Ethics: Doctor-Assisted Suicide

[PK1]

Thing on CNN's 'crawl' a few days ago mentioned Belgium considering making it legal for children with terminal illnesses to request euthanasia. oogling around for more information, The Netherlands already allows children as young as 12 to request suicide (with their parents' consent.)

Is this ethical? I would say it isn't. I conceed though often times our objections to suicide are more for our own comfort than the patient's, but giving this option to people just feels wrong.

So, exactly how much should a doctor get for expunging a life: one hundred, a thousand, perhaps a hundred thousand dollar? They don't practice medicine for nothing. And who is going to pay for this simple thing? The public? Why not just toss individuals off a cliff. That would be free and the end would be exactly the same.

I personally believe that the dying have an opportunity to teach us, strength of character, hope, love, and how to live and appreciate every moment we have. OR, they can demonstrate how to run away from adversity.

Now I do not believe in having every operation and taking every drug up to that moment of death. I do firmly believe that one can certainly turn his or her life over to the Creator and say, "Whenever You are ready Lord ---- I'm in Your hands." And frankly, God doesn't send a bill.

Like I said I'm from Belgium and I don't mind having to pay for this. I don't believe that there's anything gained, emotionaly, spiritiully or that it's neccesarry to show charactar when you are in pain and have no hope of relief. How much do you think a person with Lou Gehrig's appriciates life when he lays in his bed and can't even blink anymore, or the person who's in the last stages of cancer, drugged up so he's in a constant state of semi-wakefullness? This is a difficult topic but I don't believe anybody has the right to tell another person how to die, anymore then he has the right to tell someone how to live. And if a person decides enough is enough, I find it humane that that person is given the right to do it legaly, cleanly and at a time of his choosing.

---
On the side, i had a lot of fun visiting Belgium earlier this year; great food, beer and scenery in/near old towns like Ghent/Gent/Gand, Brugge/Bruges or resort town Knokke-Heist or even busy Brussels. Antwerpen did not impress me as much, but i only passed thru it.
Is it my imagination, or has traffic gotten much worse over the past decade?
.

 

[forkup]

Thing on CNN's 'crawl' a few days ago mentioned Belgium considering making it legal for children with terminal illnesses to request euthanasia. oogling around for more information, The Netherlands already allows children as young as 12 to request suicide (with their parents' consent.)

Is this ethical? I would say it isn't. I conceed though often times our objections to suicide are more for our own comfort than the patient's, but giving this option to people just feels wrong.

So, exactly how much should a doctor get for expunging a life: one hundred, a thousand, perhaps a hundred thousand dollar? They don't practice medicine for nothing. And who is going to pay for this simple thing? The public? Why not just toss individuals off a cliff. That would be free and the end would be exactly the same.

I personally believe that the dying have an opportunity to teach us, strength of character, hope, love, and how to live and appreciate every moment we have. OR, they can demonstrate how to run away from adversity.

Now I do not believe in having every operation and taking every drug up to that moment of death. I do firmly believe that one can certainly turn his or her life over to the Creator and say, "Whenever You are ready Lord ---- I'm in Your hands." And frankly, God doesn't send a bill.

Like I said I'm from Belgium and I don't mind having to pay for this. I don't believe that there's anything gained, emotionaly, spiritiully or that it's neccesarry to show charactar when you are in pain and have no hope of relief. How much do you think a person with Lou Gehrig's appriciates life when he lays in his bed and can't even blink anymore, or the person who's in the last stages of cancer, drugged up so he's in a constant state of semi-wakefullness? This is a difficult topic but I don't believe anybody has the right to tell another person how to die, anymore then he has the right to tell someone how to live. And if a person decides enough is enough, I find it humane that that person is given the right to do it legaly, cleanly and at a time of his choosing.

---
On the side, i had a lot of fun visiting Belgium earlier this year; great food, beer and scenery in/near old towns like Ghent/Gent/Gand, Brugge/Bruges or resort town Knokke-Heist or even busy Brussels. Antwerpen did not impress me as much, but i only passed thru it.
Is it my imagination, or has traffic gotten much worse over the past decade?
.

Lol, you have no idea. At least 25 percent in the last decade, probably more

 

[sealybobo]

Thing on CNN's 'crawl' a few days ago mentioned Belgium considering making it legal for children with terminal illnesses to request euthanasia. oogling around for more information, The Netherlands already allows children as young as 12 to request suicide (with their parents' consent.)

Is this ethical? I would say it isn't. I conceed though often times our objections to suicide are more for our own comfort than the patient's, but giving this option to people just feels wrong.

My mom's dying of Alzheimer's. It's so sad. I think at this point we are close to being comfortable with giving her enough morphine to kill her. She's just suffering at this point. But it would be hard.

At least we go see her every day. I see people in that home who have no quality of life.

I know it seems right to take care of them best we can till they die naturally but that's no way to live.

My mom is suffering and all we can do is comfort her while we watch.

And she can't take the pill herself. She can't do anything.

But funny me and my dad keep feeding her. One doctor hinted we could just stop feeding her so much but we can't do that to mom.

I can't imagine she can live like she is very long but they say some live for years

 

[sealybobo]

"The worst pain is still better than the best being dead." Me.

I disagree. Obviously you've never been in pain that ain't going away.

And don't you believe in heaven? I don't but don't you?

 

[RodISHI]

Nazi Germany went down this road and it led to genocide but I guess people want to do it again. What a bunch of fuckheads you people are.

What a moron, comparing personal willful and sometimes personal willful assisted suicide with enforced euthanasia. Obviously high school history was as far as you got, if that far.

He is trying to warn people it is a slippery slope and opening a door that was not easy to shut the first time around.

 

[forkup]

Nazi Germany went down this road and it led to genocide but I guess people want to do it again. What a bunch of fuckheads you people are.

What a moron, comparing personal willful and sometimes personal willful assisted suicide with enforced euthanasia. Obviously high school history was as far as you got, if that far.

He is trying to warn people it is a slippery slope and opening a door that was not easy to shut the first time around.

I think it's a serious stretch, to compare people choosing they have suffered enough, to a state killing of people it deems undesirable. Euthanasia has been legal in a lot of first world nations for decades so the slippery slope theory is both incorrect and dishonest.