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Assisted Suicide


dj_bollocks

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On March 27, George and Shirley died holding hands in their own bed in a Toronto retirement home. Their children, who watched from the foot of the bed, say the couple drew their last breaths at almost the same moment. They had been married for just shy of 73 years.



The Brickendens are one of the few couples in Canada to receive a doctor-assisted death together, and the first to speak about it publicly.


They wanted to explain what it meant to them to die at a time and place of their choosing, as at least 2,149 Canadians and likely hundreds more have done since assisted dying became legal in this country.



But cases like theirs also raise uncomfortable questions about whether the vague eligibility criteria in Canada’s assisted-dying law are sometimes being interpreted more broadly than the government intended.



One of the most controversial stipulations in the law is that a patient’s natural death must be “reasonably foreseeable,” – something that could plausibly be said of every nonagenarian. The law dictates other requirements, including intolerable suffering and irreversible decline, but those concepts can be elastic, too.



https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-medically-assisted-death-allows-couple-married-almost-73-years-to-die/

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If I'm faced with a certain slow and painful death and I want to end my life before shit gets nasty, then it's my fucking choice and no cunt will tell me otherwise. It's fucking ridiculous that euthanasia remains such a widely debated topic.

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What's the doctor's view on all this?

 

Big change for them and let's be honest, due to staffing 'issues' it will be some nurse that ends up doing the deed then will go on to get fuck all compo or professional respect when their nerves finally snap due to the stress of it.

 

They should've watched Harold Shipman in his cell with a bit more care - he'd have been ideal for it.

 

If they allow assisted suicide to be legal then they have to bring back capital punishment too. All the moral arguments for abolishing would be rendered null and void.

 

Won't be long before the real master-plan becomes apparent - doctors will be told by the government to meet a certain assisted suicide quota per health board per month.

 

It's a Tory wet dream to 'save' the NHS and abolish those whom are too poor to be sick.

 

No thanks.

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If they allow assisted suicide to be legal then they have to bring back capital punishment too. All the moral arguments for abolishing would be rendered null and void.

 

You are going to have to run me through this one, as surely the biggest moral argument against capital punishment is that you execute someone innocent of the crimes they are being punished for?

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You are going to have to run me through this one, as surely the biggest moral argument against capital punishment is that you execute someone innocent of the crimes they are being punished for?

The biggest moral argument against capital punishment is that the state has no right to kill an individual.

 

If you allow assisted suicide then you allow the state through the actions of an appointed individual acting within the law to kill someone.

 

If the latter is permissible then so, logically is the former.

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The biggest moral argument against capital punishment is that the state has no right to kill an individual.

 

If you allow assisted suicide then you allow the state through the actions of an appointed individual acting within the law to kill someone.

 

If the latter is permissible then so, logically is the former.

 

By your logic, we should legalise murder as well.

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The biggest moral argument against capital punishment is that the state has no right to kill an individual.

 

If you allow assisted suicide then you allow the state through the actions of an appointed individual acting within the law to kill someone.

 

If the latter is permissible then so, logically is the former.

 

I'd disagree with that being the main one. There are various instances where we allow state appointed individuals (or groups of people) to kill individuals while acting within the law. Armed police is one example and the armed forces another. It may be designed to be used in defence or as protection to other individuals in the state, but overall, it shows that on a moral level, we as a collective do not have issue with appointing that power to the state. I think the biggest moral issue with capital punishment is that you can kill an innocent person. We see many convictions overturned years after the event. Maybe less so than before, with advances in forensic science, but they still happen. Even then, you said all the moral arguments would be rendered null and void, so even if you believe that is the biggest one, it doesn't cover them all.

 

As for your final point, logic is used loosely. It would be like saying that if an armed policeman can use lethal force to end a situation that puts public at risk, then he could use it to shoot people he doesn't really like the look of. It's logical as he is legally allowed to use his gun in one situation so why not in another. They are two very different situations. One allows someone to choose to die at a time of their choosing rather than leaving it to a killer disease to ravage their body over the remainder of their life. The other is deciding to kill someone who has been found guilty of a crime by a group of their peers.

 

I can only assume that there is a reason that anyone would try and package them as one, and that is because their arguments on either can't stand on their own legs separately.

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I'd disagree with that being the main one. There are various instances where we allow state appointed individuals (or groups of people) to kill individuals while acting within the law. Armed police is one example and the armed forces another. It may be designed to be used in defence or as protection to other individuals in the state, but overall, it shows that on a moral level, we as a collective do not have issue with appointing that power to the state. I think the biggest moral issue with capital punishment is that you can kill an innocent person. We see many convictions overturned years after the event. Maybe less so than before, with advances in forensic science, but they still happen. Even then, you said all the moral arguments would be rendered null and void, so even if you believe that is the biggest one, it doesn't cover them all.

 

As for your final point, logic is used loosely. It would be like saying that if an armed policeman can use lethal force to end a situation that puts public at risk, then he could use it to shoot people he doesn't really like the look of. It's logical as he is legally allowed to use his gun in one situation so why not in another. They are two very different situations. One allows someone to choose to die at a time of their choosing rather than leaving it to a killer disease to ravage their body over the remainder of their life. The other is deciding to kill someone who has been found guilty of a crime by a group of their peers.

 

I can only assume that there is a reason that anyone would try and package them as one, and that is because their arguments on either can't stand on their own legs separately.

 

We are talking about daily life - your examples are tending toward the extreme [after, I accept some extreme language on my side i.e. a reference to Harold Shipman];

 

Armed police, the armed forces where clearly the background is in utilitarianism i.e. people with guns shoot at one bad person to stop them from killing various innocent people are not a sufficient examples of the relationship between the state and an individual in daily life.

 

Therefore I can't accept your examples here as they are not connected to the state acting against an ordinary individual in the regular course of their life.

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We are talking about daily life - your examples are tending toward the extreme [after, I accept some extreme language on my side i.e. a reference to Harold Shipman];

 

Armed police, the armed forces where clearly the background is in utilitarianism i.e. people with guns shoot at one bad person to stop them from killing various innocent people are not a sufficient examples of the relationship between the state and an individual in daily life.

 

Therefore I can't accept your examples here as they are not connected to the state acting against an ordinary individual in the regular course of their life.

 

Okay, and I was obviously being flippant with those. The rest still stands, why try and mix two different topics together instead of looking at them each individually? It is clear they are very different as one involves someone exercising their free will but asking for assistance with it and the other involves other parties deciding whether someone you are stopping being a danger to the public should either be incarcerated or killed.

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Then you accept the states right to kill.

 

Your only concern is with the fallibility of the law.

 

We have very different views if my summary of your views is correct.

 

That is quite clear. For a start you are looking at it as it being the states right to kill, where as I look at it as a person exercising their free will but asking for the assistance to do it in the most humane way. You look at it as a tool to cut healthcare costs whereas I look at it as a tool to stop people suffering, if that is their choice. You've decided it has to be the state that does it, while if the law relaxes it, I don't see why it needs to be.

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That is quite clear. For a start you are looking at it as it being the states right to kill, where as I look at it as a person exercising their free will but asking for the assistance to do it in the most humane way*1. You look at it as a tool to cut healthcare costs whereas I look at it as a tool to stop people suffering, if that is their choice. You've decided it has to be the state that does it, while if the law relaxes it, I don't see why it needs to be.*2

*1 It will start that way.

 

Then recommending it will become part of standard medical training.

 

Then it will become a cost-cutting target.

 

I have no evidence for any of these views.

 

They are only my assumptions; if you open the door to state sanctioned killings then they will open it wide inch by inch, year by year.

 

 

*2 Could you in all honesty ask someone, your spouse, a grown up child or friend to kill you - knowing that would be something that they would carry on their conscious their whole life?

 

I'd like to think that I could never be that selfish, no matter how ill I got.

 

 

We do have very different views and discussing this issue with you is interesting, thanks.

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*1 It will start that way.

 

Then recommending it will become part of standard medical training.

 

Then it will become a cost-cutting target.

 

I have no evidence for any of these views.

 

They are only my assumptions; if you open the door to state sanctioned killings then they will open it wide inch by inch, year by year.

 

 

*2 Could you in all honesty ask someone, your spouse, a grown up child or friend to kill you - knowing that would be something that they would carry on their conscious their whole life?

 

I'd like to think that I could never be that selfish, no matter how ill I got.

 

 

We do have very different views and discussing this issue with you is interesting, thanks.

 

My point on it being state controlled was more that it could be undertaken outside of the NHS. It could be NGOs that undertook it, or dare I say it, private companies! The model in Switzerland seems to revolve around Dignitas, which is an NGO. I guess the main issue with looking at allowing those options is the cost involved. Becomes an issue of whether you can afford it and then creates a two tier system. I guess it points to euthanasia and state's right to kill aren't mutually exclusive though.

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Your life is your own... no-one has the right to tell you what you can do with it so long as it harms no-one else.

 

If I decided to top myself and some interfering cunt told me, "No... because the law and, oh, the bible.." I'd make sure I took them with me.

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The guy knew the way his life was going to end up and he also knew that assisted suicide was illegal. Therefore he should have had the foresight to acquire the means to end his own life before he got to this stage and then he wouldn't have to go through all these court battles.

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Good documentary on suicide with folk jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge. So many folk do it there that setting up a camera to film favoured sections and you don't have to wait long to capture a jumper.

Bloke at end of documentary does an impressive inverted back flip to start his short journey.

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