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DArtagnan
Guest
Correction, she is saying
My mistake
Well, people just need to do what I say - and most people won't need that kind of help
Rights vs Privileges
- Thread starter Corwin
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My mistake
Well, people just need to do what I say - and most people won't need that kind of help
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Omega
Guest
Later, when's that? After a succesfull attempt? Or after an unsuccessful attempt in which case doctors will often give even more (often numbing, insensitizing) medication, often against their own will, simply because now they've been diagnosed 'suicidal'?
From what I've learned: suicide is rarely an impulsive act. If it is, they die now too! In a terrible way. And cause witnesses to have lifelong traumas. If people are able to get a humane and simple drug, from special doctors for example, they become visible. Doctors could explain to them it's just part of the medication and that their feeling will end as soon as they are cured. Or if the situation is that simple (i.e. bad side effects): give them a different medication/treatment. Person saved.
Really, I don't see the problem.
What if they'll have to take that medication for the rest of their lives, who are we to say: well, live on, it's just the medication…
Who's life is it? Does one have to stay alive just to please others? I think if one's mature and sound of mind (which could be assessed by doctors) one should have the right.
BTW, thanks for pointing out I'm a she and sorry to have brought up an old topic
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GothicGothicness
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As mentioned the problem is where to draw the line, who qualify for death help by a doctor?
Haven't you heard the stories of people failing to commit suicide and regretting they ever tried? or of illegal "death" doctors which "convinced" people to commit suicide through drugs. Or relatives who tried to pull the plug on someone and kept saying how he wanted to die to gets hands on his money?
Who decides what is defined as an "uncureable" disease?
It appeared like a simple yes to me to before… but if you keep thinking about it becomes more and more complicated. Especially if you know people who have been suicidal in their youth and are now living a happy life with children… or people who recovered from failed attemps and regret it and got a good life… or even more importantly those who want to commit suicide but don't dare to… and finally their life improved and they are glad they didn't do it ? however with some help and medics they might be dead now?
As for those with a truly miserable life and no happiness what-so-ever who just want to die…. these days there are pills to make you more happy and get you on your feet again.
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Omega
Guest
I'm not following you there, might be you're too concise, or that my English doesn't suffice. But I get an unpleasant feeling in my stomach reading this:
I fear you'll get Kafkaesque situations if you'll ignore the level of the single human, of the individual. The human mind is better equipped to deal with microlevel stuff. The detail improves the understanding of the larger picture…
A photo of a child in a warzone, for example, or a story about a family struggling for survival, is more convincing than dry facts and figures. Compassion and the ability to empathize leads to humanity.
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DArtagnan
Guest
You don't seem to understand, and it would take a long time to explain in detail.
So, I'll try to boil it down.
Basically, it's about the fact that it's impossible to determine what each human being in the world actually deserves, because there's absolutely no way to measure worth, need, and capacity in any kind of wholesome or objective sense.
The world is full of resources that we can use to further ourselves and to improve the quality of life for everyone - including non-humans.
Currently, the society of the world is dividing resources in - I claim - an absolutely insane way, with the vast majority ending up at the tiny minority. That is insanity.
My approach - which is utterly utopian if you look at the way the world works, and how ignorant the human race is - would be to divide resources equally, without trying to guage who is more deserving.
For that to work, we first have to ensure that there is enough left in the world for everyone - and we have to cover basic needs for everyone before we can start dividing resources for less vital needs or projects. We also need to ensure that everything we do is based on taking only what is needed, and that we use resources optimally to produce additional resources to be able to sustain our life and the health of the planet. About a million other things as well.
My point has nothing to do with taking away from the individual or removing the identity of anyone. It's actually about removing cultural barriers entirely, as well as the language barrier.
Ultimately, it's about making each individual a culture - and providing each individual with the freedom to exist without the boundaries of external ignorance or judgment.
I have ideas of how to solve a large row of the inevitable problems, like resource distribution and crime. But as I said, it would take books for me to explain. I haven't got all the answers, and many of my ideas would need to be fleshed out and worked at for many, many years. Most likely centuries.
But I have no doubt that our current world society is completely counterproductive to physical and mental health, as well as the overall health of our planet.
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Omega
Guest
No, I'm sorry, I haven't, truly. I'm only hearing that line from people who are not in favour of giving adult people the basic right to have their own life at their disposal. But hey, me not hearing about it doesn't say much.
It's fair that when talking about regret one should consider the opposite as well: the stories of people who succeeded and are glad they tried. Alas, they don't speak. But it'll be hard for some to imagine that there are people jumping for joy mere thinking of being dead.
Usually the ones that thrive in a normal situation (fear death and love life) have difficulty understanding an abnormal situation. But a wish in an abnormal situation can be legitimate indeed.
People can be trained to assess whether a wish is a legitimate wish.
No, I haven't. All doctors I've heard of in my country (The Netherlands) are very conscientious when it comes to euthanasia, it has an emotional impact on them, it's not something they take lightly, in fact, it's something they'd rather not do. And who on earth, with a proper mind, would rather kill people than cure them?
"Death doctors" which convince people to commit suicide need best to operate on their own, I guess. Doctors I know of work in a team. Doctors that euthanize have to answer to other (independent) doctors the who, why, how.
"Death doctors"… working in a team… A bunch of people all plotting to convince someone/several people to take a euthanasia pill… farfetched. Unless they act under a criminal regime.
Speaking of convincing others to take a drug: how does changing a privilege for some (doctors and pharmacists can take their own life quite easily) into a basic right for all, affect the way doctors behave? What's keeping doctors now from convincing people to commit suicide?
The drug should be taken under the supervision of a medical team.
Doctors do, all the time.
I have a different question:
Who decides what is defined as an "unbearable" disease?
My answer: the patient does, ultimately; it's HIS feeling, it's HIS life. I think it's silly to force someone to live.
So, back to the first question, where to draw the line: IMHO the patient draws the line. And when he has convinced a bunch of trained doctors, the patient gets a pill. And dies amidst his beloved ones, not alone on a rail track, or worse: being seriously injured and crippled for life if the attempt fails, and despite having the same wish, never being able to do an other attempt again. Nightmarish.
I never said people should be able to buy a death pill in the supermarket. Of course it has to be regulated and justifiable/accountable (what's the english term).
I don't think you do justice to unhappy people, their problems and solutions available. Life and people are not always as kneadable as you'd like.
GothicGothicness
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It's not like the only option you have if you want to commit suicide is to jump in front of a car or from a high building or such a things. IMHO people who do that kind of thing wants to attract some attention to their death. If you truly have your mind set on dying and prepare your relatives and friends or which people it could be, they'd usually choose any of the calmer methods available. One of which is buying sleeping pills in the supermarket and eating all of them at the same time...... which often result in that you fall asleep calmly and die.
So in that case you put it to a really sick person to decide if he can live or die, he himself? even if he should suffer from a disease which could be cured? there are a lot of people who have been sick and in pain wishing they could just die... but they keep fighting on... when they finally got through the nightmare they'd get back to a happy life. What I am saying is you can't really trust a sick person ( especially if mentally unfit ) to make such a decision.
What we have in sweden now is a method were people who have a sickness that is so serious we can't recover from it with the current technology is to give drugs which makes it so they can't feel pain and also gives them an ease of mind, and wait for them to die. This is costly and perhaps not very helpful. But you don't have a doctor ( who by the way as you mentioned have feelings ) having to have put a killing drug in them. This system is more costly and I am not certain it is better than allowing active death help for someone with such an illness though. But as I said it is again a fine line.
So in that case you put it to a really sick person to decide if he can live or die, he himself? even if he should suffer from a disease which could be cured? there are a lot of people who have been sick and in pain wishing they could just die... but they keep fighting on... when they finally got through the nightmare they'd get back to a happy life. What I am saying is you can't really trust a sick person ( especially if mentally unfit ) to make such a decision.
What we have in sweden now is a method were people who have a sickness that is so serious we can't recover from it with the current technology is to give drugs which makes it so they can't feel pain and also gives them an ease of mind, and wait for them to die. This is costly and perhaps not very helpful. But you don't have a doctor ( who by the way as you mentioned have feelings ) having to have put a killing drug in them. This system is more costly and I am not certain it is better than allowing active death help for someone with such an illness though. But as I said it is again a fine line.
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JemyM
Okay, now roll sanity.
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I say that this is pretty much a myth. The criteria they have in the Nederlands for euthanasia are very strict and make most concerns pretty much obsolete.
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MasterKromm
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Rights are like laws,
-their worth/validity is tied directly to their enforceability.
-they are not static and vary greatly depending on society.
-they can change/evolve within any given society at any time.
But, IMO, the first point -their worth/validity is tied directly to their enforceability is all that matters… What happens in a state or society experiencing protests(Egypt), anarchy or rioting/looting(New Orleans post Katrina)? Fundamental laws and rights can and will be forgotten. You don't need massive systemic failure to see a loss of rights - people are raped, killed and emotionally/physically abused every day. That doesn't even begin to touch on the people who suffer not through a loss of "inalienable rights" but through starvation or exposure…
Which brings me to my point/question:
If something cannot be guaranteed is it still a right or is it an ideal(or something else altogether)?
-their worth/validity is tied directly to their enforceability.
-they are not static and vary greatly depending on society.
-they can change/evolve within any given society at any time.
But, IMO, the first point -their worth/validity is tied directly to their enforceability is all that matters… What happens in a state or society experiencing protests(Egypt), anarchy or rioting/looting(New Orleans post Katrina)? Fundamental laws and rights can and will be forgotten. You don't need massive systemic failure to see a loss of rights - people are raped, killed and emotionally/physically abused every day. That doesn't even begin to touch on the people who suffer not through a loss of "inalienable rights" but through starvation or exposure…
Which brings me to my point/question:
If something cannot be guaranteed is it still a right or is it an ideal(or something else altogether)?
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dteowner
Shoegazer
I'm right there with you on this one, Omega. It's one of the few instances where I have to give you pinko Euros a humble tip of the hat--you're WAY ahead of the US on right-to-die issues. We're hopeless mired by nanny state lefties that think they know what's best for you and bible-thumping righties that think it's God's decision. I guess concepts like personal choice and personal responsibility for those choices just ain't what they used to be...
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Omega
Guest
You seem to be restricting yourself to divideable resources. Hm, what to say… I'm not a material girl.
It would be a start - insufficient though because of immaterial needs, conflicting needs and the rarity of some materials.
Design flaw. I would have liked us to be more like bonobos than chimpansees.
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Omega
Guest
Hm, no. People who do that kind of things went deeply into the matter and they learned that those two means (train, jump from height) are the easiest means that ensure immediate death in most cases. Few survive.
And as for attention: it's a common misapprehension, alas, that people who are expressing a death wish, seek attention. Professionals, people who are dealing with suicidals on a regular basis, always urge to take death wishes seriously.
Not true. See the above. Sure, people prefer calmer methods, but problem is they rarely get their hands on drugs that ensure a nice peaceful death. Eating every pill you can find in the medicine cupboard usually doesn't work. But first attemptors rarely know that. You can harm your body, in a serious and painful way, but death? Same with cutting the wrists, cutting them the way it's usually done, horizontally, will give you a fair chance of being found alive. The proper way is quite difficult to do.
AFAIK sleeping pills rarely do the trick. Besides, the human body is a great thing: it protects itself from danger. So when swallowing lots of sleeping pills you'll have to take an extra drug: one that will prevent you from vomitting. 'Cause chances are that you'll suffocate in your own vomit. Not a nice peaceful death. Again there's that risk of survival - with brain damage.
BTW in your country it's easy to get sleeping pills without prescription? Anyway, AFAIK it's pretty difficult in Europe to get the drugs that ensure a quick peaceful death. If illegally bought you've got the problem: are they the real thing or fake? Again, one could end up alive but seriously hurt.
If it were that easy like you said, buy pills in the local supermarket, your country would be flooded with terminal tourists. Switzerland has had some problems in that area, but they closed the borders after an uproar in British newspapers about a British conductor and his wife who went to Switzerland to seek death - at least that's what I think I saw in a television programme while doing other things.
The man had cancer and they thought it'd a good idea to die together after having had a life full of love. When you have no children, perhaps no real friends, or health problems of your own, I can imagine you'd like to go at the same time with your better half.I just think people ought to have a choice. It's no obligation. Nobody's forcing him. And I think the initiative to talk about euthanasia should always come from the patient himself.
People die out of sheer recklessness day in day out, but when a person comes along who has well thought about his own death, you'd deny him the opportunity?
So, if you can't really trust a sick person, how do you asses what's wrong with a patient? By ignoring what he says, the anamnesis, as well as the important feedback? Doctors are experts in medicine, but patients are experts regarding their body. They need each other in order to get a good diagnosis.
Again, a patient can not do this on his own, it can never be a whim. You'll have to be sound of mind and know what you're talking about. Mad or mentally retarded people, those that do not understand the implications of their wish, those that can not be held fully accountable of things they do and want, are naturally excluded. You'll have to convince a doctor, probably on more than one occasion. And you'll have to convince more than one doctor because they are all supervised.
You're talking about people with terminal physical illnesses. Palliative care is also being practised in my country. This is being done in the majority of cases, active euthanasia is definitely not the norm. Most doctors prefer palliative care, some do because it simply implies less supervision - thereby ignoring the wish for active euthanasia from the dying patient.
Some patients with terminal physical illnesses don't want to stretch their life, on and on, just waiting, becoming more and more a shade of who they once were, until there's absolutely no life left. They'd like to go with dignity, and in full consciousness.
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Omega
Guest
Yes, the criteria are very strict. It usually concerns terminal physical illnesses. There has been a couple of patients (twelve or so) with Alzheimer's disease during the last ten years, but more and more people are demanding the possibility to be able to get out with dignity. The problem is you have to be sane, so it's only possible in the early stage of Alzheimer's - at the same time most family doctors think it's only allowed for physical illnesses. Other illnesses of the mind, euthanasia practised by psychiaters, is rare, it has been done once or twice. And approved of, by a supervising commission.
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Omega
Guest
It would have surprised me if you'd expressed a different point of view, dear dteowner.
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DArtagnan
Guest
You seem to be restricting yourself to divideable resources. Hm, what to say… I'm not a material girl.
If you figure out some way to distribute non-dividable resources - let me know.
As for not being a material girl, it's my experience that it's more common for girls to claim it - than to actually live it.
I'm not suggesting that distributing resources evenly will solve immaterial needs, but if you look around you - you'll find many immaterial needs that are directly related to how resources are being distributed.
People would not have access to rare materials on an individual basis - unless it was demonstrably more vital than how the world society as a whole would need them.
In most cases, rare metals would be worthless in the kind of society I'm suggesting - so no one would want them. Their only potential use would be practical - and whatever was there - would be distributed through an automated process, not entirely unlike the democratic process - except one taking into account a lot of other factors, rather than merely the majority vote.
Design flaw. I would have liked us to be more like bonobos than chimpansees.
Cute
I know it's easier to jest than to think - and I don't blame you.
*kisses*
GothicGothicness
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So if it has been practiced that rarely do you in that case think that the rules are too strict ?
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DArtagnan
Guest
GG
What are you suggesting as an alternative?
That people should never, under any circumstances, be allowed to choose death in a legal way?
If not, then what would it take for you to think it's ok to allow them that choice?
What sort of process do you have in mind?
What are you suggesting as an alternative?
That people should never, under any circumstances, be allowed to choose death in a legal way?
If not, then what would it take for you to think it's ok to allow them that choice?
What sort of process do you have in mind?
I would say that the only real right people should have is to be allowed to do what they want with their lives so long as nobody else could reasonably consider themselves negatively affected by that.
After that it's down to priviliges by society for basic healthcare, shelter, food and access to education. Priviliges that in my opinion should be earned by doing what they can to give back to that society.
Unfortunately I'm fairly disaligned with any real world societies in that. I'm not allowed to choose the manner of my own death or the intoxicants that I want to ingest and I'm forced to pay for priviliges for people quite determined to do absolutely f all to earn them.
After that it's down to priviliges by society for basic healthcare, shelter, food and access to education. Priviliges that in my opinion should be earned by doing what they can to give back to that society.
Unfortunately I'm fairly disaligned with any real world societies in that. I'm not allowed to choose the manner of my own death or the intoxicants that I want to ingest and I'm forced to pay for priviliges for people quite determined to do absolutely f all to earn them.
GothicGothicness
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I am not sure if legal way is the correct phrase. As mentioned earlier I had been a supporter for this, but didn't realize the complications it had. Especially after experiencing several events related to suicides in different ways.
People with extreme physical illness is the hard point for me…. but disregarding that one.
Aside from the mentioned pills… which people do use to kill themselves in different ways.. even if it might be complicated as Omega said, many succeed.
There are things like hanging yourself, and a lot of other ways.
The point is that it is not easy to do is something that in itself prevent people from committing suicide. That omega has never encountered or heard about people who attempted suicide and later regretted it a lot and got a happy life is very surprising to me… but given that she never experienced such a thing I would understand her point. Even more importantly often the failed suicide is the trigger and a realization for the person that they still want to live.
Should a person who failed a suicide still have an extremely strong death wish, they could of course attempt again.
Besides I think it is a hard weight for any employee to give death to another person even if it is what that person which, and could give that person mental problem at some points in life.
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DArtagnan
Guest
Interesting thoughts, but you're not really answering my question.