Another Point on the Lynching of Tracy Latimer

I do have to admit that a portion of the people who oppose "mercy killings" are Conservative Catholics and Conservative Evangelicals. The People who oppose "mercy killings" are people from religious organizations and disability rights groups. The people who support "mercy killings" include a section of the right-to-die movement. I went on facebook and, like I said, alot of the people who were members of the Free Robert Latimer groups were white guys with shaved head and mostly from the Prairies. Historically, people with white skins and shaved heads are members of outright fascist organizations like the Aryan Brotherhood, Neo-Nazi groups and Skinheads. Also, from what I understand, the majority of the fascists in Canada are in the Prairies. Another person, I facebook, who supported freeing Latimer was quoted saying on his page that "Religion is for the week who compromise the Bible for their beliefs" he also described himself as "very conservative".

Going back historically, the people who have advocated for "mercy killing" have been Eugenicists, largely in the United States, and the National "Socialist" Party (i.e. the Nazi Party) in Germany. Hitler called for the widespread "mercy killings" of the disabled, describing their lives as "lives not worth living". Hitler later expanded "mercy killings" to Jews, Gypsies, Blacks, Homosexuals, Communists, Social Democrats, Jehovah's Witnesses etc. "Mercy killing", historically, has been code-word for genocide against the oppressed and even outright fascist terror (see http://www.eugenicsarchive.org/eugenics/ and http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/holocaust/h-euthanasia.htm).

The fact that SOME of the people who denounce the killing of Tracy Latimer are against abortion and euthanasia should not sway you from solidarizing with the downtrodden and the oppressed (in this case the disabled, like Tracy). A vanguard party must not take stances based on who supports what or what is "more left-wing" or "more radical" but what advances the interests of the Proletariat. You state it rather eloquently yourself:

"But Marxists’ opposition..........is conditioned not by the character of others who may oppose it, but by what advances the class interests of the proletariat."

- Canada: I.S. Upholds Anti-Woman Religious Courts: Sharia "Socialists"

Spartacist Canada No. 147

Winter 2005/2006

http://www.icl-fi.org/print/english/wv/861/sharia.html

I think what is happening at this point it that the Christian Right is cynically manipulating the genuine grievences of the disabled community to promote opposition to euthanasia and abortion. I think it is crucial for the party and the workers' movement to intervene. To show that that their is a hard-line to be drawn between support for euthanasia and abortion on one end and "mercy killing" (i.e. the murder of the disabled and other oppressed peoples) on the other end. The supporters of Latimer, by masking their movement as support for "the right to die" along with the betrayal of many right-to-diers are forcing the disabled into the hands of the Christian Right. If you unable to solidarized with the disabled, they will only continue to be forced into the hands of the Christian Right. Just like how the betrayal of the Kremlin and Warsaw Stalinist forced the historically class-conscious Polish Proletariat into the hands of Solidarnosc or how the betrayal of the Stalinists, Centrists, Syndicalists and Reformist forced the peasants and Moroccan separatists into the hands of the fascistic Francisco Franco during the Spanish Civil War.

I am not aware of you supporting Robert Latimer and hopefully you aren't. You cannot however, in my opinion, stand on the fence post. You must show solidarity for the disabled! Like you would for any oppressed be who are under attack, whether by the state, by outright fascists like the Ku Klux Klan or Fascistic Yahoos like Robert Latimer:

To face reality squarely; not to seek the line of least resistance; to call things by their right names; to speak the truth to the masses, no matter how bitter it may be; not to fear obstacles; to be true in little things as in big ones; to base one’s program on the logic of the class struggle; to be bold when the hour for action arrives – these are the rules of the Fourth International. It has shown that it could swim against the stream. The approaching historical wave will raise it on its crest.

- The Transitional Program (1938)

Against Opportunism and Unprincipled Revisionism

by Leon Trotsky

http://www.marx.org/archive/trotsky/1938/tp/tp-text2.htm#wg

.....the [Communist’s] ideal should not be the trade union secretary, but the tribune of the people, who is able to react to every manifestation of tyranny and oppression, no matter where it appears, no matter what stratum or class of the people it affects; who is able to generalise all these manifestations and produce a single picture of police violence and capitalist exploitation; who is able to take advantage of every event, however small, in order to set forth before all his socialist convictions and his democratic demands, in order to clarify for all and everyone the world-historic significance of the struggle for the emancipation of the proletariat.

What is to be Done?: Burning Questions of our Movement

Chapter 3: Trade-Union Politics and Social Democratic Politics

by Vladimir Lenin

http://www.marx.org/archive/lenin/works/1901/witbd/iii.htm#v05fl61h-397-GUESS

More Tracy Latimer Articles:

http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/news/story.html?id=6f6ab496-8e7b-4913-a9ea-e98cd06b6b50

Vancouver Sun - Archive: Punishment and the Relevance of a Past

http://www.thestar.com/comment/columnists/article/309347 Smiling girl loved music: The Tracy we never knew

http://www.ccdonline.ca/publications/latimer-watch/0500b.htm Council of Canadians with Disabilities - Publications - Latimer Watch - Common Homicide: Killing of People with Cerebral Palsy

http://www.ccdonline.ca/publications/latimer-watch/1197h.htm Council of Canadians with Disabilities - Publications - Latimer Watch - Responding to Dying with Dignity

http://www.ccdonline.ca/publications/latimer-watch/1196.htm Council of Canadians with Disabilities - Publications - Latimer Watch - CCD Watching Supreme Court for Decision in Latimer Case

http://canadianpress.google.com/article/ALeqM5hRbtFwU7lv2Cr1K5FOl-c2UZdnvw Latimer puts faith in court of public opinion after killing disabled child

http://canadianpress.google.com/article/ALeqM5j87a3gtWzsT6vnOdx-o7s_1eo6DQ Legal options few for Latimer, despite his vow to continue fight

http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/story.html?id=90463bcd-cfe7-4bbe-98ce-14c153b6ea2b&k=12258 Latimer in Ottawa

http://www.thestar.com/News/Canada/article/346933 Latimer, in Ottawa, ‘asked over for supper’

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20071205/Latimer_071206 Observers divided over Latimer parole decision

http://dawn.thot.net/Tracy_Latimer.html DisAbled Women's Network (Ontario) - Tracy Latimer

More info on the killing of Tracy Latimer:

(This post is dedicated to Pat, a Chewing the Fat reader with multiple disabilities, a reader that fears that an existance lived on 'disabled death row'. I hear you Pat ... and this one's for you.)

So are they lazy?

Just incompetent?

Or do they like the idea of dead disabled kids?

You gotta ask yourself what's up with the media and it's love affair with Robert Latimer. Ever since the child murderer got a parole the news has been full of inaccurate and misleading reports about Bob's case. Let's take a couple of examples:

Radio Commenter: Robert Latimer, who has always maintained that he is not guilty of murder, that he was distressed about the pain his significantly disabled daughter experienced ...

Television Reporter: Robert Latimer, who has steadfastly maintained that he ...

Good God, does anyone do any research? Does anyone ask a question or two about the facts of the case? Has Robert managed to snow everyone? In the movies reporters are always about the 'facts of the case' about 'exposing injustice' ... well I guess that's just Hollywood cause it sure ain't the Canadian media. The main fact (for any reporters reading, a 'fact' is a 'truth' an 'actuality' ... um let's put it simpler ... a 'fact' is what's 'real' not simply what you've been told ... um ...you see ... people sometimes lie.) the main fact is ...

He lies.

That's right.

Fact:

He LIES.

On the day of her murder, Robert told his wife, Laura, that Tracy had died in her bed. That same day he called the police to report that his little girl had passed away in her sleep. OK, if you are counting that's two lies right there. Then after the initial call to the police they called him back and again he told them that Tracy has died while asleep in her bed. That's three.

The police arrive and our Bob is having a smoke on the porch while the rest of the family is grieving in Tracy's room. He tells the police officer, again (forgive me I know this is repetative), that Tracy died in her sleep while under his care. (four) A very bright police officer noticed that something was wrong with the story because it was obvious, when he looked at Tracy, that she had died earlier than Bobby was claiming.

Now he tells another lie (five) that he put her to bed and she was feeling a little bit of discomfort at that time. (Where is the outrageous, unmanageable, life of pain that she was supposed to be experiencing?) Well she couldn't have been experiencing discomfort because he had murdered her by this time.

Then Bob, Bobby, the Bobster, insists on a cremation, a request that startles his wife. But the police tell him that there has to be an autopsy. Days and days later after the evidence had mounted up against him a cop asks him if he killed her to put her out of her misery, he changes his story and says that it was 'compassion' that led him to kill his daughter. Oh my, I've lost count.

So not only did Robert Latimer not maintain from the get go that he was ending Tracy's misery, he lied, and lied, and lied again. The story changed when he had no where else to go, after a toxicology report, after a search warrent and an ensuing search of the farm, then suddenly, poof, a murderous father becomes a compassionate daddy. Three days, that's three days, after the toxicology report was conclusive that Tracy had died of carbon monoxide poisoning. Three (3) (III) days after the report and a full ten (10) (X) days after her death.

And the media buys it.

Without question.

Well, we the disabled do not. We know the lie. We live in disabled bodies and we know the lie. We hear the sentiment, "I'd rather be dead than be disabled ..." We know what it means. We know prejudice. We know discrimination. And we sure as hell know murder.

Robert Latimer was convicted of murder.

He tried fibbing to the police and they didn't buy it.

He tried confusing the court and they didn't buy it.

So he aimed at the Canadian public, played to their prejudice and got a willing audience.

So here we are, facing a Latimer that wants to campaign for the right to murder the disabled. Well, we know that he lies and we have the truth.

We can't rely on the media to do it. So we'll have to do it ourselves. Call him what he is.

Latimer ... you are nothing but a liar.

A murderous liar.

And we the disabled and our supporters, will call you on it each and every time you speak. That, little Bobby, is a promise.

A fact.

Written by well known disability activist David Hingsburger.

This article was originally on Vavid Hingsburger's Blog Chewing the Fat I was copied by Lisa Anne Gozzard on Facebooks

http://www.facebook.com/topic.php?uid=8235055798&topic=4344

There are several groups on facebook that support Robert Latimer getting out of prison. This site is for people who support the notion that everyone has the right to live including persons with disabilities.
The case against Robert Latimer is this:

Robert Latimer was charged and convicted of second-degree murder under Canada 's Criminal Code. However during Robert Latimer's confession to the police he stated two facts.

1 He made the decision to kill Tracy 12 days before the murder. By definition under the Criminal Code this would be first-degree murder because it was premeditated.

2 He lied to the police for two days after the murder. He told the officers that Tracy died in her sleep. If he was so convinced that he had a moral obligation to do this why would he lie? Why would he not come forward and state the reasons for his decision?

During the trial the prosecution introduced evidence that Mrs. Latimer kept a journal of Tracy 's life. The journal was key evidence because very little was written about Tracy 's pain. Robert Latimer and his supporters would argue that he murdered Tracy to put her out of her pain. If you were keeping a journal would you not highlight the concerns of your daughter's pain within those pages?

When Doctors provided an option for the Latimer's to attempt to alleviate Tracy 's pain by amputating her leg, the Latimer's made the decision not to proceed. I will not argue the point it was their decision as her parents. But the operation could have made her life a little easier. Mrs. Latimer stated in court that she was opposed to the operation because it would not cure Tracy . She was also quoted as stating that Tracy was dead the day she was born. Both quotations are from a website that I will forward to you if you wish.

Finally, when Robert Latimer has had the opportunity to receive parole he is unable to express any remorse or sympathy towards his victim. People blame the parole board for not freeing Robert Latimer. All that Mr. Latimer has to do is express regret for his actions.

I received a very positive letter from the federal government regarding the Robert Latimer case. It appears that the government will not interfere with the parole board's decision. However, Mr. Latimer is still appealing the parole board's decision. We will see over the next few weeks what comes of this.
by Scott Allardyce

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=8235055798