Call for Euthanasia on Psychological Grounds To Be Banned

[Nearly Sane]

No, they aren't passing responsibility on to anyone, they want to be able to access the drugs - that doesn't make anyone else responsible, they still have to take them.

O.

Doesn't someone have to provide them in some form of controlled environment? While they, and society, are not responsible for the act itself, they are responsible for the facilitation?

[Udayana]

No, they aren't passing responsibility on to anyone, they want to be able to access the drugs - that doesn't make anyone else responsible, they still have to take them.

O.

That still involves the "rest of us". Someone has to manufacture and prescribe these drugs or otherwise make them available.

[Nearly Sane]

We're stuck in a catch 22 here. If someone is suffering from an untreatable mental illness, we will define them as not responsible enough to be helped in taking their own life. If they are responsible enough that we think their desire to die is not because of an untreatable mental illness, then they aren't suffering enough to be helped in taking their own life.


It's hardly surprising when in many ways our categorisation of mental illness despite the work done over the last fifty years, is really not much more than at the level of weird but not dangerous, sad but not bad, bit dodgy, and nutjob.


Putting anything that vague into legislation is a nightmare, never mind that there isn't clear agreement on how people should be treated even when they are suffering incredible physical pain, and we determine that they are of sound mind and want to be able to be helped to die when they are unable to do so themselves. I suspect in part because some people even then see it as indicative of not being of sound mind.


Added to that the fear that some people might be manipulated into a painless societally acceptable suicide, if there is no criteria to be used other than they appear to want to, is a legitimate one, and one hard to guard against.

[floo]

Yes, I generally agree that for un-treatable cases, physical or mental, where there is unrelieved suffering  that society should help in dying. There will always be some debate over which cases are treatable/un-treatable, which suffering is unbearable, which not.

It is the person suffering who has the final say as to what is bearable and what is not, imo.

[Shaker]

That still involves the "rest of us". Someone has to manufacture and prescribe these drugs or otherwise make them available.

These aren't special death-dealing drugs designed only to kill people though - they're barbiturates, used to induce muscle relaxation and sleep.

The drugs used for execution by lethal injection in some US states are becoming increasingly hard to come by, but that's because the manufacturers won't supply them to prisons based on a moral objection to capital punishment, not because they're made only to kill people.

[floo]

Supposing assisted dying was legalised in the UK, which required that people were specifically trained to carry out the procedure, would anyone on this forum be willing to train as an assisted dying practitioner?

[Shaker]

Supposing assisted dying was legalised in the UK, which required that people were specifically trained to carry out the procedure, would anyone on this forum be willing to train as an assisted dying practitioner?

Yes. I regard suffering as A Bad Thing and think that anything which can be done to avoid it is A Good Thing. I would regard such a function as a compassionate vocation designed to that end.

[Udayana]

These aren't special death-dealing drugs designed only to kill people though - they're barbiturates, used to induce muscle relaxation and sleep.

The drugs used for execution by lethal injection in some US states are becoming increasingly hard to come by, but that's because the manufacturers won't supply them to prisons based on a moral objection to capital punishment, not because they're made only to kill people.

Indeed. Probably not very hard to obtain illegally.

On a different tack ... how could it be your right to kill yourself (with state aid) but not to obtain all drugs, over the counter, for your own unregulated use?

[floo]

Yes. I regard suffering as A Bad Thing and think that anything which can be done to avoid it is A Good Thing. I would regard such a function as a compassionate vocation designed to that end.

I would certainly be willing to be trained for such a purpose, and would do it on a voluntary basis and not for payment.

[Outrider]

That still involves the "rest of us". Someone has to manufacture and prescribe these drugs or otherwise make them available.

If we consider people's right to self-determination to be a valid idea, then providing people options is equally an individual right. Whilst you might not want to take part, you aren't just advocating stopping someone because you don't want to take part, but you're advocating stopping those of us that are in favour of making these available from doing that, as well.

And still, why - no-one would be forcing you to take part, it's making the option available to other people. We, as a society, still permit people to smoke even though we know that it will kill some of them in gruesome, horrible ways - should we ban smoking? Drinking alcohol, which is the most damaging drug out there on the market at the moment, licit or otherwise.

O.

[Nearly Sane]

Except we obviously don't go down the whole consistent line on self determination. You can argue we should but I can't go out and buy heroin approved by the law.
 
I can't get a gun either, nor do we necessarily allow people that we think of as not being.of sound mind to do everything that we might allow others.

[Udayana]

If we consider people's right to self-determination to be a valid idea, then providing people options is equally an individual right. Whilst you might not want to take part, you aren't just advocating stopping someone because you don't want to take part, but you're advocating stopping those of us that are in favour of making these available from doing that, as well.

And still, why - no-one would be forcing you to take part, it's making the option available to other people. We, as a society, still permit people to smoke even though we know that it will kill some of them in gruesome, horrible ways - should we ban smoking? Drinking alcohol, which is the most damaging drug out there on the market at the moment, licit or otherwise.

O.

Yes, I just reflected on that same train of thought above. Not really sure how easy access to methods of killing yourself, slowly or not, affects the principle of whether society should support termination of lives for reasons not generally considered reasonable.