{"id":4878,"date":"2005-07-25T10:22:51","date_gmt":"2005-07-25T10:22:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/viamedia\/2005\/07\/timing-is-everything.html"},"modified":"2005-07-25T10:22:51","modified_gmt":"2005-07-25T10:22:51","slug":"timing-is-everything","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/2005\/07\/timing-is-everything.html","title":{"rendered":"Timing is Everything"},"content":{"rendered":"

Not Dead Yet is blasting PBS:<\/a><\/p>\n

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In an all-too-common feat of cultural insensitivity, PBS has chosen July 26th, the anniversary of the signing of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) to air "POV: The Self-Made Man." The documentary features the videotaped statements of Bob Stern, an elderly man deciding to commit suicide rather than face possible disability, medical uncertainly or complications. <\/p>\n

"The choice of this particular air date is an affront to people with disabilities in this country," says Diane Coleman, president of Not Dead Yet, a national disability rights group based in Forest Park, IL. "It’s the 15th anniversary of the signing of the ADA, a law that is, for people with disabilities, the nation’s largest minority, what the Civil Rights Act of 1964 is for people of color. Not only is this being ignored by PBS, but the network is featuring and promoting a program about a person so terrified of aging and disability that he commits suicide. In terms of sensitivity to diversity issues, this puts PBS in the same league as the Fox News Channel. And, no, that is not a compliment." <\/p>\n

Stephen Drake, research analyst for Not Dead Yet, notes that the film is a slanted portrayal of the broader issues. "Normally, we don’t comment when a rich, privileged guy decides to take his own life. We didn’t comment when Hunter Thompson shot himself. After all, Thompson wasn’t asking for a change in the law, a permission slip, or help from anyone." <\/p>\n

Drake says the situation is different with "The Self-Made Man." "It’s being promoted as a tool for adding to the public discourse in regard to assisted suicide, an issue confronting the U.S. Supreme Court and legislators in California. Whether society will treat some suicidal people differently than others is a public policy issue. The film, however, frames the issue as a dispute between religious conservatives and those who "believe in autonomy." <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Not Dead Yet is blasting PBS: In an all-too-common feat of cultural insensitivity, PBS has chosen July 26th, the anniversary of the signing of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) to air "POV: The Self-Made Man." The documentary features the videotaped statements of Bob Stern, an elderly man deciding to commit suicide rather than face…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":180,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4878","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\nTiming is Everything - Via Media<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/2005\/07\/timing-is-everything.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Timing is Everything - Via Media\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Not Dead Yet is blasting PBS: In an all-too-common feat of cultural insensitivity, PBS has chosen July 26th, the anniversary of the signing of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) to air "POV: The Self-Made Man." 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The Catholicism comes from her side. Amy grew up in a number of places - Indiana - Washington, DC - Lubbock Texas - Arlington, Virginia - DeKalb, Illinois - Lawrence, Kansas - and Knoxville, Tennessee, where the family settled in 1973. She attended Knoxville Catholic High School, then the University of Tennessee where she majored in history. She received an MA in Church History from Vanderbilt University, where she wrote a thesis on the changing role of women in 19th century American Protestantism, and the ways Scripture was used to justify those changes. She worked as as a teacher in Catholic high schools and a Parish Director of Religious Education and started writing for the diocesan press - the Florida Catholic - in 1988. Amy has written columns for Our Sunday Visitor and Catholic News Service at times over the past twenty years. Her articles have been published in venues ranging from Our Sunday Visitor to the New York Times to Commonweal. She has written 17 books. 18, if you included the as yet tragically unpublished novel. Amy has five children, ranging in age from 26 to 4 and was married to Michael Dubruiel, who died unexpectedly in February 2009. She lives in Birmingham, Alabama.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/author\/awelborn"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4878","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/180"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4878"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4878\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4878"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4878"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4878"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}