Amy Winehouse's Death: a Preventable Inevitability.

Amy Winehouse, 27, Is dead. No surprise there, I am afraid. Some deaths are more inevitable than others – particularly some early deaths.

Now, Amy Winehouse was famous for two attributes: her music and her addictions to drugs and alcohol. Indeed, it could be argued that she was more famous for her addictions than her music – since the former won her more tabloid newspaper coverage than the latter. She was always in the newspapers for things no-one would want to be in them for.

I can’t comment on her music, or its ultimate worth, since I didn’t really pay much attention to it. However, I can comment on her life and death: it seems overwhelmingly likely that she did not have to die so young. Her death, whilst an inevitable result of the lifestyle she led – was also preventable. There is a lesson here for all relatives of addicts: don’t stand by and watch – do something. Amy Winehouse would most probably be alive today, if others had been firmer with her on the matter of her addictions. Although the cause of death is not presently known, there are relatively few deaths, in the modern world, in 27 year olds, by natural causes. Given her drug addicted lifestyle, it seems most likely that her addictions contributed to her death – either directly, by overdose, or indirectly, through the health damage they caused.

If drug addicts (and that includes alchoholics) are not to die young, like Amy Winehouse, a certain lack of freedom should be imposed on them, until they are able to control themselves, with respect to their addictions. Amy Winehouse should have been monitored very closely, to ensure that she did not have access to any drugs or alchohol. I know it seems like such a regime would have denied her, her “rights”…but, really, who should have a “right”, to destroy themselves, by drugs? In such cases, it would be more humane, and ultimately less painful, to step in and directly prevent the addict from any access to the substances they would otherwise seek out. This may seem at odds with the belief that people should be allowed to live the lives they please – but, in the case of addicts, the lives they please will, most frequently, lead directly to early deaths. Thus, it seems reasonable to intervene, until such time as the addict is no longer an addict and, perhaps, has come to live their lives as if they value them.

It could be said, that drugs alone, didn’t kill Amy Winehouse, but a lack of love, by those closest to her. If they had truly loved her, they would have stepped in and made sure, beyond any doubt, that Amy Winehouse did not have access to any harmful drugs, legal or otherwise. That they did not, or were not effective in doing so, shows that they either did not love her enough, or did not understand the duties that come with that love. Sometimes, those who love another, feel they should indulge them and let them live the life they please. That is fine, only if the life desired, is not a self-destructive one. In all situations in which the loved one desires, consciously or otherwise, to destroy themselves, those who love have a duty to protect the life of the loved one, from harm. It does seem that that this was not done in this case. Amy Winehouse was famous for her inebriated, intoxicated, “shambolic” performances in the latter years of her life. So, clearly, she was not being denied access to drugs, legal or otherwise. Whatever “care” she was under, was not effective – or did not care to deny her what it should have done.

Amy Winehouse was a musician. This makes her loss more acute than a typical early death – for, in dying, whatever music she would have produced had she lived a normal life, will now never be. It is a pity, she was not protected from the most dangerous person in her life – herself.

Rest in peace, Amy.

Posted by Valentine Cawley.

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Why you should be healthy.

Why should you be healthy? Think of your own reasons before reading on.

Living, as I do, in a country different from the one of my birth, confronts me, daily, with new experiences and people that I would otherwise not have met. It opens my eyes, too, to ways of seeing the world that I would not have suspected. One of these ways surprised me, recently.

I was speaking to a Chinese national. I asked him what was most important to him. He said. "My health is the most important thing."

There were no surprises, there, then. I looked at him more closely. He did not seem particularly healthy to me, being young, but having receding hair.

"Why is health important to you?" I pursued, seemingly unnecessarily, but not truly so.

"Because...", he began, with some degree of intensity, "If I don't healthy, then can't smoking, can't drinking, can't go nightclub."

I nearly laughed, but for his sake I didn't. I thought it a marvellous - he wanted to be healthy enough to ruin his health. He saw health as something that allowed him to indulge in unhealthy pursuits. For him, health was like a bank account with contents to be spent while he still had it.

I didn't argue with him on the point, nor did I speak of the obvious consequences of this viewpoint: it seemed as if I would offend him, if I did. It did, however, remind me that there are always different ways of seeing the world: this was his.

I wonder if anyone else sees health as something that allows one to have unhealthy habits...do you?

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