Greys Anatomy, abortion and assisted dying.

Grey’s Anatomy

I’m doing this. It has 21 seasons, 25 episodes and I’m up to season 8. It’s ok. Binge-watching saves me from feeling alone and is a good get out when I’m supposed to be doing unpleasant tasks that I’d rather not do. Like writing.

(I’ve just spent months doing interviews with activists from my time in the political samba band Rhythms of Resistance. I’ve been writing a 2000 word piece for The National for the 20th anniversary of the anti-G8 camp at Stirling against the G8 summit at Gleneagles, abruptly brought to an end by the 7/7 bombings in London. While doing these interviews I realised this isn’t just an article, it’s a book. Maybe entitled Anarchy in the UK in the early 21st century. Why is writing so hard? Why is it such agony? Anyway I’d like a book deal for this but I’m not sure I even have an agent anymore because he may have retired and I think he’s probably given up on me as I don’t have such a high profile anymore. )

Back to Grey’s Anatomy. This was one of the highest rated shows in the US for a long time. It’s set in the early 21st century, which sounds recent but things move so fast today that the technology gives them away: what you notice in the early episodes is that nobody has a mobile phone and then when they do, they aren’t smart phones.

The show suffers from the overwhelming American propensity for sentiment even when the writers think they are being tough. (Maybe the sentimentality is a cover-up? America, so obsessed with winners and winning, that there is no universal free healthcare in the richest country on the planet). Cristina the type A surgeon, played by the fabulous Sandra Oh, is married to an ex-vet, now Chief of Surgery, and she gets pregnant. She has an abortion. I’m up to the bit when they are on the verge of splitting up. I think the show assumes we will sympathise with her. Abortion is a trigger issue for Americans. There is no nuance. But if you are married and healthy and solvent and have an abortion of course you are going to split up. It’s a death knell. There is no future for the relationship.

I’ve had two abortions both with the father of my one child. The first we were going through a bad patch and I freaked out. The second we had split up and I would have been a single mother to two kids.

I regret both. Worst things I have ever done. Women aren’t supposed to say this, in case by admitting this, we are allowing a crack in the law allowing abortion to become illegal again. I still support the legal right to abortion but abortion is sad. It is killing. Men go to war and women have abortions. That’s how I see it. Death and killing is a part of life: you don’t want to have to do it but sometimes you have to.

The assisted dying bill going through parliament has pushed buttons for me. It brought up the buried memory that with the first abortion I was coerced. On the morning of the scheduled abortion, I changed my mind. I told the father that I wasn’t sure and didn’t want to do it. He got angry and made me go. Emotional coercion. As soon as I had it, as soon as I woke up, I was devastatingly sad and grieving, determined to get pregnant again as soon as possible.

The two most important parliamentary bills of the last century are the abortion bill and the assisted dying bill. Both were brought by private members, the first by David Steele, the leader of the Liberals, in 1967.

The assisted dying bill has been brought by Kim Leadbeater, a Labour MP. This was not part of the Labour manifesto but it’s clear that Leadbeater (who became an MP only because her sister was killed, I mean she wasn’t even a member of the Labour Party when she was parachuted in) has been pushed to bring this bill by Keir Starmer. I guess she thinks she’s going down in the history books. She is, but not in the way she thinks. Like many thick people, she’s very ambitious.

Why is it a private members bill? Because it doesn’t have to jump through the normal legislative hoops. It’s the easy option, especially when you have an overwhelming majority in parliament. (Example the ban against fox hunting had something like 66 hours of debate, while assisted dying has had a mere 5 hours ffs).

Most people I speak to are in favour of assisted dying. I think this is because they don’t actually know what this bill is proposing. They think they are being kind – saving people in pain from a long awful death.

This is not the case.

The people that most need this bill are not eligible for it. If you cannot self-administer the drugs, say because you are paralysed or have motor neurone disease or physically incapacitated, you are not eligible.

In every country where they have assisted dying, they start off with strict criteria but gradually as it is normalised they widen the criteria. In Canada you can have assisted dying if you are too poor to pay your bills. You can be killed by the state if you have anorexia or serious mental health issues.

Also the stipulation in this UK bill is that you must have six months to live. There is no way to determine whether someone has six months to live. In the case of a good friend of mine - her father is 95 and 18 months ago it was said he had terminal cancer and had literally days to live. He’s still going. He was in a hospice and is now in a home. He’s enjoying it. He’s enjoying life. My friend told me that her father had learnt things about himself, at the age of 95, that he’d changed.

One of the issues of this bill is that it does not protect against coercion. Women are particularly vulnerable in domestic violence situations and could be coerced into agreeing to terminate their life.

All older or disabled people could be coerced by others to end their lives. Not all families are good and kind. Especially if there is money to be inherited.

I don’t believe the NHS is able to carry out assisted dying, they can barely deal with a broken wrist as I discovered earlier this year. I do not believe that private companies should be able to carry it out. This is a slippery road.

Assisted dying will become like abortion - a matter of mere paperwork and bureaucracy. It will be normalised. Once you open that door you cannot close it.

I’m completely against this bill as it stands.

Blackcurrants and cherries from my garden

My supper club on June 21st

My fragrance themed supper club will take place at my house on the 21st June. Tickets cost £45 Book here at this link. You can bring your own drink, but there will be a free cocktail included at the beginning. I hope to see you.