For those interested, there’s a formal debate about this here:
http://www.intelligencesquaredus.org/debates/legalize-assisted-suicide
Obviously, most of us on here would agree it’s OUR choice. But sadly, legislation is always held captive by
1- money (hospitals stand to make TONS off of living chronically sick people, and the last 6mo of someone’s life accounts for the majority of a hospital’s revenue) and by
2- other people’s stupid religious belief’s shoved down our throats. Who cares what YOUR religion says? Why should YOUR beliefs dictate MY life?
3- And fuck your holier than thou attitude.
12 comments
I think society’s strong faith in psychiatry plays a huge role. The idea that somone who wants to die needs psychiatric intervention (even in most cases where they have been diagnosed with a serious chronic or terminal illness) is widely accepted. I’m sure some also fear the potential for abuse – which I agree does exist.
Yeah but the potential for abuse doesn’t hold up to logic. It’s like saying, well there’s potential for illegal organ harvesting, so we’ll ban ALL organ transplants. There are some people who will abuse pain killers, so we’ll ban ALL pain killers. That kind of reasoning doesn’t make any sense and yet it’s always used as a way of saying why we can’t have assisted suicide. Just regulate it like you do with organ transplants.
I mean it would be easy to pressure vunerable elserly people, especially those with dementia, into doing this. Many would quietly cooperate out of fear, guilt, or inability to communicate the problem. The suicide rate is already the highest among the elderly and this would allow society to have even more of an excuse to ignore them. Society may simply adopt the attitude that the elderly are nothing but a burden and should off themselves.
I believe the right should exist, but I can’t ignore the potential for it being abused.
No, those with dementia and those who are incapable of making clear, lucid decisions, are barred from from obtaining assisted suicide.
If you watched the video, you would know what the stats are- Oregon has the Death with Dignity Act, in the first 17 years that it’s been legalized (since 1997), only 752 took the pills- that’s just 44/year and only 3.6/month. Five out of six who applied got denied.
It is heavily regulated- they don’t give those pills out willy-nilly to everyone. It is very, very hard to get approved.
I believe I may have misunderstood the primary issue here. I have been posting in between various activities today, so haven’t yet had a chance to watch the video.
If the pills were easy to obtain, my ass would be in Oregon in line to get one of those pills! And I bet half the people here too.
Also worth noting that another 400 were granted the pills, but ultimately chose not to take them in the end. It gave them comfort to at least have that choice.
And no, they don’t give you the pill for you to physically hold onto- while they grant you the pill, you don’t get it into your actual hands until just the moment before you off yourself, and there are dozens of staff who watch you take it.
Thanks for giving me the first rebuttals I have ever seen against the slippery slope argument. So yeah, lets ban all cars so they can’t be used they be used in crimes? Refusing a decent death to those who need this remedy is just beyond what I can wrap my head around.
I know, I’ve always hated the slippery slop argument. Even if not talking about assisted suicide at all, the slippery slope crap is just annoying. Remember in the 90s, it was all about banning gory games because apparently kids playing gory games is a slippery slope to kids becoming violent and then becoming criminals. All from a game. Sheesh.
The slippery slope thing is fear mongering based on faulty logic.
But caring about others’ welfare and not wanting them to be abused isn’t a slippery slope argument l. Should we only care about ourselves and just say screw other people?
I said in this post, and have said in others, that I do believe the option should be available. But I can’t just ignore the potential for abuse when deciding how to go about doing this.
*oops, an extra letter got in there