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Death Is That Man Taking Names - Intersections of American Medicine, Law, and Culture (Paperback, New edition)
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Death Is That Man Taking Names - Intersections of American Medicine, Law, and Culture (Paperback, New edition)
Series: California/Milbank Books on Health and the Public, 7
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The American culture of death changed radically in the 1970s. For
terminal illnesses, hidden decisions by physicians were rejected in
favor of rational self-control by patients asserting their 'right
to die' - initially by refusing medical treatment and more recently
by physician-assisted suicide. This new claim rested on two
seemingly irrefutable propositions: first, that death can be a
positive good for individuals whose suffering has become
intolerable; and second, that death is an inevitable and therefore
morally neutral biological event. "Death Is That Man Taking Names"
suggests, however, that a contrary attitude persists in our culture
- that death is inherently evil, not just in practical but also in
moral terms. The new ethos of rational self-control cannot refute
but can only unsuccessfully try to suppress this contrary attitude.
The inevitable failure of this suppressive effort provokes
ambivalence and clouds rational judgment in many people's minds and
paradoxically leads to inflictions of terrible suffering on
terminally ill people. Judicial reforms in the 1970s of abortion
and capital punishment were driven by similarly high valuations of
rationality and public decision-making - rejecting physician
control over abortion in favor of individual self-control by
pregnant women and subjecting unsupervised jury decisions for
capital punishment to supposed rationally guided supervision by
judges. These reforms also attempt to suppress persistently
ambivalent attitudes toward death, and are therefore prone to
inflicting unjustified suffering on pregnant women and
death-sentenced prisoners. In this profound and subtle account of
psychological and social forces underlying American cultural
attitudes toward death, Robert A. Burt maintains that
unacknowledged ambivalence is likely to undermine the beneficent
goals of post-1970s reforms and harm the very people these changes
were intended to help.
General
Imprint: |
University of California Press
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Country of origin: |
United States |
Series: |
California/Milbank Books on Health and the Public, 7 |
Release date: |
September 2004 |
First published: |
September 2004 |
Authors: |
Robert A. Burt
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Dimensions: |
229 x 152 x 16mm (L x W x T) |
Format: |
Paperback - Trade
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Pages: |
232 |
Edition: |
New edition |
ISBN-13: |
978-0-520-24324-8 |
Categories: |
Books >
Social sciences >
Sociology, social studies >
Social institutions >
Death & dying >
General
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LSN: |
0-520-24324-2 |
Barcode: |
9780520243248 |
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