Assisted suicide: how would Ebenezer Scrooge have voted?

Near the start of A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens describes Scrooge as ‘a tight-fisted hand at the grindstone’. When a pair of portly philanthropists assail Scrooge on Christmas Eve, looking for a charitable donation, he says something that proves the description accurate. On being told some would rather die than go to the workhouse, Scrooge says, ‘they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population’.

It is a moment of heart-stopping heartlessness. In the peerless Muppet adaptation, Beaker and Doctor Bunsen Honeydew shake their heads in disbelief and consternation. This moment has signalled Scrooge’s unmistakeable depravity to generations of readers, staking out just how far his inhumanity goes — and therefore just how drastic his redemption will need to be.

This Christmas, however, will be the first time since Dickens wrote those words that Scrooge’s mentality has begun to find its way into our government legislation. Even if the proponents of assisted suicide see it as an advance in compassion, dignifying individual autonomy, we have crossed a border into Scrooge territory. Now, ‘they had better do it’ no longer unambiguously signals man’s inhumanity to man: it is the watchword of those who count themselves on the side of the angels.

A moment to regret

Scrooge comes to regret this moment; later, he asks about Tiny Tim’s chances of survival, and the Ghost of Christmas Present repeats his callous words back to him. The Ghost exposes the ugly pride undergirding Scrooge’s thinking: who is he to decide which human beings are surplus to requirements? Perhaps, ‘in the sight of Heaven’, the very ones Scrooge dismisses as worthless are more valuable than he.

‘They had better do it, and decrease the surplus population’: Scrooge came to regret his awful words, and doubtless we, as a society, will have many reasons to regret the step Parliament has taken.

What should we do, in response? There is much praying (and fasting) to be done, and then other ways to engage as concerned citizens for our culture’s good. There are many important battles yet to fight, at the level of policy and implementation. But perhaps we can learn another lesson from Dickens as well, and act accordingly.

The danger of a life in isolation

Scrooge’s heartlessness goes hand-in-glove with his isolation: Dickens describes him as ‘secret, and self-contained, and solitary as an oyster’. There’s terse comedy in the moment where Scrooge is asked for a donation:

'What shall I put you down for?'
'Nothing!” Scrooge replied.
'You wish to be anonymous?'
'I wish to be left alone,' said Scrooge.

But Scrooge is not granted his wish: by the end of the story, the oyster has been prised open and Scrooge’s repentance sees him restored to his family, his co-workers and his community.

There is an insight here, and we shouldn’t miss it. Not that being with others will automatically produce righteousness: certain sins are only possible in community. It is, however, that life as an oyster renders us less human in ourselves, and less human towards others.

I need to learn that. As an introvert, I feel a pang of readerly sympathy with Scrooge: very often I, too, wish to be left alone. So I’ve decided, as much as possible, to accept every offer of help that comes my way. Aged 34, I already find myself prizing my autonomy and independence too much, already find myself unwilling to ‘be a burden’ to others, or feel like a ‘taker’ rather than a ‘giver’. If I’m finding it hard now, how much harder will I find doing that in another few decades — and in another few decades after that, if the Lord gives me that long?

Better to learn the value of depending on others now, before it’s too late. What step might you take out of the oyster shell?