There is a lot to be said for a contrarian mind. In fact, as Douglas Wilson has observed, in a prevailing secular humanist clime, having a contrarian mind is arguably a basic requirement for Christian living.
Urbane contrarians, particularly those with a merry impishness, are national treasures. He is an example:
Dying of cancer is the "best death" and we should "stop wasting billions trying to cure" it, a leading doctor has said. Dr Richard Smith, a former editor of the British Medical Journal, said that cancer allowed people to say goodbye and prepare for death and was therefore preferable to sudden death, death from organ failure or "the long, slow death from dementia". . . .One up for contrarians!
"You can say goodbye, reflect on your life, leave last messages, perhaps visit special places for a last time, listen to favourite pieces of music, read loved poems, and prepare, according to your beliefs, to meet your maker or enjoy eternal oblivion," Dr Smith wrote in a blog published for the BMJ, a journal he edited until 2004. "This is, I recognise, a romantic view of dying, but it is achievable with love, morphine, and whisky. But stay away from overambitious oncologists, and let's stop wasting billions trying to cure cancer, potentially leaving us to die a much more horrible death," he wrote.
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