Derek Humphry is the co-founder with his late former wife Ann Wickett, of the Hemlock Society. Humphry is a suicide ideologue, author of the how-to-commit-suicide guide Final Exit, who is utterly indifferent that his book has been found next to the bodies of teenage suicide victims.

But Humphry is not mealy-mouthed. He doesn’t try to hide his agenda behind mealy-mouthed euphemisms such as “death with dignity” or “aid in dying.” In this regard, he had this letter published in today’s Register Guard:

“As the author of four books on the right to choose to die, including “Final Exit,” I find the vacillation by the Department of Human Services (Register-Guard, Oct. 23) on how to describe the lawful act of a physician helping a terminally ill person to die by handing them a lethal overdose, which they can choose to drink (or not), an affront to the English language.

“‘Physician’ means a licensed M.D.; ‘assisted’ means helping; and ‘suicide’means deliberately ending life.

“The department’s cop-out choice of the words “death with dignity” is wildly ambiguous and means anything you want. Let’s stick to the English language and in this matter call a spade a spade.

DEREK HUMPHRY”

Indeed.