BRUSSELS (AP) - A man who emerged from what doctors thought was a vegetative state says he was fully conscious for 23 years but could not respond because he was paralyzed, his mother said Monday. Rom Houben, 46, had a car crash in 1983 and doctors thought he had sunk into a coma. His family continued to ...(Read more...)
I think the photo the doctors took of the inside of her head says everything. I'd be damned sure I had my paperwork done so that nobody could lock me up in my body for 23 years.
The first thing I'd do with that keyboard is to tell them to pull my plug, and to shove that special keyboard up whoever's a** that chose to leave me there that long.
That's fine if that's your choice, Jay. I assume you are unfamiliar with the fact that the "husband" blocked any attempts at rehabilitation or to attempt to have her communicate with a keyboard or eye tracking cursor. The fact that you would not want to live that way does not justify giving her husband, who had a monetary interest in her death, and who was living with another woman (legal bigamy?) the right to starve her to death. The parents were willing to assume the burden of supporting and rehabilitating her. Any familiarity with the facts of the case shows that the man is a murderer whose actions were abetted by the state.
Can't agree with you here. The autopsy upheld the doctor's earlier conclusion that she was brain dead- the brain was (literally) like swiss cheese. As to the husband, regardless of whether he had a personal interest in her death, consider the length of time that had passed. It is not like he immediately shacked up with some woman the moment his wife entered the hospital. Also, while I don't recall - and am not going to go back and look up (had more than enough of that circus while it was happening) - the details, I don't believe there was much of an estate, maybe some insurance money ($100k?) involved.
I do remember finding it offensive that the state, Jeb Bush et al, tried to intercede on behalf of the parents. So I presume you are referring to the existing laws at the time, which ultimately enabled her death.
I had heard those stories too. But then I heard they weren't so after all. It's worth reading about again and the wiki article has most of that information. Her parents got several nurses to tell stories about abuse and higher functioning, but the judge noted that it was obviously a lie as the supposed timing made no sense. Also, her husband was offered more money to sign over her guardianship to her parents, lots more, but he refused. The CT scan does tell quite a tale.
E
Luke Setzer Club Coordinator, RoR Florida Coordinator
I recommend reading the entire article, but this passage should give you an idea of its content:
This is yet another obvious example of abysmal, practiced, purposeful ignorance by medical personnel - including Dr. Snyderman and her staff who prepared this piece. I cannot understand how anyone, professional medical person or layman, can continue to believe that the farce known as "Facilitated Communication" [FC] represents anything other than a fantasy that was begun back in 1977, when an Australian woman named Rosemary Crossley came up with the idea that autistic persons could express their thoughts via a keyboard when their hand was "supported" by what she called a "facilitator." In 1989, Douglas Biklen, a sociologist and professor of special education at Syracuse University, eagerly took up her cause, and as a result vast sums were donated to SU by friends and family members of autism victims - money that was simply wasted in futile "research."
I am sorry, but who asserted that the woman wasn't horribly brain damaged?
Whether she was brain dead is another thing entirely, and that can't be determined by post-death examination of the macro features.
The courts didn't act on the basis of any attempt to rehabilitate and communicate with the woman. The courst prohibited any attempt to do just that.
Each of us is free to write a living will to say under what circumstances we wish to be starved to death.
Terri Schiavo was starved to death at the say so of a man who had a monetary interest in her death, who was at the time of her death a defacto bigamist, and who refused any and all attempt to communicate with her, when any attempt to rehabilitate her could not have hurt her if in fact she was brain dead.
The argument that she had to be killed to put her out of her suffering because she was brain dead is so obviousl self-refuting that those who make it cannot themselves possibly believe it.
Houben has started writing a book on his experiences.
That is a startling sentence, fraught with philosophical import: his experiences where?
This is an illustrative anomaly, one of the clearest examples I ever heard of, of life clinging to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, even in an existential prison.
He clung to some form of sanity for 23 years, in near total isolation, and 'has started writing a book on his experiences.' I think I'll look forward to reading that book.
I'll be interested in looking for evidence of how he weighed the discomfort of skins not his own at his plight, relative to his own. Did he wish for an end, as those around him might have for him? With no physical means to realize his own end, was that moot? But, no physical means does not rule out purely mental means; the question 'can a mind terminate its own life?' -- can someone just 'give up and die'-- has no empirical evidence, because there is a strong bias in the empirical evidence. Examples like Houben who clearly deliberately survive and cling to life come back from the edge to testify, while those who deliberately give up don't. For all we know, he or any one of us might actually have the purely mental power to pull our own plug, to deliberately give up life and consciousness.
How would any of us ever run that experiment, and prove it?
Don't try.
Just the once, but then we're unable to record the data. Unless there have been volunteers who have run he experiment.
That is why I always stayed away from those $2 psych lab experiments in college.
Yet again, your tone, emotionalism, and condesention are without peer on this site. Bigamist? Who cares? Is it your business what he does in his bedroom or home? Should that be illegal? Like...sodomy????? As for the monetary interest, didn't you read he was offered more money to give her up than he would have inherited???? BLANK OUT!
Each of us is free to write a living will to say under what circumstances we wish to be starved to death.
That's interesting. This seems to be a reversal of a previous position you took that you should not be free to seek assisted suicide. As I recall you regarded the notion of a right to assisted suicide as "bizarre". I'm glad you see that it is a right after all.
I recommend reading the entire article, but this passage should give you an idea of its content:
This is yet another obvious example of abysmal, practiced, purposeful ignorance by medical personnel - including Dr. Snyderman and her staff who prepared this piece. I cannot understand how anyone, professional medical person or layman, can continue to believe that the farce known as "Facilitated Communication" [FC] represents anything other than a fantasy that was begun back in 1977, when an Australian woman named Rosemary Crossley came up with the idea that autistic persons could express their thoughts via a keyboard when their hand was "supported" by what she called a "facilitator." In 1989, Douglas Biklen, a sociologist and professor of special education at Syracuse University, eagerly took up her cause, and as a result vast sums were donated to SU by friends and family members of autism victims - money that was simply wasted in futile "research."
Luke that is very interesting. A simple test as Randi points out can affirm if Rom Houben really is communicating of his own free will, just have his "facilitator" go into a separate sound proof room, ask Rom a basic question, and then bring in the facilitator to see if Rom can answer the question. From the video Randi links at first glance it just appears the facilitator is just moving Rom's hand and typing out the words herself. Rom's eyes are even closed, how could he know what to type if he isn't even looking at the keyboard screen? Definitely looks suspicious. (Edited by John Armaos on 11/25, 12:40pm)
Whether she was brain dead is another thing entirely, and that can't be determined by post-death examination of the macro features.
Brain death is determined from neuroimaging and various tests of reflexes, motor functions, and bodily processes, according to this detailed professional explanation. For posterity, here's the wiki on brain death. The autopsy confirmed, but was not needed to determine, that Terri was brain dead.
Life imitating art! (Or is it only junk science imitating art?)
When I first heard the Rom Houben news report, it of course immediately brought to mind the Hindi film Har Dil Jo Pyar Karega (Every Heart That Will Fall In Love..., 2000, directed by Raj Kunwar.)
In this romantic comedy, our picaresque hero, Raj (Salman Khan,) pulls wealthy heiress Pooja Oberoi (the radiant Rani Mukherjee) from a car crash. At the hospital, doctors inform her family that, despite not being able to move or speak, Pooja is able to understand and remember everything said in her presence, and will eventually make a full recovery. After some weeks, the family is able to check the seemingly unconscious Pooja out of the hospital and take her home.
Meanwhile, that rascal Raj, having exploited the Oberois' gratitude for his having saved the life of their only child, has become a fixture in their palatial mansion. There he met Jahnvi (the incomparable Preity Zinta,) only daughter of Mr. Oberoi's long-time accountant. Having in infancy lost her mother, Jahnvi has been raised in the Oberoi household as Pooja's sister and best friend.
Salman Khan as Raj:
Rani Mukherjee as Pooja:
Preity Zinta as Jahnvi:
Speaking to Raj, Jahnvi's father describes Jahnvi and Pooja's life together before the accident:
For the English translation of the lyrics to "Piya Piya O Piya" ("Darling, Darling, O Darling,") you can watch them play on YouTube, over a still of Miss Zinta, here:
This is a fun film. The main things preventing it from being a classic of light entertainment are the negative elements in Raj's character (i.e. he is somewhat sympathetic as an aspiring musician, yet Raj's most often-used talents seem to be conning people and evading creditors) that render him unworthy of the love of either Pooja or Jahnvi. Also, some of its slapstick routines fall a little limp. -Bill
"Yet again, your tone, emotionalism, and condesention are without peer on this site. Bigamist? Who cares? Is it your business what he does in his bedroom or home? Should that be illegal? Like...sodomy????? As for the monetary interest, didn't you read he was offered more money to give her up than he would have inherited???? BLANK OUT!"
(This from the man who says he doesn't understand what the picture to the right implies about Terri Schaivo's supposed vegetative state. "Blank out," indeed.)
Ethan, your screaming response that I am an emotionalist is quite funny.
Schiavo's "right" to starve his "wife" to death was based on the fact that as her husband he was entitled to do so. Do you not find it ironic that he was a "husband" who was living in a common law marriage with another woman?
As for your reference to sodomy, what the hell are you talking about? I am talking about the factual determination that he had abandoned his interest in her as a wife, not whose genitals he was inserting his tongue into.
Let me see if I get this. You think that as a fudgepacker I should have no problem with a man who cheats on his wife having her starved to death because it's hypocritical for a pervert sodomite to criticize a pervert bigamist?
Well, I hate to point out that there's a huge difference between the custom of polygamy and the crime of bigamy. I might seem condescending.
Your inability to follow a simple line of thought, that a man living with another woman can hardly claim to be a husband to the wife he has abandoned, doesn't require my condescension to make it clear you are an hysterical nitwit. You do that quite well yourself.
"That's interesting. This seems to be a reversal of a previous position you took that you should not be free to seek assisted suicide. As I recall you regarded the notion of a right to assisted suicide as "bizarre". I'm glad you see that it is a right after all."
Are you serious, John, that you can't understand the difference between a person refusing medical treatment (In this case, tube feeding) and a person demanding that rather than commit suicide herself, a doctor do it for her by lethal injection?
I won't point out that letting someone die and killing her are two quite different things, because to do so would be condescending of me.
This news brings hope for others in "persistent vegetative states" like Terri Schiavo. 
