A REMINDER OF HOW HUMAN, AND HOW VALUABLE, WE ALL ARE
From a recent column in the Washington Post, from a noted political columnist, that I think in this case need not make any of us take political sides.  Rather, it reminds us of something all of us with Moebius appreciate--the value of all human life, no matter how not "normal" or "worthwhile" some might see that life.  Here are some of the best excerpts from the column:
"When Jonathan Frederick Will was born 40 years ago — on May 4, 1972,
his father’s 31st birthday — the life expectancy for people with Down
syndrome was about 20 years. That is understandable.

The day after Jon was born, a doctor told Jon’s parents that the first
question for them was whether they intended to take Jon home from the
hospital. Nonplussed, they said they thought that is what parents do
with newborns. Not doing so was, however, still considered an
acceptable choice for parents who might prefer to institutionalize or
put up for adoption children thought to have necessarily bleak
futures. Whether warehoused or just allowed to languish from lack of
stimulation and attention, people with Down syndrome, not given early
and continuing interventions, were generally thought to be incapable
of living well, and hence usually did not live as long as they could
have.

Down syndrome is a congenital condition resulting from a chromosomal
defect — an extra 21st chromosome. It causes varying degrees of mental
retardation and some physical abnormalities, including small stature,
a single crease across the center of the palms, flatness of the back
of the head, a configuration of the tongue that impedes articulation,
and a slight upward slant of the eyes. In 1972, people with Down
syndrome were still commonly called Mongoloids.

Now they are called American citizens, about 400,000 of them, and
their life expectancy is 60. Much has improved. There has, however,
been moral regression as well....So today science enables what the ethos ratifies, the
choice of killing children with Down syndrome before birth. That is
what happens to 90 percent of those whose parents receive a Down
syndrome diagnosis through prenatal testing.

Which is unfortunate, and not just for them. Judging by Jon, the world
would be improved by more people with Down syndrome, who are quite
nice, as humans go. It is said we are all born brave, trusting and
greedy, and remain greedy. People with Down syndrome must remain brave
in order to navigate society’s complexities. They have no choice but
to be trusting because, with limited understanding, and limited
abilities to communicate misunderstanding, they, like Blanche DuBois
in “A Streetcar Named Desire,” always depend on the kindness of
strangers. Judging by Jon’s experience, they almost always receive it.

Two things that have enhanced Jon’s life are the Washington subway
system, which opened in 1976, and the Washington Nationals baseball
team, which arrived in 2005. He navigates the subway expertly, riding
it to the Nationals ballpark, where he enters the clubhouse a few
hours before game time and does a chore or two. The players, who have
climbed to the pinnacle of a steep athletic pyramid, know that
although hard work got them there, they have extraordinary aptitudes
because they are winners of life’s lottery. Major leaguers, all of
whom understand what it is to be gifted, have been uniformly and
extraordinarily welcoming to Jon, who is not.

Except he is, in a way. He has the gift of serenity, in this sense:
The eldest of four siblings, he has seen two brothers and a sister
surpass him in size, and acquire cars and college educations. He,
however, with an underdeveloped entitlement mentality, has been
equable about life’s sometimes careless allocation of equity. Perhaps
this is partly because, given the nature of Down syndrome, neither he
nor his parents have any tormenting sense of what might have been.
Down syndrome did not alter the trajectory of his life; Jon was Jon
from conception on.

This year Jon will spend his birthday where every year he spends 81
spring, summer and autumn days and evenings, at Nationals Park, in his
seat behind the home team’s dugout. The Phillies will be in town, and
Jon will be wishing them ruination, just another man, beer in hand,
among equals in the republic of baseball."


“Light yourself on fire with passion and people will come from miles to watch you burn.”---John Wesley (1703-1791