In his column “Whose life is it, anyway?” (Metro, Oct. 22), Adrian Walker strongly implies that opposition to Question 2 is a right-wing position. In particular, he cites the opposition of the Catholic Church and “right-wing groups who seem to view [Question 2] as an element of a left-wing, pro-gay agenda,” but he does not mention that Question 2 is being opposed by groups including the Massachusetts Medical Society, the Massachusetts Hospice and Palliative Care Federation, and the American Medical Directors Association.

Also opposed to Question 2 is the African-American newspaper the Bay State Banner, which has been criticized for taking a position supposedly at odds with its generally progressive agenda. But progressives should not be fooled: Question 2 is not a liberal proposition; it is a libertarian one. Its failure to require counseling or family notification represents a larger failure to recognize that none of us in this life is completely autonomous, and that we all exist in a web of relationships that entail obligations to one another.