Should euthanasia be legalized for patients who request it?

[HawkPerception]

Yes. People should be able to make decisions on their own lives

No. People should get therapy and help

[nightdrot]

Voted No.

While there is an understandable temptation to view euthanasia as a form of compassion and thus respect for life, this is a sort of misnomer. In effect, making life optional and thus setting the stage for a culture where life is a convenience and not an imperative.

Take that step, and the culture starts on a very slippery slope. One individual makes a choice. A million individuals making a choice becomes a cultural movement with all sorts of unintended consequences.

The society will begin to make fine-line distinctions about which lives must be maintained and those which are dispensable. What starts as a seemingly bright line becomes blurry and - invariably - as night follows day, those blurry lines will conduce to an ethic of convenience.

Life is maintained and sustained not because it has merits on its own terms, but rather by a subjective standard of its quality and utility. What starts out as an illusion of compassion gives way to a matrix of considerations, biological and moral, about what lives are not yet eligible to be ended and what are.

Downward flows the spiral. The same ethic, by the way, that leads to abortion on demand and why the laws in most states still forbid suicide. The latter a residual of the belief that law ought embody an ethic that gives primacy to life and that the difficulties and circumstances in which life may exist at any moment are, in the ultimate analysis, of secondary importance to the value of life itself.

Put simply. the value of life is absolute and not dependent on the circumstances in which it finds itself. This then being a broader ethical and cultural question and not merely one of individual choice or utility.

The British statesman and political philosopher Edmund Burke wrote, "The effect of liberty to individuals is that they may do as they please. We ought see what it will please them to do before we risk congratulations." Therein lay the problem with laws that permit euthanasia, abortion on demand, physician assisted suicide and indeed suicide itself.

(The last being especially interesting insofar as it functions more as an expression of societal values than as something that can be enforced at any given moment in time. Grant that such laws do empower law enforcement to prevent a suicide where it is in a position to do so.)

In any case, a society that premises its law as "Choice" - as euthanasia advocates must invariably do - effectively leaves open the question of the value of human life. It becomes not a standing principle, but a subjective judgment to each individual. In such a society, human life becomes not an end in itself, but mere instrument. Life becomes not an object whose preservation is the highest standard, but rather a convenience to be maintained or not according to the satisfaction of another's will.

Aristotle said that the first questions of politics are, "How ought we to live? What kind of a people do we wish to be?" The implicit answer of those who support euthanasia, abortion on demand, physician assisted suicide and the like is, in effect, that it is nobody's business. Predictable results follow. One cannot expect the society to absent itself from collective moral judgments on the value of life and then expect an ethical social order to result.

[OfDeath]

So you think someone who will certainly die suffering excruciating pain should just have to put on their big boy pants and suffer in unimaginable agony when the technology to compassionately end their misery is available?

[nightdrot]

@OfDeath They need not suffer pain. If the technology is there to end their lives, then the technology is there to ameliorate the pain. Indeed, there is a whole subset of medical science dedicated to that purpose. The point being that live is valued for its' own sake and is not a thing to be dispensed with when inconvenient or difficult.

Indeed, where such an ethic prevails, life is no longer valued. It then becoming a mere instrument of utilitarian calculation and not a value inherent in itself.

Yours' is the fallacy of the false alternative.

[OfDeath]

Not a false dilemma at all. Some pain is so severe that even hospitalisation with a pain management specialist on hand can’t stop it without that person being rendered unconscious. When the person wakes up, they are simply in debilitating pain so bad that they are simply physically unable to enjoy life. This is just a fact. In extreme cases such as these, euthanasia is the most compassionate option. In other cases where a person cannot enjoy the only possible options of existence left for them, having the option of euthanasia should be available. You seem to have an ideologically based view on this from reading your other responses. This shouldn’t be an issue of identity politics. Euthanasia is a compassionate solution to irreversible suffering. Quality of life is what matters most.

[nightdrot]

@OfDeath So in that event, what is the objective standard you set? At what objective point in law is "quality of life" impaired and how is it measured objectively?

The problem is that by your standard, such as it is, in law the value - and even the quality - of life becomes not an objective standard. Rather the value and quality of life is relativized and from that point on the standard sinks.

The value and quality of life then no longer matters in law - and by that in the culture - but one of an array of options. "Choice" becomes the standard - and that is no standard.

If you want to see a culture where the value and quality of life is relative, look about you. Rising crime, murder, abortion and suicide rates, drug abuse and so forth. Once there is no standard, but the value and quality of life becomes subjective, there is no standard and bad things follow.

We euthanize animals - dogs, etc. - not people. There is reason for that distinction.

[OfDeath]

You just asked me a question and then went on assuming my answer which you got wrong.

[nightdrot]

@OfDeath So answer it. I am explaining the logical implication of your position and its problematic - both legal and cultural - aspects. Feel free to respond - that is the point of this site after all.

[sirderpsalot123]

I’m all for it.

We don’t let our pets suffer for months on end in pain, I’ve always thought it was incredibly cruel that we allow it to happen to humans.

[HawkPerception]

Same

[sirderpsalot123]

Thanks for MHO

[Elena_Stewart]

I think it should be legalized but with conditions. people who have an incurable diseases or disabling condition should be allowed to die in dignity if they choose.

[HawkPerception]

Agreed entirely again. I think that we agree on a lot of views based on the way you think.

I think you might be an INTP when it comes MBTI personality. Have you ever done the test?

Do you think that this describes you?

https://www.16personalities.com/intp-personality

Or am I way off? 🤣

[Elena_Stewart]

Didn’t do it before. Let me try it and let you know, but I believe you are right😁

[HawkPerception]

Sounds good! Looking forward to the results! 😊

[Elena_Stewart]

Nope, you were wrong. It is ENFP
Campaigners are enthusiastic, creative, and sociable free spirits, who can always find a reason to smile.
By the way, I didn’t pay attention to that I in INTP because I know I am a mix of introvert and extrovert more to the extrovert personality

[Elena_Stewart]

But I know I am logical😊

[HawkPerception]

Ah well. At least you know your personality type now 😂

I just assumed since we have similar ways of thinking, we might have similar personalities 😅

[HawkPerception]

You are definitely logical. I can give you that.

[Elena_Stewart]

Yeah, it was fun thanks😊

[Elena_Stewart]

Thanks for mho😊

[HawkPerception]

I always give MHO to people I agree with the most

[Elena_Stewart]

👍🏻👍🏻

[LaurenM1997]

Sorry to ask this but what is euthanasia? 😬

[HawkPerception]

Medically assisted suicide

[LaurenM1997]

Oh 😕

[Unit1]

It's painlessly falling asleep from getting deprived from oxygen and never waking up.

[OlderAndWiser]

There are people who make unsuccessful suicide attempts and who are later quite grateful that they didn't succeed.

[puurikke]

It is in my country and I'm glad it is.

When you want your life to end, you can tell this to a GP. The doctor will have a conversation with you and check if it is allowed.

There are 4 checks that all have to be positive: 1) is it voluntary and did you think it over, 2) is your situation hopeless and do you experience unbearable suffering, 3) do you understand what's going to happen, 4) there isn't a different option (for instance counselling, surgery or medicine).

If the 4 checks are positive than an independent doctor has to check everything again. And if all is correct, the first doctor will follow a certain procedure. After the euthanasia everything will again be checkt by a third doctor. If any step was skipped or went wrong, the doctor will get charged.

So euthanasia is only possible for the worst situations. It's safe and compassionate. My aunt, grandmother and an uncle choose euthanasia, for my uncle it came to late and he died while suffering a lot. Thank god my aunt and grandmother didn't have to go through that ordeal.

Because of the high rate in suicides there is talk about also legalising a different end of life procedure. But that's a more difficult thing to do because when is your life 'done'?

[Unit1]

100%

Switzerland - the region, that does everything right - offers it. The irony is that you can get it where it's not needed (AKA when life is just fantastic) and not get it where it's obviously highly preferable (AKA when life is persistently shit).

[OfDeath]

If there is nothing else which can be done, yes. For example someone had incurable cancer and their death will certainly come with excruciating suffering, yes they should be given the option. Under these type of circumstances only. Life is too precious a thing to throw away under uncertainty.

[GuyAnswersGirls123]

Maybe as a last resort option after alternative measures have been exhausted, but I'd be concerned about perverse incentives. I'd at least err in opposition to its subsidization. It's an area I'd want to tread very carefully.

[naartjie]

Voted no.
Tbh someone like me, I’d be going through rough week and make the call.
Life is worth living. People are valuable

[strateguy632]

only if they are fatally ill anyway. otherwise just d. n. r. category passive do not resuscitate but never with a harmful action.

[RebelinSteel]

Yes it should be made legal as it is in other countries, more countries are starting to allow it.

[TonyMetal___86]

Option B because we must encourage life not death, it ain't our right to kill a human being even of the other asks for it...

Some people have lost their minds, we must help them or fix them, not losing our minds like they did!

[CozyCoffin]

Sure. Terminally ill patients deserve to be treated like human beings allowed to have a final choice to die with dignity.

[Dargil]

A moral dilemma for me. Maybe some but not all.

[DarkLegacy]

Depends on the context, if they are mentally unwell then no.

[AngryCarl]

People who can benefit from therapy should be able to get it. People who are terminally ill should be helped to die with a degree of dignity.

[NathanDavis]

it should not be so simple, no

[XXblack88]

🤔 The machine looks like something I could teleport in. I don't like the idea personally.

[DizzyDesii]

I personally don’t agree with that

[Rangers]

Yes, that would be great for me