# Should there be the universal right-to-die?



## TopCat (Feb 9, 2021)

I have recently taken an interest in the case of Tony Nicklinson, a man who suffered a stroke that left him completely paralysed, unable to move any of his limbs except for his head and eyes; a condition known clinically as 'locked in syndrome'. For years he wanted to end his life, but was unable to do so without help. He campaigned to the High Court to state that it would be lawful for a doctor to help him end his life. If they refused, he wanted them to state that the current law was incompatible with his human rights. The court refused to do both of these things. Shortly afterwards, he refused food and water and died of pneumonia. He passed away in August 2012, but had lived for seven years prior in this state. No doubt, he probably would have lived on for many more years too, but actively chose to end his life after his case lost.

Nicklinson, perhaps quite rightly had no interest in living with such a debilitating condition, yet was unable to end his life on his own terms and in a peaceful way. I am sure many here would agree that living with such a condition would be considered the stuff of nightmares. On a personal level, my 80 year old grandmother is presently living with terminal cancer, is bedridden and in constant pain. The law where she resides stipulates that assisted suicide is illegal, despite the fact that her continued suffering is arguably in the interests of neither her family nor the state. Clearly, there is something fundamentally wrong with the current legislation when an animal is treated more humanely than an actual human being. This obviously begs the question as to whether there should be the universal option of dying a peaceful death for those suffering with chronic, terminal or life-altering conditions, if no improvement is deemed possible.

Advancements in medical science now mean that there exists the capability of keeping a person alive artificially for many years, even when doing so, it could be argued would not be in their best interests. Indeed, ventilators and other life-sustaining machinery can effectively keep a person alive long after their natural expiry date. Arguments in support of such measures usually involve the suggestion that life is precious in someway, and that for this reason it should be sustained at all costs. Yet, is life really as precious as we're led to believe? Ironically, I have found that those who often campaign against right-to-die on a ethical basis do not consider the ethics of artificially keeping somebody alive in the first place. The suggestion that all life is precious could be seen as a selfish and idealistic view which does not take the person's suffering into account. I am aware of several cases where a person has been or is still being kept alive artificially, even when the person has no quality of life. There's one notable case of a woman in Ireland who has been kept alive since 2008, despite the fact that she has been unable to speak, swallow or move and has only been able to communicate by blinking her eyes, following brain surgery.

In my view, the right-to-die should be a basic human right given that death comes to us all at some point. I'd be interested in other people's views on this, too.


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## Lemmingwise (Feb 9, 2021)

He did end life on his own terms. Nobody was willing to risk the legal / moral results of doing it for him.

The subject is not as simple as you paint it with your suffering grandma.

I remember watching a documentary that terry pratchett was part of before he ended his life. There was also the ending of life of another brit who travelled to switzerland to make it possible.

They filmed his final moments. At the last moment he seemed to want to drink another glass of water, it seemed a kind of last minute regret maybe? The nurse stopped him, said "no" , and then he died.

It's easy to construct the possibility that he was having second thoughts. His wife already didn't really support his decision. Then compounded by grief these instances can be a battleground for families and doctors.

And what of the nurse? Is she plagued by suffering of doubt?

Suffering by itself is a poor argument, even though I find it convincing, because the idea is that aided termination of life is an end to suffering. But it also opens the door to causing new suffering.

On top of that it opens the door to new paths of economic incentives.

Poltically it's very valuable if people end their life early. Old people receive pensions and benefits and use the majority of health care. When they're dead, that's done.


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## TopCat (Feb 9, 2021)

Lemmingwise said:


> He did end life on his own terms. Nobody was willing to risk the legal / moral results of doing it for him.


I suppose you're right, but it probably wasn't the peaceful death he was hoping for.


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## Andy Bandy Man (Feb 9, 2021)

It's probs better to have the right to die gracefully, but can you imagine the avenues a right to die opens up. 

Like as an institution, I just worry about the possibility of it being corrupted.

So I think maybe, like a court hearing. Like pick a jury pool that all COULD see the reasons one MAY wish to die, and judge the intent?


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## Moff Ensign (Feb 9, 2021)

I think you have a right to die but it isn't your right to burden other people with having to kill you


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## No. 7 cat (Feb 9, 2021)

No.

It becomes, and has become a Soylent Green method of killing the old and the sick. There have been cases where family wanted rid of troublesome old and demented relatives.


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## Andy Bandy Man (Feb 9, 2021)

Ensign said:


> I think you have a right to die but it isn't your right to burden other people with having to kill you


Arrested for suicide by cop


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## Lemmingwise (Feb 9, 2021)

TopCat said:


> Yet, is life really as precious as we're led to believe?


Btw if you don't think life is precious, kill yourself.

Why care about something that isn't precious?


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## A Thick Piece of Meat (Feb 9, 2021)

most people i seen who want to die dont actually want to die its their depression clouding their judgement


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## Rusty Crab (Feb 9, 2021)

After seeing some of the images on here, yes.


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## Boris Blank's glass eye (Feb 9, 2021)

I can relate since I watched my father waste away due to GBM, but


UnimportantFarmer said:


> No.
> 
> It becomes, and has become a Soylent Green method of killing the old and the sick. There have been cases where family wanted rid of troublesome old and demented relatives.


Governments and corporations have violated so many of our rights already. We shouldn't make it easier for them.


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## The best and greatest (Feb 9, 2021)

Lemmingwise said:


> Btw if you don't think life is precious, kill yourself.
> 
> Why care about something that isn't precious?


Because my existence is a divine comedy.

Im just smart enough to  recognize my insignificance and the meaninglessness of my being, and just arrogant enough to want to keep going anyway.


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## Lemmingwise (Feb 9, 2021)

The best and greatest said:


> Because my existence is a divine comedy.
> 
> Im just smart enough to recognize my insignificance and the meaninglessness of my being, and just arrogant enough to want to keep going anyway



Then be "smart" enough to recognize the divine comedy of suffering grandma's.


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## Haim Arlosoroff (Feb 9, 2021)

I struggle with this question. For while I feel morally the answer is no , I know that the churning masses of failure the cities make must be controlled.  You cannot ask stupid people to know how to fix their lives and its getting harder the more we centralize due to population densities and technology.  Finite space, finite resources, infinite population growth until something stops it.

So we either construct an easy mode for stupid people, and smart or corrupt people will realize the benefit of cheating their way into that system.  Or we make a trash can for non-self-recoverable lives that have become miserable for the people involved.  I cannot think of a decentralized third option that isn't going to construct a dystopia instead of what we want it to do.

I struggle with this question.  I think the answer is yes, certainly for medically irrecoverable cases.


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## Bad Gateway (Feb 9, 2021)

Yes. Any extended rationalization one way or the other is faggotry.


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## The best and greatest (Feb 9, 2021)

Lemmingwise said:


> Then be "smart" enough to recognize the divine comedy of suffering grandma's.


Oh I do.

I prefer not to cry for other people's miseries.  Instead I laugh and rejoice that it even exists at all.


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## wtfNeedSignUp (Feb 9, 2021)

It's kinda like abortion, where 99.9% of the arguments for the right to die is based on extremely rare conditions that will never happen to 99.9% of the populace. Personally I'm against it, since the acceptance of death as a right (rather than the absolutely worse thing you can take from a person) kills any of the last vestiges of morality in the western world. It will very much lead to hurting emotions being considered worse than murder (a point we are already tittering on right now).

There is also the likely case of deviants getting off of manipulating people to suicide, or powerful people forcing others to commit it. Not to mention it's pointless since if you commit suicide then society can't really punish you anymore.


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## Deepthoughts (Feb 9, 2021)

You can off yourself any time you want. Just don't burden other people with the choice. Become a quadrapaligic because of a stroke? Welcome to life, we all take that chance.


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## draggs (Feb 9, 2021)

No. Stop tearing down the moral underpinnings of society for muh convenience and because muh exceptions. Stop backsliding into barbarism.


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## Hollywood Hulk Hogan (Feb 9, 2021)

Yes. If someone is in that much pain and wants their life to end, it's their life, who are you to say they should be forced to stay alive?

I have had relatives die of cancer and it seems completely horrible. I'd probably end it all if I got a painful terminal disease, too. It's selfish to force someone to be alive in a life of pain.

That being said, you can't force someone else to end your life and I understand why they don't legalize assisted suicide (imagine opening that can of worms).


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## Frostnipped Todger (Feb 11, 2021)

My stepmother has advanced Motor Neurone Disease and can't eat, walk, or breathe without constant pain. She's literally waiting to drown in her own saliva because she is a UK citizen and they don't allow euthanasia. If I kept a dog in the same condition, I'd go to jail. 
As with all things, a modicum of common sense is required. If someone is depressed, that's not a good enough reason. If someone has a terminal illness with no hope of a reprieve, I say that it should be an option.


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## Kujo Jotaro (Feb 16, 2021)

As someone who has seen countless people die of old age and any number of diseases that kill the elderly (dementia, Parkinson's, CHF, etc...) I would say it should be allowed for the elderly and terminally ill under the condition that it's written out prior in very clear directions as to when it is appropriate to euthanize them. No one should have to make the decision about whether or not they're loved one should be euthanized no matter how horrible of a state that person is in. There needs to be written directions from said patient(like a DNR even if it is just a standard document), and approval by physicians, thing is I'm not sure physicians would ok euthanize at all. In my experience physicians do not treat dying patients, these patients are switched over to hospice care because physicians are not comfortable with even easing a patients inevitable death. This might be different elsewhere but my local hospitals won't even allow patients to be admitted to hospice before leaving , they're in the practice of healing people not "giving up on patients". 

I understand where physician's come from on this point though, a commitment to life/health and preserving it is fundamental to proper practice of medicine. Allowing yourself to accept defeat even on the most hopeless of cases might slip into you accepting defeat on cases with reasonable but still unlikely odds. Once you cross that line where do you stop? This in many ways is similar to the abortion debate where lines are seemingly drawn arbitrarily, and questions of morality are determined by "science".    The fundamental difference between this question and the question of abortion is that the life being terminated is one of a human being who at one point most likely had a semblance of consciousness that could express itself and be recognized by other consciousnesses. That's why I think if this was ever to be instituted it would be key that the individual express in very clearly written form when it is appropriate for their life to be ended, especially before they're in the full grips of whatever afflicts them.


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## Zero Day Defense (Feb 16, 2021)

Yes, but only if you can prove that you gave yourself life.


draggs said:


> No. Stop tearing down the moral underpinnings of society for muh convenience and because muh exceptions. Stop backsliding into barbarism.


Even the barbarians weren't this crazy.


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## Taylor Swift's Ghostwrite (Feb 16, 2021)

I think as technology advances and we can keep people alive who would have died without it, we should be giving more people the option to peace out instead.


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## queerape (Feb 17, 2021)

Canada is in the process of expanding their right to die law. Euthanasia is legal in Canada, but only if you are still able to consent to it at the moment of your death. So unlike a lot of other countries that allow it, you cannot currently give an advance directive in Canada. This of course is an issue if say, you are dying of Alzheimer's or brain metastatic cancer, and your disease may rob you of capacity before you want to go. The proposal in Canada is to allow advance directives for those who have a pathology that may rob them of capacity in an unpredictable manner or before they can get their affairs in order, get access to euthanasia and be ready to go.

Canada is also considering at some point in the future seeing if it is possible to extend medically assisted dying to those with untreatable psychiatric illness, which has been done in the Netherlands. They have put an 18 month moratorium on it to allow the House of Commons and Senate to think about it, and to allow physicians and the medical community to deliberate. It would require one to define when a mental illness is considered medically terminal. Of course we use heroic measures on those who are mentally ill and attempt suicide, but that is predicated on the assumption the condition they are suffering from is considered treatable to the point where they can be brought to the point to not wanting to or needing to commit suicide.

It may well be that some people are untreatable- they have tried nearly every modality of treatment for years and years, and have had no success. Why should we force someone with depression that has failed to respond to every single treatment there is to suffer for the entireity of a natural lifespan, just sort of existing in constant pain that no one can do anything about? Or someone with schizophrenia who cannot stop hearing voices and has lived their whole life in and out of psychiatric wards to no avail. There has even been cases of untreatable eating disorders where the treatments of force feeding themselves are causing more mental harm to the person than letting the person stop eating and drinking and letting the conditions run its natural course  with palliative care only (an argument used in NJ to allow a woman with severe remitting anorexia  to end her life by VSED). But how do we know at what point someone's mental illness is beyond treatment, when and how can we diagnose it as a terminal condition, and allow an assisted death? That's the question that has to be answered first.


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## gangweedfan (Feb 18, 2021)

As long as tax money isnt used to pay for it feel free to kill yourself.


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## Red Mask (Feb 18, 2021)

Yes. However, this has to be done very carefully as this can be an easy out for people who want an old/sick person gone(as mentioned before) and the choice can only be made BY the person suffering(advance directive also previously mentioned).


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## SITHRAK! (Feb 19, 2021)

TopCat said:


> Should there be the universal right-to-die?​


YES.
Medical professional here. Orofacial prosthetist, epitheticist. I rebuild faces for a living. 
Have seen people psychologically broken by not being able to afford a simple denture reline.
Have seen adult children drive $90k cars away from their parents living in poverty.
Have seen faces eaten away by cancer. Have tried to rebuild lives mauled by dogs.
Have seen heads stitched up like baseballs and skulls shattered like eggs.
Have created obturators for people who cannot eat, drink or speak without them.
Have dealt with Ehlers-Danlos, Cri du Chat, Neural tube defects, Roberts Syndrome and more.
I'm a eugenicist. And I've been made that way not only by my college medical ethics course, but also by contact with my patients.


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## Cyclonus (Feb 19, 2021)

I mean logically incels should be allowed to kill themselves based on what we tell them. Women owe them nothing. The world owes them nothing. But they owe the world nothing either, including their existence. Why should we force them to live a life they find full of unbearable loneliness?


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## Rich Evans Apologist (Feb 19, 2021)

I invite people curious on the topic to actually read into countries and state (or did more than Oregon allow it?) where it goes into practice. The number of people who kill themselves 'just cause' due to the availability is incredibly small, and the gatekeeping is strict and thorough.

Its applications are overwhelmingly for the conditions described by others here - terminal, painful illnesses and non-lives from which there is no recovery, which are decidedly _very fucking common_ if you even remotely speak to someone who actually works in health care. This shit isn't a once-in-a-million scenario; it happens to a lot of people when they've only got 2-3 years left. I always find it funny when the moralspeak is used as a cover for the fact that people selfishly can't let go of their 80+ year old parents who are clearly only suffering and have nothing more to chase, who blow their life savings to prolong that unwanted existence for a few months all because consoomer society is so fucking afraid of acknowledging death.

For monkeybrains who no read good, here's an example of perhaps this policy's most liberal implementation, and how the gatekeeping does function to weed out people who are young and riddled with mental illness.


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## Subtle (Feb 19, 2021)

Before or after reading this thread?
Yes.


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## Not Really Here (Feb 19, 2021)

Rich Evans Apologist said:


> I invite people curious on the topic to actually read into countries and state (or did more than Oregon allow it?) where it goes into practice. The number of people who kill themselves 'just cause' due to the availability is incredibly small, and the gatekeeping is strict and thorough.
> 
> Its applications are overwhelmingly for the conditions described by others here - terminal, painful illnesses and non-lives from which there is no recovery, which are decidedly _very fucking common_ if you even remotely speak to someone who actually works in health care. This shit isn't a once-in-a-million scenario; it happens to a lot of people when they've only got 2-3 years left. I always find it funny when the moralspeak is used as a cover for the fact that people selfishly can't let go of their 80+ year old parents who are clearly only suffering and have nothing more to chase, who blow their life savings to prolong that unwanted existence for a few months all because consoomer society is so fucking afraid of acknowledging death.
> 
> For monkeybrains who no read good, here's an example of perhaps this policy's most liberal implementation, and how the gatekeeping does function to weed out people who are young and riddled with mental illness.


About that reading thing-


> *A doctor accused of failing to verify consent before performing euthanasia on a dementia patient has been cleared of any wrongdoing by a Dutch court.*
> The 74-year-old patient, who died in 2016, had expressed a wish to be euthanised but also indicated that she wanted to determine the right time.


This article left out that the woman killed had to be restrained by her family while the "doctor" gave her a lethal injection.
Source


> *In January a young Dutch woman drank poison supplied by a doctor and lay down to die. Euthanasia and doctor-assisted suicide are legal in the Netherlands, so hers was a death sanctioned by the state. But Aurelia Brouwers was not terminally ill - she was allowed to end her life on account of her psychiatric illness.*





> Aurelia Brouwers argued she was competent to make the decision. But could a death wish have been a symptom of her psychiatric illness?
> 
> "I think you never can be 100% sure of that," says Kit Vanmechelen. "But you must have done everything to help them diminish the symptoms of their pathology. In personality disorders a death wish isn't uncommon.


Source


> Although he supported the 2002 euthanasia law at the time, Boer now regrets that it didn’t stipulate that the patient must be competent at the time of termination, and that if possible the patient should administer the fatal dose themselves. Boer is also concerned about the psychological effect on doctors of killing someone with a substantial life expectancy: “When you euthanise a final-stage cancer patient, you know that even if your decision is problematic, that person would have died anyway. But when that person might have lived decades, what is always in your mind is that they might have found a new balance in their life.”





> A category of euthanasia request that Dutch doctors commonly reject is that of a mentally ill person whose desire to die could be interpreted as a symptom of a treatable psychiatric disease – Eelco de Gooijer, in other words. Eelco was turned down by two doctors in Tilburg; one of them balked at doing the deed because she was pregnant. In desperation, Eelco turned to the Levenseindekliniek. With its ideological commitment to euthanasia and cadre of specialist doctors, it has done much to help widen the scope of the practice, and one of its teams ended Eelco’s misery on 23 November 2016. A second team from the same clinic killed another psychologically disturbed youngster, Aurelia Brouwers, early last year.


Source
If you want to anhero yourself I don't care have fun with it, it's far more disturbing when the government sanctions killing people while at the same time banning execution for murderers and rapists as being too extreme.
With the state of "laws" currently being not what was written down but what a court later decides is reasonable the question isn't what any particular law looks like in the moment.


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## (((Oban Lazcano Kamz))) (Feb 19, 2021)

yes and it should be decided by your government without your consent.


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## Rich Evans Apologist (Feb 19, 2021)

Not Really Here said:


> This article left out that the woman killed had to be restrained by her family while the "doctor" gave her a lethal injection.


Yeah, an Alzheimer's patient in their 70s will definitely be able to remember to ask for and set the time proper for their death.
Good thing she didn't write in her certified will that she wanted to be euthanized if her condition worsened significantly.  This case can then be seen as a litmus test of whether a living will qualifies as consent for the purposes of the dutch law, or if it hinges literally on verbal permission. It is also abundantly clear that the family was on board with this, probably because they weren't selfish pricks that wanted to prolong her suffering so they could delay feeling bad.


Not Really Here said:


> Source


This article supports my argument that the process is incredibly thorough and involves jumping through a lot of hoops to get there. Of note:
"The clinic oversaw 65 of the 83 deaths approved on psychiatric grounds in the Netherlands last year, though only about 10% of psychiatric applications are approved, and the process can take years."
83 deaths in a year zers the netherlands is gonna be a graveyard.
(granted the AP article suggests that there are 6000 cases of euthanasia more broadly, which is a more believable and significant number)
"In RTL's film, Aurelia Brouwers talks about attempts to end her own life.
"I think I tried about 20 times. I was critical a few times, but I often got to hear that my heart and lungs were so healthy.  The doctors said, 'It's a miracle, she made it.'""
I think she might have been a little serious about dying, what with that 20 attempts thing.


Not Really Here said:


> Source


Euthanasia of the young and old are often conflated. This article and the one above reflect that there's still a lot of controversy for people who are suffering, especially from mental illness, but are young. This controversy and these questions are then used as a cudgel in the far-more-common end-of-life situation instances.
Rosy optimism that "things will get better" seems abundantly misplaced if you look at suicide statistics and life expectancy decreases, but so too is a cold belief that all people who indicate they want to die will continue to do so.

I find the stipulation that the patient should administer the dosage to themselves to be misguided, but that the patient should be able to back out even at the last second - and to have to confirm their willingness - is already largely what happens. Making it codified rather than de facto would be good - as the stories of the youths point out, they essentially take long, extended holidays before the date to spend with the finer points of life, during which they are encouraged to opt out of the treatment if their minds have changed at all. This is after forcing them to jump through all of the various hoops to even get put on this path - if someone really wants to die that badly and is never deterred, I don't know what you're supposed to say to them. The woman in the economist video backs out at the last second and opts to continue on.


Not Really Here said:


> With the state of "laws" currently being not what was written down but what a court later decides is reasonable the question isn't what any particular law looks like in the moment.


Not related to this topic in specific, but this is why laws should be written with much more iron-clad wording. Look at almost any legislation cited in a lot of these instances, and you find they're hardly exhaustive of possible scenarios and situations, and rely wholly on interpretation. Courts have since the notion of judicial review practiced this process of clarification, which can always be overwritten by the legislature.


Not Really Here said:


> If you want to anhero yourself I don't care have fun with it, it's far more disturbing when the government sanctions killing people while at the same time banning execution for murderers and rapists as being too extreme.


Depends on the logic applied - if you can prove without a doubt that someone is guilty of rape or murder, absolutely without a shred of potential error, then capital punishment should be on the table. Europeans see it as pointless because it is ineffective as a deterrent - and it is; American insistence that the death penalty lowers rates of violent crime is retarded and unsupported emotional thinking. I'm not sure on what other grounds Europeans really oppose the practice beyond the notion of 'barbarism,' which gets them Rottinghams.
But if you just want to eject someone from existence and not be burdened by them, by all means. I certainly wish this argument was applied to 100% guilty and convicted pedophile sex offenders, at the very least.


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## Not Really Here (Feb 19, 2021)

Rich Evans Apologist said:


> Yeah, an Alzheimer's patient in their 70s will definitely be able to remember to ask for and set the time proper for their death.
> Good thing she didn't write in her certified will that she wanted to be euthanized if her condition worsened significantly.  This case can then be seen as a litmus test of whether a living will qualifies as consent for the purposes of the dutch law, or if it hinges literally on verbal permission. It is also abundantly clear that the family was on board with this, probably because they weren't selfish pricks that wanted to prolong her suffering so they could delay feeling bad.
> 
> This article supports my argument that the process is incredibly thorough and involves jumping through a lot of hoops to get there. Of note:
> ...


Yeah, it's well known that suicide takes dozens of attempts and a series of attempts are never a cry for help.
I note you dismissed the fact that 2 other clinics refused.


Rich Evans Apologist said:


> Euthanasia of the young and old are often conflated. This article and the one above reflect that there's still a lot of controversy for people who are suffering, especially from mental illness, but are young. This controversy and these questions are then used as a cudgel in the far-more-common end-of-life situation instances.
> Rosy optimism that "things will get better" seems abundantly misplaced if you look at suicide statistics and life expectancy decreases, but so too is a cold belief that all people who indicate they want to die will continue to do so.
> 
> I find the stipulation that the patient should administer the dosage to themselves to be misguided, but that the patient should be able to back out even at the last second - and to have to confirm their willingness - is already largely what happens. Making it codified rather than de facto would be good - as the stories of the youths point out, they essentially take long, extended holidays before the date to spend with the finer points of life, during which they are encouraged to opt out of the treatment if their minds have changed at all. This is after forcing them to jump through all of the various hoops to even get put on this path - if someone really wants to die that badly and is never deterred, I don't know what you're supposed to say to them. The woman in the economist video backs out at the last second and opts to continue on.


"largely what already happens" But not always, meaning people are killed against their express wishes with state approval.


Rich Evans Apologist said:


> Not related to this topic in specific, but this is why laws should be written with much more iron-clad wording. Look at almost any legislation cited in a lot of these instances, and you find they're hardly exhaustive of possible scenarios and situations, and rely wholly on interpretation. Courts have since the notion of judicial review practiced this process of clarification, which can always be overwritten by the legislature.


The fact that "shall not be abridged" is applied as "whenever the government feels like it" means that no law, no matter how long and "exhaustive of possible scenarios and situations" will be applied as voted on. This isn't a theory, this is history.

Depends on the logic applied - if you can prove without a doubt that someone is guilty of rape or murder, absolutely without a shred of potential error, then capital punishment should be on the table. [/QUOTE]
And yet that standard doesn't apply when a doctor kills you while your family is holding you down and you are screaming no. Strange that.


Rich Evans Apologist said:


> Europeans see it as pointless because it is ineffective as a deterrent - and it is; American insistence that the death penalty lowers rates of violent crime is retarded and unsupported emotional thinking. .


I've literally never heard the argument that the death penalty lowers rates of violent crime other than making it impossible for a murderer to murder again.
Where exactly are you hearing this argument from.


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## Rich Evans Apologist (Feb 19, 2021)

Not Really Here said:


> Yeah, it's well known that suicide takes dozens of attempts and a series of attempts are never a cry for help.
> I note you dismissed the fact that 2 other clinics refused.


It's directly mentioned that she has contact with friends and family and a whole slew of medical personnel, so... what more help was she crying for? Were you gonna read her a bible verse and tell her that it'll all get better on the other side of the hill or something? 

That two other clinics refused is an example of the process being thorough. She went through two refusals and then went to this specialized last-ditch body, which is itself already controversial and approves a small minority of applications. She did not waltz in to a clinic and get her lethal injection in a single go - little harder than getting hormones in the US.


Not Really Here said:


> "largely what already happens" But not always, meaning people are killed against their express wishes with state approval.


Yes, cases in which someone suffers from extreme dementia / alzheimer's, or is a half-dead nonverbal vegetable with no chance of recovery are thorny little cases in which this standard is hard to apply. Unless you believe in psychics, I suppose.


Not Really Here said:


> The fact that "shall not be abridged" is applied as "whenever the government feels like it" means that no law, no matter how long and "exhaustive of possible scenarios and situations" will be applied as voted on. This isn't a theory, this is history.


I forgot that the US constitution is the global landmark, so I'll narrow this one down:
_Marbury v. Madison_ happened in 1803. _Plessy v. Ferguson_ was 1896. 
Courts have always interpreted unclear and ambiguous bills, laws, and statutes. It's not new; it's just that you're not the zeitgeist anymore.


Not Really Here said:


> And yet that standard doesn't apply when a doctor kills you while your family is holding you down and you are screaming no. Strange that.


The articles don't mention screaming, but I'll assume she was thrashing around wildly. You are aware what Alzheimer's does to a brain, right? So even if someone, when lucid, writes in their 100% verified true & honest living will that "if my condition seriously worsens, euthanize me," we are to disregard both that whim and the reality of Alzheimer's to assume they are fully lucid... so they can live a few months longer? 

What, are you afraid your kids are going to strap you down once you get Alzheimer's? Just don't write in your living will that you want to be put down if you become seriously worse, and you can burden them well into your 90s.


Not Really Here said:


> I've literally never heard the argument that the death penalty lowers rates of violent crime other than making it impossible for a murderer to murder again.
> Where exactly are you hearing this argument from.


You've never heard someone say that we should have the death penalty for sex crimes or mass shooters or whatever in order to deter others from doing those crimes?
You can find it all over facebook and twitter whenever there's an arrest / conviction / etc related to the topics.
No _serious _political bodies make this argument, sure, but I was talking about European perceptions of the US's interest in capital punishment.


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## Rupert Bear (Feb 19, 2021)

UnimportantFarmer said:


> There have been cases where family wanted rid of troublesome old and demented relatives.


I see nothing wrong in that case. Why should some family have to put up with a really old parent with extreme anger issues or some other unstable mental condition which makes life for everyone around them hell?
Doesn't have to be with euthanasia, though.


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## No. 7 cat (Feb 19, 2021)

Rupert Bear said:


> I see nothing wrong in that case. Why should some family have to put up with a really old parent with extreme anger issues or some other unstable mental condition which makes life for everyone around them hell?
> Doesn't have to be with euthanasia, though.


This older person should still have a right to their life. We all get cranky when older.


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## ConfederateIrishman (Feb 19, 2021)

You would have to be absolutely retarded to trust modern society in handling this 'right' with the proper responsibility it deserves.

I could also rant how the concept of 'rights' has only led to everything by default not being allowed unless it is explicitly given as a 'right', instead of the other way around where you had a comparatively much smaller list of things you explicitly can not do, but that is a completely different subject.

tl;dr: Removing yet another Taboo will be bad; Oh, and it _*will *_happen, so have fun with that.


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## Syaoran Li (Feb 19, 2021)

Yes. I do think people should have that right.


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## Niggernerd (Feb 19, 2021)

Yes and it should be like make a wish that you get to choose how to die. 
Personally i want thrash to play while im on a rocket powered wheelchair, going on loops , jumping a pit of fire and lava, spikes and epicly dunking into a giant crocodile pool so i may do the thumbs up like in terminator before I'm eaten alive.


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## Rupert Bear (Feb 19, 2021)

UnimportantFarmer said:


> This older person should still have a right to their life. We all get cranky when older.


Of course they do, hence why i said Euthanasia is not necessary, they can simply be put in a retirement home or something
To word my point differently: Maybe old people shouldn't be parents for that very same "everyone gets cranky when older" reason.

Oh, and btw, throwing BPD fits 24/7 over minimal imperfections that leave the kids traumatized for life isn't what i would call "cranky".


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## AtheistWestonChandler (Mar 19, 2021)

Yeah, think everybody should be allowed to die if they want to die.
Think it's as important as the right to live


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## AtheistWestonChandler (Mar 19, 2021)

AtheistWestonChandler said:


> Yeah, think everybody should be allowed for if they want to die.
> Think it's as important as the right to live


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## Cope or Rope (Mar 19, 2021)

Yeah there should be right to die if it's voluntary.


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## Unyielding Stupidity (Mar 22, 2021)

No, I don't think there should be a right to die, as that opens up the possibility of more authoritarian governments killing off political enemies and then saying they consented to it through such a right.


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## ArnoldPalmer (Mar 22, 2021)

Yes, if you're crying on the internet about how badly you want to die, then put your money where your fucking mouth is and exit.


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## Blasterman (Mar 30, 2022)

> As someone who has seen countless people die of old age and any number of diseases that kill the elderly (dementia, Parkinson's, CHF, etc...) I would say it should be allowed for the elderly and terminally ill under the condition that it's written out prior in very clear directions as to when it is appropriate to euthanize them. No one should have to make the decision about whether or not they're loved one should be euthanized no matter how horrible of a state that person is in. There needs to be written directions from said patient(like a DNR even if it is just a standard document), and approval by physicians, thing is I'm not sure physicians would ok euthanize at all. In my experience physicians do not treat dying patients, these patients are switched over to hospice care because physicians are not comfortable with even easing a patients inevitable death. This might be different elsewhere but my local hospitals won't even allow patients to be admitted to hospice before leaving , they're in the practice of healing people not "giving up on patients".
> 
> I understand where physician's come from on this point though, a commitment to life/health and preserving it is fundamental to proper practice of medicine. Allowing yourself to accept defeat even on the most hopeless of cases might slip into you accepting defeat on cases with reasonable but still unlikely odds. Once you cross that line where do you stop? This in many ways is similar to the abortion debate where lines are seemingly drawn arbitrarily, and questions of morality are determined by "science". The fundamental difference between this question and the question of abortion is that the life being terminated is one of a human being who at one point most likely had a semblance of consciousness that could express itself and be recognized by other consciousnesses. That's why I think if this was ever to be instituted it would be key that the individual express in very clearly written form when it is appropriate for their life to be ended, especially before they're in the full grips of whatever afflicts them.
> 
> ...




Thus, there is a right to death, if it is voluntary.


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## Wesley Willis (Mar 30, 2022)

Just legalize drugs, We already have guns. Problem solved.


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## gang weeder (Mar 30, 2022)

"Right to death" doesn't need to be somehow codified into law. Just comes as a necessary package deal with the right to self-defense. If you want out, go buy a gun. Practically speaking no one can stop you regardless of how they feel about suicide.


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## Narutard (Mar 30, 2022)

I would have said yes just a couple days ago, but now? If you think you want to die you simply don’t get how funny existence is.

Excluding those with a disease/disorder of course, they can all die.


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## Roast Chicken (Apr 3, 2022)

Yes. Barbiturate cockatil parties with nitrogen gas hookahs should be a thing. With rigorous psychological evalution and approval from doctors, of course.

One of my colleagues recently died from cancer. By the time the NHS found out why he'd had a persistent cough, lost weight and got pneumonia he was full of inoperable tumors and the only route left was to make him as comfortable as possible.

He eventualy died of multiple organ failure. I wasn't there, but I'd like to hope he was doped into a blissful coma.

In the weeks before he died I read a book which involved a character who'd tried to off herself by overdosing on painkillers and booze - she died slowly in hospital before being smothered by another character, but the author describes that while she was unconscious or seemingly so, she could feel the agony of her organs shutting down. When she gad the strength to speak, she begged her husband to smother her.

Now, it wasn't a great book but I assume the author had done her research on this subject to write that chapter. When I heard that my colleague had finally died from multiple organ failure I wondered how comfortable or oblivious he had been in his final hours - was he too paralysed from the drugs to express how he was feeling and only seemed to slip away peacefully? This shit is haunting; almost like it's done on purpose so that people who watch their loved ones perish in front if them don't have to be burdened by the possibility that they died in silent agony.

 If I end up with terminal cancer, just put me down like a dog. I don't want to get to a point where I turn yellow and swell up with fluid like my grandad did or just be repeatedly pumped with painkillers until my liver quits, or just slowky fucking starve to death, or become delirious like Total Biscuit did in his final days.


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## ToroidalBoat (Apr 9, 2022)

One's own life isn't owed to the cult that is modern "society".


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## duckbutter&toejamsandwich (Apr 10, 2022)

I'd like to say yes. I've watched some people I love die long drawn out deaths. It was terrible to watch and horrific to go through. I've heard about others who had DNRs ignored who had their ribs crushed during CPR. They spent their last few hours in agonizing pain just so some wanna be hero nurse could feel good about themselves. While I think suicide is a sin, I also believe in free will and there is no higher freedom than bodily autonomy. 

However in the current world we live in, with it's youth worship, family breakdown, and corporatist mentality, there is no doubt in my mind that it would lead to the elderly being murdered.  We already saw this happen with the frankly horrific treatment of elderly in care homes during COVID-19.  The vast majority of healthcare dollars is spent in the last few years of life and every healthcare company would be chomping at the bit to find any excuse to cut those costs. 

Then there is the alienation within the modern family. Starting with Gen-X and getting worse with each additional generation, children now see their own parents and grandparents as the enemy. They are seen as the racist bigots who stole all the easy living and abused their innocent children by trying to teach them responsibility and values. Many have stopped talking to their older relatives entirely. With this animosity and their climbing debt is not hard to envision them pushing for a quicker death for their parents. 

And then there is the government. The last few years have shown that western governments see their populations as nothing more than consumers at best and burdensome excess for the rest. Western governments are full of WEF and Gates aligned politicians. Both WEF and Gates are open about how the want to drastically reduce the population. "Compassionate" euthanasia would be one of many ways to accomplish this. 

It is not a far leap of logic to see this starting with the very sick at deaths door, then moving on to ending ones life before they get so sick, to ending it when the quality of life starts to severely decline. Then moving to those whose lives just kinda suck.  We've seen this in the Nordic countries that have allowed euthanasia. They already allow for the previous conditions to receive assisted suicide. I could easily see social pressure developing to push people who cannot work or who are deemed too different  to voluntarily end their lives so they no longer burden society. 

We are already a culture of youth and consumer worship that are alienated from our elders. Logan's Run is right around the corner.


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## Wormy (Apr 17, 2022)

ArnoldPalmer said:


> Yes, if you're crying on the internet about how badly you want to die, then put your money where your fucking mouth is and exit.


Working on it.


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## PipTheAlchemist (Apr 24, 2022)

No. Suicide is a sin


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## mr.moon1488 (Apr 24, 2022)

For what race?


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## Pokemonquistador2 (Apr 24, 2022)

I'm all for DNR orders because people should be allowed to die naturally, if they're on their way out the door. I don't like government assisted suicide because you'll get things like depressed 12 year olds opting to die and that one munchie woman who got euthanized because her government wouldn't give her an allergy free house.


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## DDBCAE CBAADCBE (Apr 24, 2022)

I’ve always believed in a Universal Right To Die. Though, I always fear that people could all too easily make a rash choice that had they lived they may have regretted. So I guess I’m a bit of two kinds on the issue.


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## topsikrets (Apr 24, 2022)

Though I'm not comfortable with doctors performing it, I don't see an alternative to those who are physically incapable of doing themselves.


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## Ly Erg (Apr 24, 2022)

Terminal Ill patients who suffer agony or sickly symptoms should be allowed to die in their own terms. I have seen and have been through some horrible shit that made me feel like death was the best option for me to get rid of the sheer shit I was going through. Now put that on someone who A. Can't be cured and B. Can't be given aid to deal with the symptoms and yea, let them choose their terms on how they should go.

No fucking way am I ever going to live with Alzheimer's till I drop dead. My memories fading away and my personality changing or receding is enough to declare I'm no longer me already and should be put down. Rather die with my memories than live a little longer just to not remember the things I've experienced.

Same thing with any terminal illness that makes me miserable, lowly and in pain that gets worse overtime. Once I reach a stage where the real shit kicks in, I'm out.

I'm not going to go through that shit. Anyone who tries to stop me because of their own moral dilemma is going to find a sharp object in their throat. I'll force them to kill me if I can't kill myself and need third party help to get the job done. I'm spiteful enough to do it and I would have plenty of motivation to keep going with the pain alone.

You deny my right to die.

I'll deny your right to live.


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