Canada’s Plot to Kill the Poor and Mentally Ill

By Liana Gordan

“There is only one really serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide. Deciding whether or not life is worth living is to answer the fundamental question in philosophy. All other questions follow from that” — Albert Camus

Euphemism has long been the tool of the tyrant. 

It is a rhetorical technique that aids in the rapid spread of propaganda, usually functioning as the backbone of political sophistry, although it is often disguised as empathy. The words of the progressive politician drip with honey and sweet-sounding promises of equality, progress, and technological usurpation of environmental conditions. They dress their policies up in life and rights-affirming language such as “reproductive rights” or “death with dignity.” In reality, their proposals facilitate the death of the most vulnerable.

In recent years, a manifestation of this disingenuous semantic game has been exposed in the cultural acceptance of “euthanasia,” otherwise known as medically-assisted suicide. 

Euthanasia in Canada is a relatively new development. The practice became legal in June 2016 when the government enacted legislation allowing eligible Canadians to apply for medically-assisted death. Proponents of the policy defended it through appeals to “empathy” and “mercy.” 

Euthanasia, they argued, simply affords people the right to die on their terms. Imagine a severely ill, incapacitated individual who would, in the very near future, lose virtually all ability to autonomously dictate and enjoy his life. Isn’t it more humane to quickly and painlessly put him of his misery? 

The euthanasia movement has consistently justified access to medically-assisted death in this way. It has brushed off as fear mongering warnings about what it may mean for human dignity.

What I’ve seen in Canada is a far cry from the compassionate picture painted by euthanasia’s advocates. The government targets the weak, vulnerable, and sick in a calculated effort to reduce its financial burdens, such as healthcare coverage, which have grown under Canada’s welfare state. 

The legislative framework that made euthanasia more freely accessible to qualified applicants was set in 2016, with the number of applicants increasing steadily year by year. By 2021, the total number of medically-assisted deaths in Canada was 31,664. This number was not limited only to the elderly. While people ages 18-45 make up a small portion of MAID deaths, their numbers have been steadily rising. For example, in 2017, only 34 MAID deaths were in the 18-45 year-old category. In 2021, that number rose to 139. 

The government recently expanded euthanasia too. In March 2021, Parliament passed MAID legislation with important revisions to eligibility criteria. The old version included “safeguards,” such as if someone’s death is imminent or foreseeable. 

Now, the euthanasia seeker doesn’t even have to be dying in order to be granted the right to be killed by the state. They could be suffering any chronic physical condition. One man tried to apply on the basis of chronic back pain. A 90-year-old woman decided to euthanatize herself rather than face another COVID lockdown and the extreme loneliness, isolation, and depression it caused. The disturbing picture of the future of euthanasia in Canada is exemplified by the case of Kiano Vafaeian, a 23-year-old man who was approved for euthanasia on account of his depression and diabetes. 

Starting in March 2023, access to euthanasia will be broadened to those suffering mental conditions such as depression or anxiety. In a nation where terminology like “mature minors” has been thrown around irresponsibly, teenage anxiety and depression are no longer mere psychological predicaments. They may require the treatment of euthanasia.

Given these multiplying measures, the trajectory of euthanasia seems bleak. Who’s to say what “safeguard” gets repealed next? Age of consent? Ability to consent? The slippery slope that dissidents of euthanasia are often unfairly charged of engaging in is no longer hypothetical. The Quebec College of Physicians recommended that euthanasia access be extended to “extremely ill” newborns.

The Canadian government recently released documents speaking to the economic benefit MAID will have on an overburdened health-care system. The government has never shied away from incurring extreme health-care costs, spending 300 billion dollars on it annually. Why care now? 

Rather than repudiate a fundamentally flawed health-care system that, besides its exorbitant spending, faces problems of long wait lines, labor shortages, and drug shortages, Canada’s Left would rather encourage the sick, elderly, and hopeless to kill themselves to save the system money. The hypocrisy of the progressive bureaucratic elites is revealed by their unashamed financial motivations. To them, human life is merely a sacrifice at the altar of achieving political and economic unity.

In a culture that has already accepted the toxic presupposition that meaning is a subjective psychological projection, it is only a matter of time before the depressed and anxious who feel they have nothing to live for have an unobjectionable claim on their death. Our cultural antipathy towards this clear abuse of the vulnerable fits in well with the past century of the West’s ideological heritage. A long line of influential ideologues who have built the philosophical framework of leftist policy long ago repudiated the existence of God and belief in the objectivity of human rights as mere religious superstition. In place of the cultural ethos of the West — belief in human rights, dignity, purpose and freedom — a new god is raised, one that sees human life as nothing more than a byproduct of random chemical processes, malleable to the environment it is subjected to.

In light of this present darkness, the words of Aleksander Solzhenitsyn come to mind: “The simple step of a courageous individual is not to take part in the lie. One word of truth outweighs the world.”

The first step to undoing the intricate web of falsehoods constructed by the elite is to do what most people seem utterly afraid to do: speak the truth. Only then can we break free from illusions of “equity” and “compassion” and unveil progressivism for what it is: a mechanistic entity that seeks to control, subjugate, and victimize.

Liana Gordan is a student at Tyndale University pursuing a degree in philosophy. She makes political and cultural content on Instagram and TikTok. Liana can be found on Instagram @llianagordan.