."
Keywords:
Fiction |
Physician-assisted dying (PAD) |
Australia |
Victoria |
Oregon |
Catholic Church |
Catholic |
Rhetoric: Slippery slope |
Rhetoric: Suicide 'contagion'
Read more...
Posted on Sunday 15th November 2015 at 2:38am
Catholic scholar Bernadette Tobin rails against assisted dying arguments advanced in the ABC's Q&A program this week. I explain why her arguments fail.
In a recent opinion piece in the ABC’s Religion and Ethics section, Bernadette Tobin1 rails against assisted dying, commencing with the criticism that the ABC’s Q&A discussion on the subject this week “lacked precision.” But Tobin’s opinion piece itself commits exactly this offence, as I explain.
For the sake of brevity I’ll only quickly mention that Tobin’s piece also fails on the score of accuracy. For example, she wrongly asserts that “euthanasia” means a doctor administering lethal medication to a patient. It doesn’t. “Euthanasia” simply means “good death”: nothing more and nothing less, regardless of how it occurs. Tobin also asserts that voluntary euthanasia in lawful jurisdictions has caused non-voluntary euthanasia to develop.
Keywords:
Physician-assisted dying (PAD) |
Voluntary euthanasia (VE) |
Australia |
Bernadette Tobin |
Catholic |
Analysis |
Lobbying: Opponents |
Rhetoric: Killing |
Rhetoric: Slippery slope
Read more...