If you go to this page on the BBC’s website in the next few days, or if you arrive in the next month or so if you download this file (mp3), you will hear an extraordinary interview. It is with a softly spoken Canadian farmer. He euthanased his 12 year old daughter who suffered from cerebral palsy and who was becoming progressively more tormented by escalating interventions. The interviewee says she didn’t get any sleep from the pain in her last week of life. It’s a fascinating and harrowing interview. On a minor note I was fascinated with how stupid and insensitive the interviewer was, with his bouncy middle class British accent, and excruciating manner in which he asked questions as if he were questioning the man about a visit to the shops or asking which knife you eat the next course with.
Thanks for this. You’re right about Mr Bennett Jones. He’s not aggressive, or even totally unsympathetic, just completely unable to make the sort of connection that Andrew Denton, Richard Feidler or Phillip Adams for that matter, would make.