Euthanasia defenders are finally saying the quiet part out loud

(LifeSiteNews) — Two euthanasia stories have captured the public imagination over the past several weeks. A two-year-old child in the Netherlands was euthanized even though an independent medical assessment found that “the child was not continuously suffering unbearably” and that “there were still reasonable alternatives.” Despite that, a euthanasia committee found that the requirements for killing the child by lethal injection had been met.

The second story involves the death of Brigitte Stegemann. Her granddaughter Brigitte Kranendonk says she was euthanized against her will after failing to understand what medical professionals were proposing to her. The New York Post’s lede is a good example of how the international press has covered the story: “The 83-year-old Canadian grandmother who was allegedly euthanized against her will died a bloody mess with her hands clasped in prayer after a botched first attempt.”

Kranendonk recently told her entire story on The Kelsi Sheren Perspective podcast:

Brigitte Kranendonk sat down for a long form convo about her 83 year old grandmother GG.

The Kelsi Sheren Perspective

I’ll be sitting down with her entire family tonight for an exclusive, dropping Wednesday. pic.twitter.com/2C5CD1hp2A

— Kelsi Sheren (@Kelsisheren) September 28, 2026

READ: Cardinal Eijk condemns euthanasia of Dutch toddler

Few prominent euthanasia defenders have addressed these stories; they are simply too difficult to defend (although many Canadians have insistently claimed on X that Stegemann’s family is lying and that euthanasia is always peaceful and compassionate). Enter Richard Hanania, a columnist for the Boston Globe who was recently published in Unherd courtesy of Sohrab Ahmari. Hanania was once a member of the eugenicist alt-right; he left the alt-right, but remains a staunch advocate of eugenics.

Hanania is a longtime defender of Canada’s assisted suicide regime. In 2022, he claimed that Canada “has adopted a humane policy.” In 2023, he followed that up with an essay titled “Canadian Euthanasia as Moral Progress.” In one particularly revelatory tweet this month, he responded to an anti-euthanasia advocate’s declaration that his life would be worth living even if he were incapacitated by saying, “I can’t imagine a more evil ideology than this.” I believe him; Hanania was one of the most enthusiastic defenders of the influencer couple who aborted their baby earlier this year because he had Down syndrome.

Richard Hanania is the personification of post-Christian ethics. He believes people with disabilities should be killed in the womb, if possible. He is not just supportive but passionate about euthanasia because he fundamentally believes some lives are not worth living. Unlike the activists at Dying with Dignity, he doesn’t skirt around this point or deny it. In a 2024 essay titled “Forced Diaper Wearing Is Not Human Dignity: The anti-euthanasia movement is an assault on what is best in man,” Hanania wrote:

I’ll be nothing but a burden on the taxpayer, and maybe my children, who make their lives smaller and perhaps forgo opportunities to form families of their own in order to take care of me. One thing I’m going to stress to them when they’re old enough is that they definitely should not do that, and if they decide differently I would consider that a failure to transmit my values, which say that if and when I get to be too much of a burden I should be put on the proverbial iceberg and allowed to drift off to sea.

To be clear, Hanania isn’t just talking about “choice.” He is making a moral judgement about the value of the lives of others, too – and he is worried that “our nice Christian society” will prevent euthanasia from spreading. Hanania again:

To be reduced to such a state of dependency would be the worst imaginable fate. I feel the same way about other people’s lives. Hearing that someone I liked or respected died is much better than hearing that they’re in constant pain and unable to take care of themselves.

READ: Daughter demands reforms after mom’s euthanasia death following suicide attempt

Hanania takes it further in another essay, directly tackling the argument that assisted suicide regimes victimize people with disabilities. Sure, he says. But that’s a perk.

“One could just as easily say that people who want to kill themselves after becoming disabled are seeing things more objectively, and when they accept their condition they’re coping and living under a kind of false consciousness,” Hanania writes. “I’m pretty sure I would want to kill myself if I was ever paralyzed, and I grant it’s possible that maybe I would want to change my mind after a while.”

“But I wouldn’t want to become reconciled to living with such a condition,” he emphasized. “The idea that I might accept it would for me be even more reason to commit suicide, lest I get used to accepting a defective version of myself.” That’s about as overtly Nazi as you’re going to get from a euthanasia advocate. Hanania believes that people with disabilities are fundamentally “defective,” and that if he were ever disabled, he’d want to kill himself before he could get used to it.

In short: people with disabilities are worthless.

Hanania is honest where other euthanasia advocates are not. The foundational premise of euthanasia is not “choice” or “autonomy.” It is that some lives are worth living, and some are not. Different regimes may draw the line dividing those lives in different ways, and euthanasia advocates will continue to push for an expansion of the boundaries. But as the killing of the Dutch two-year-old starkly highlights, the farce of “choice” eventually falls to the logic of euthanasia.

As Jeff Blehar noted: “Hanania is the only person I’ve ever seen shift from the alt-right to the progressive left because the alt-right simply wasn’t committed enough to a culture of eugenicist death.”

But at least he’s honest.