Are You For Or Against Euthanasia?
By skysuccess
@skysuccess (8858)
Singapore
December 10, 2008 4:39am CST
I just came across an article on the Daily Mail (UK) today and I would just like to share this with everyone here and ask for your take on this.
The article is about a wife who had brought her husband to this Suicide Clinic in Switzerland to end his life, after being diagnosed with an incurable motor neurone disease (MND). On top of it all, she has actually allowed the television company to film the whole ordeal of the last moments.
It is a very touching article indeed and I am just awe struck. Through it all, I am just being more wary just how fragile life can be and that we should actually cherish it. However, I just could not see myself actually deciding on such a path even if I were to be struck with a fatal and incurable disease or cancer. There is another part of me that just wants to put up a fight and I am sure that some family members of mine will be ever supportive of it. Yet, there is another side where the road will be quite eventful and may even be a toll on those around and myself including.
As much as what has been said and published here, I still could not come clean with a decision to end it on my accord. What about you? Will you do it? Or are you against euthanasia totally?
6 people like this
13 responses
@LaurenInLA (2270)
• United States
10 Dec 08
I have such a lust for life that I can't envision that I would choose to euthanize myself. On the other hand, I have seen some family members die long and painful deaths and remember thinking that there should be some humane way to end life when a person is suffering so much and there is no longer any quality of life. We euthanize our pets out of love so logic tells me that we should be able to end human life out of love as well. Still, morally and ethically, I think that I would have a problem doing it. My religion teaches me that God is the only one who has the power to end a life and I'm not sure that I could get past that.
5 people like this
@sharra1 (6340)
• Australia
10 Dec 08
But would you refuse to let someone else have that right to end their own life. That is what many religious people and politicians do now. I have no wish to die but if I lost any quality of life I might think differently and I would like the right to make that choice for myself.
4 people like this
@LaurenInLA (2270)
• United States
10 Dec 08
I absolutely believe that it is a personal decision and if someone wants to end their own life, it is their decision to make. Politicians should have no voice in that decision. Religion should have a voice but not be the determinate. I also agree with your point in terms of ending your own life. Since I haven't been in the kind of pain that might make me want to end my life, I cannot say that I wouldn't give that option serious consideration were I to be in that situation.
4 people like this
@grandpa_lash (5225)
• Australia
10 Dec 08
I have been in constant pain, not too severe but requiring prescription painkillers, for the last decade. Eventually that pain, or the development of my emphesema, will become so insisitent taht it will make my life a total misery, and since I consider I've had a pretty full life and don't really have the urge to battle too much for what's left of it, I will take the early retirement option when I deem the time has come. That won't be for another ten years at least, or so I would hope.
Lash
4 people like this
@skysuccess (8858)
• Singapore
11 Dec 08
grandpa_lash,
First of all, I do hope that your condition will improve and that a cure or miracle will arrive in due time (sincerely from the bottom of my heart to a friend like you). However, I do hope that you will be slow with the decision to retire early should that 10th year arrives. I would hate loosing a friend like you to this option and I am sure that your loved ones would hate too. I think the sense of attachment would be much stronger at your end there and my question then is would you still have the heart for that "retirement" plan when the other party would want to be with you through the thick and thin of it, till it is actually your time as decreed by God?
They say experience is the best teacher and in the words of Kevin Arnold “Memory is a way of holding on to the things you love, the things you are, the things you never want to lose.” Hope you will recover soon and that not give up a good fight with tough times.
Take care and thanks for your posts.
1 person likes this
@sharra1 (6340)
• Australia
12 Dec 08
Oh not to worry. He will not take that path unless it has become unbearable to live with and I hope that will not happen for a long time but every winter we are going to be worried as that is when lung problems get bad.
But if it gets so bad that life has become unbearable then why should he be forced to suffer like that.
2 people like this
@grandpa_lash (5225)
• Australia
11 Dec 08
Well yes, it does. The only concern I will have is to be sure my partner doesn't run into any legal difficulties from my actions.
Lash
3 people like this
@sharra1 (6340)
• Australia
10 Dec 08
I could see myself taking that path. If I was dying in agony I would not want to hang around for the last agonising moments. I want the right to choose when I leave this life and the right to be able to die with dignity and not in endless suffering.
I do not see why someone else has the right to say I cannot do it just because they think it is morally wrong. I do not see it that way and it is my life not theirs.
4 people like this
@skysuccess (8858)
• Singapore
11 Dec 08
sharra1,
Thanks for dropping by, I do agree with you that life could be a real pain at times. However, we do not simply live by and with ourselves alone. We have loved ones, siblings, spouse, children and friends - what if they do not want you to leave but wants to stay by your side and fight the fight of your lifetime?
I am coming along the lines from POST 1 and I am trying to offer you another perspective which I am sure some of your love ones are along those trend of thoughts.
Take care and do have a nice day.
2 people like this
@grandpa_lash (5225)
• Australia
11 Dec 08
Then we need to define the terms of your question. There are two main forms of euthanasia, voluntary and involuntary. I do not believe in involuntary euthanasia; I do believe in voluntary euthanasia. Involuntary euthanasia could well lead to the situation rocketj1 fears. It is generally seen as being applied to those who are unable to speak for themselves on the assumption that if they could they would choose to die. This I see as extremely dangerous. Voluntary euthanasia, especially if it is a matter of law that mental competence be established before the request is granted, has no such dangers.
In legal terms it should be quite simple to phrase legislation is such a way that involuntary euthanasia simply could not be assumed from the legislation. That's what legal training is for.
Lash
3 people like this
@grandpa_lash (5225)
• Australia
10 Dec 08
We're talking about the right to self-determination, not the right of a government to decide.
Lash
2 people like this
@lynnemg (4529)
• United States
10 Dec 08
I am a firm believer that it is not up to us to decide when and how we die, therefore; I could not see myself going to such a place no matter how bad off I was. I do also believe that a person has the right to make their own decisions. I have watched many people suffer for a very long time in pain and agony, and having seen that, I can understand why people would make that choice. I am against euthanasia for myself, and I doubt I could bring myself to help a family member kill themself, but I am not altogether against it, because it is such a personal choice.
3 people like this
@cienna (50)
• Philippines
10 Dec 08
I also heard of that facility in Switzerland. I think it's the same one where a certain sport celebrity went to also end his life(?).
For me though, I just don't believe that we have a right to end someone's life. I had an experience of having a family member suffer from an illness, so i know how the wife felt. but then, it is immoral and against my belief to resort to euthanasia. Only GOD has the right to take someone's life because He was the one who gave it to us. as family and/or friends our role should only be to extend our love and support to him/her and make him/her as comfortable as we can.
3 people like this
@kat_princess (1470)
• Philippines
12 Dec 08
I'm pro-life and I'm against processes that are against life such as this.It's so sad to know that this is happening.We should value human life because it's so fragile.
1 person likes this
@teapotmommommerced (10359)
• United States
16 Dec 08
I am not sure what I will do when the time is near or if I was in terrible pain that no amount of pain medication will cut. In my opinion you have to think of quality of life and not quantity.
1 person likes this
@manunulat (604)
• Philippines
11 Dec 08
It's against my oath, my profession and my core belief. While there are "orders" in the hospital that is yet to be challenged, like the "Do not resuscitate order"... participating in euthanasia basically to end the life of a patient is a "never" especially when all options has not yet being tapped. An individual who wants to end his life needs help and a family who chose to end a members' life needs help. It is an open argument. The question is, "who should take hold of our lives?" Anything that goes against nature is troublesome and this is where I stand.
1 person likes this
@marshiemallows (1010)
• Philippines
11 Dec 08
even if the time would come that i'll seeing one of my love ones suffering, i wouldn't even try or think about killing them myself. i think i would just pray and ask God that if ever they are destined not to survive that suffering, i hope He won't let them spend longer time in pain and agony.
i just don't think that euthanasia is right because even if your reason for doing so is good, it just wouldn't justify the misdeed which is taking someone else's life.
2 people like this
@bellebads (740)
• Philippines
11 Dec 08
i can't imagine my self doing the procedure/process. i'm a prolife and i believe in miracles. only god has the right to take away the life of any person. but i can't blame others by doing euthanasia, maybe because it's to much for them to bear to see their loved ones dying in pain so they choose to end the agony than seing their loved ones in that situation.
2 people like this
