ishter

I think we've had enough of these lesser serious debate topics, and it's time for some more politics and pressing societal matters to be discussed.

I have chosen to bring up both Abortion and Euthanasia as I feel both arguments retain solid points for and against, and I'm almost sure both of these topics will have supporters on either side. Although these topics are separate legally, moralistically speaking, they are relatively similar, and similar arguments can be used to address both topics, hence the reason I combined them (but feel free to address only one, or both separately).

I will define both, but wont argue my point's until someone has opposed my views, as stated below.

Abortion: Voluntary termination of pregnancy.

Euthanasia: Killing a terminally ill patient humanely and painlessly, with legal permission from a family member or a loved one.

My views: Abortion should remain legal, but with possible timeframe reductions. Euthanasia should become legal, considering religious and cultural barriers in some countries.

Nibbles

Abortion was pretty much covered off in the Pro-Life / Pro-Choice thread, but Euthanasia is an interesting one.

I am for it, but the laws / conditions of its use have to be extremely clear.

I can't fault the planned Japanese framework:

In the case of passive (unplugging life support) euthanasia, three conditions must be met:

1. the patient must be suffering from an incurable disease, and in the final stages of the disease from which he/she/ is unlikely to make a recovery;
2. the patient must give express consent to stopping treatment, and this consent must be obtained and preserved prior to death. If the patient is not able to give clear consent, their consent may be determined from a pre-written document such as a living will or the testimony of the family;
3. the patient may be passively euthanized by stopping medical treatment, chemotherapy, dialysis, artificial respiration, blood transfusion, IV drip, etc.

For active (eg, injection) euthanasia, four conditions must be met:

1. the patient must be suffering from unbearable physical pain;
2. death must be inevitable and drawing near;
3. the patient must give consent. (Unlike passive euthanasia, living wills and family consent will not suffice.)
4. the physician must have (ineffectively) exhausted all other measures of pain relief.


That seems entirely fair to me.

NinJa

Nibbles pretty much summed up exactly what I was going to say.

Personally, I'm all for giving the control of ones fate to oneself. But what about doctors prescribing lethal doses of a drug that can effectively end ones life in their sleep? I would be against that, solely due to the medicine/pills having the slightest chance of going into the wrong hands, or accidentally be taken by someone else, or even a child.

Hospitalization is a must.

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WeAre138

For it, wholeheartedly. People should have the power to decide if they want to live their life or not.

And most of the time it's not even that type of choice - they'll die anyway. This way they can due it on their terms and without suffering the effects of the disease for a prolonged period of time.

Dante

You can see my stance on abortion here.

When it comes to euthanasia i'm of the mind that if you have a terminal illness you should be allowed to end your life, the diagnosis would obviously be down to doctors and the death would have to be carried out inside a hospital be qualified practitioners. I'm also of the opinion that if you're suffering from a serious mental illness or disability, such as Alzheimer's a living will OR the consent of the person with power of attorney combined with a doctor's analysis should also be sufficient. I have a grandparent with Dementia and i've personally heard her ask for an early death, it's one of the most heart-wrenching things i've heard in my life and I don't think anyone has the right to deny that person their relief.

Now, i'm not in a position where I would have to make this decision right now and it's extremely difficult to empathise since the experience of having a terminal disease and knowing your death is rapidly approaching is almost unfathomable. However, I also think that were I in such a position I would like to keep in control of my life and not let whatever affliction I had control when and how I die.

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iMac Girl

I wholeheartedly agree.

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Voodoo

Many of my thoughts were well made in Nibbles and Dante's posts.

I would also like to mention that euthanasia also frees up a hospital bed as well as resources. Without wanting to be seen as too cold I think that prolonging someones inevitable death while other patients, who have the possibility of living are not recieving the quality of care that would be given with the resources and time that would be freed up from euthanasia is somewhat selfish, for want of a better word. That said, killing people to free up hospital beds is not a good way to practice but where applicable, and after meeting stringent conditions it should be considered.

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Flyt

Laissez-faire when it come to a persons life. A person should be able to do what they want with their life, up to and including ending it. Terminal illness should not need to be a requirement before a person can end his or her life. Who am I to tell someone they must continue doing something they do not want to?

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Dante

Flyt, suicide is not a crime (at least not in the UK), it's the matter of assisting someone, or in other words, killing someone. I think legalising it without regulation would give rise to a lot more murders leading to acquittals.

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Flyt

I was thinking along the lines of assisted suicide, a quadriplegic for example. They cannot reasonable end their own life...even through starvation, as they would be sent to a hospital when they fell unconscious. Therefore I would consider that to be euthanasia.
Maybe I'm off base, but isn't assisted suicide a form of euthanasia?, euthanasia of a mentally ill person. To me the suffering does not have to be physical suffering. Mental suffering can be just as bad if not worse than physical suffering.

Also, in most (and maybe all) of the US, suicide is illegal.

A few years ago there was the guy in Germany that killed and ate another guy that wanted to be killed and eaten. What was that?, murder?, assisted suicide?, euthanasia of a mentally ill person? Idon't know how to classify it.

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Dante

Ah, I thought when you said "Who am I to tell someone they must continue doing something they do not want to?" you meant that assisted suicide for anyone, mental/physical illness or not.

Also, I learned that both physician assisted suicide is legal in both Oregon and Washington, something which, to be honest impressed me. Without wishing to make a huge generalisation I was under the impression that the majority of America was Christian and disagreed with assisted suicide on principle.

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blub212212

Nibbles summed it all up really well..

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Dante

Why should the patient have to suffer before being allowed "treatment"? It doesn't make sense to me that you have to suffer before you're allowed a permanent end to your suffering, why feel any pain at all?

Also, "unbearable" is entirely subjective, something you don't really want in legislation as it opens up mountains of loopholes.

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WeAre138

jesus christ....we need some people who love jesus christ on this forum.

Honestly, there is no debate. Is there anybody with a differing opinion out there? Come on, register!

Voodoo

wanna get the ball rolling then?

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ishter

I find this one-sidedness very surprising, as this is often one of those 50-50 matters.. =/

Flyt

I am very much a believer in self determination and that a individual life has little value.

The whole assisted suicide counting as euthanasia is very much a slippery slope. Where do you draw the line where the individual is suffering? Its especially troublesome when mental suffering is counted as suffering (which I do). Someone who commits or attempts to commit suicide is (imo) mentally ill and most likely suffering great emotional pain. Should that pain count for euthanasia? or because it could be transitory should it not count? Is the "suffering" of a person that is mentally ill to the point where they can not functioning society more or less than a person with terminal cancer who is having their pain managed through drugs? Or how about the person who has been married for 75 years, their spouse dies and they no longer want to go on without him/her. They are without a doubt suffering and most likely will suffer until they too die, they have lived a long and hopefully full life. Should they be helped to ease their suffering?

Like I said earlier its a slippery slope and there are so many scenarios where its easy to be inconsistent. Personally I set the bar fairly low and would allow people to "euthanize" themselves. Call it suicide it you want, but to me they are eliminating their suffering in a way that is guaranteed to work. (As a side note: if they want to take themselves out of the gene pool, it will only make the human race stronger. Which brings up another good topic for debate that really does make me think and I have not come to any kind of a conclusion...evolution of the human species)


I'm not trying to be flippant here but iirc the Nazis considered what they did to people with Downs Syndrome euthanasia. To me that was murder. I have only known a few people with Downs, and they were the happiest, most caring and loving people I've ever met. If we could all act a little more like them the world would be a better place. Yet they were "euthanized".

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Nibbles

This quote is often brought up in these debates as the definition of euthanasia:

I stand by the requirement of "unbearable suffering" because the only reason for active euthanasia to be used in the first place is if there is no other option to relieve pain (and this may be a point of contention for us).

If we remove this requirement (point 1), then we are left with:

2. death must be inevitable and drawing near;
3. the patient must give consent.


I deleted point 4 as it is now irrelevant and the only conditions would be 2 and 3. I don't agree with these conditions on their own. Nor do I agree that someone should just be able to rock up to their doctor for an assisted suicide. There has to be a damn good reason for it.

Now there is a lot of subjectivity there as you mentioned, but as there is no way to objectively quantify pain, I can't see any other way of wording it. I would imagine that in all cases where euthanasia is being considered (and it should probably be enforced), that the doctor would seek second opinions and a board would be formed to review and document (though this would probably fall into the category of point 4) such that if the decision was ever brought up in court, there should be enough clear justification.

Flyt

Nibbles, I'm curious, why do you feel that someone should be "unbearably suffering" before being helped? To me that seems very cruel.

I have/am facing a terminal illness. I have CML and was diagnosed ten years ago, I was 31 at the time. At the time of my diagnosis I was given less than two years to live. In those two years a new drug came out that interferes with the reproduction of the leukemic cells. I have since gone into remission but nobody knows if the remission will last or when (not if) the remission ends how fast I'll go down hill. Before the new drug came out I did a huge amount of research on what I could expect my last two years to be like and had picked a point where I was going to take thing into my own hands and not let the disease/nature takes its own course anymore. Death from leukemia isn't supposed to be very painful, it is death from anemia. you get tiered and your organs begin to shut down from lack of nutrients, lack of oxygen, and inability to flush toxins from your blood. I considered what I had decided to be self euthanasia as I knew waiting for the inevitable was going to be suffering (mentally) on my part.... and I wanted no part of it. I would have or will do it myself but a doctor doing to for me would have been or will be nice.

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Nibbles

Like I said above, I agree with the definition of euthanasia, that it is used as a last resort to end pain where no other method will work. If there isn't a great deal of pain, then I don't believe euthanasia is justified.

EDIT: we might have a debate on our hands after all!

Flyt

So is it just a matter of definition and everything else falls under assisted suicide (which could be a different debate)?

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Nibbles

Probably. I think we all agree with the concept to some extent, but the details change with definition.

Sorry to hear about your situation there too man. That's awful.

Flyt

Thanks...but it is what it is. I figure its part of why I have such a warped perception of the value of a life. I didn't always feel this way.

Many of these topics have revolved around the value of a human life and the end of life. I figure its because nobody has any empirical evidence as to what comes after the lights go out.. therefore they are topics for which there is no "right" answer.

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ishter

Geez flyt that is major and I'm sorry to hear, but I am also glad things are looking positive.

I would love to experience that feeling you must've felt when the doctor broke the news regarding remission, and I wish you the best of luck in the future.

I'm also going to have to agree with nibbles, disregarding how cold this viewpoint may seem. But the parameters for allowing euthanasia must be strict to say the least, and I think suffering should be required (whether it be mental or physical) to warrant one to be euthanized. I do realize this may be somewhat hard to prove as who can accurately determine the level of an individuals suffering, but the requirements must be strict.

Flyt

I understand that both of you are insisting on suffering being part of the requirement to permit euthanasia. What I dont understand is why? Why must someone suffer? Does it make their passing more noble? Is it that you feel human life is so valuable that it must be prolonged at all costs? Is it that you dont care about the person or their families and insist that they go through all the unpleasantness and anguish associate with a painful period leading up to death because of some other "higher" reason? Or is it a way to avoid the slippery slope I was talking about earlier?
I'm not trying to make you feel bad about your position, I want to understand it.

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