Mercy Killing? Euthanasia? Split From Capt. Semrau Thread

[Occam]

No offense to those involved but this is NOT a thread about abortion.

That's a whole different ball game with its own thread somewhere.

Bruce

Mea culpa.  I brought it up because there are definitely some points in common to the two issues, and religion plays a big part of those points.  It took a long time for abortion to be legalized in Canada, and I think it'll likely take a long time for euthanasia/assisted suicide to be legalized/decriminalized as well.  Getting the issue out on the table is the first step...

 

[Bruce Monkhouse]

No problem but, from past experience, I just know THAT topic will smother this topic and I will end up splitting them again.....


....and I'm lazy.

 

[vonGarvin]

Fine and dandy, their own moral code doesn't bother me. What bothers me is, why should their own personal moral rule over my own personal moral code? I suppose we're going to get into whole "well that is democracy" stuff, and the majority is right, but that's why we have a Charter of Rights and Freedoms, because the majority CAN be wrong, so we agree that the majority cannot take away certain basic human rights.

I could counter with "Well, your moral code bothers me", stick my tongue out and walk away; however, that is my point exactly.  Society has a code of "values", encoded in laws, charters, etc.  If there is a law/charter or what have you with which I disagree, then I campaign to change it.  Homosexuals changed the very definition of "marriage" in this country.  How?  By challenging the existing "code".  Parliament bought their flavour aid, and now men marry other men.

Somebody supporting /mercy killing/ etc etc etc, is not forcing you assist in killing a loved one of yours, or killing somebody you feel deserves mercy. So they are not forcing anything on you.

Faulty logic.  By that logic, since Paul Bernardo's raping and killing spree in the 1990s had ZERO effect on me, does that mean I have no right to say "You know what?  Raping and then killing your wife's sister is probably a bad thing, and I think it should be illegal.  I also think that it's probably wrong to hack up the body, encase it in cement and then drop it in the drink.  Oh, and videotaping it is a no-brainer: don't even go there!"? 

The thing about "ethics", "morality", or even just "right/wrong", "good/evil" is that people (you and I included) do care about things that have no effect on us personally, simply because it's the right thing to do. Perhaps Kant was right in talking about "universalisation" and all that jazz.

 

[ballz]

Did Paul Bernardo's actions step over SOMEBODY's rights? ANYBODY's? Yes. They did. The victim's "right to life." That's is why it was illegal. It may have had zero effect on YOU, but the same couldn't be said for everybody.

The reason homosexuals got the definition of marriage changed was *not* by changing anything, but applying the already existing Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which outlines basic human rights. They argued that the current laws that were in place was against their basic human rights, and Supreme Court of Canada agreed.

Whether 99% of Canadians were strong devoted Catholics and disagreed with Gay Marriage was irrelevant, because it was against their right as a human being. The majority was wrong. If we were at war with an African country and the majority of Canadians wanted to put all the blacks in jail in case they were spies, that would violate the basic human rights of those human beings so it would not be allowed (although it has been in the past... :-\).

And right now, I'm making the same argument for assisted-suicide / mercy killing. If there's one thing I've got a right to as a human being, it's dying. If I have any right, it is the right to die, if nothing else. Any law that tells me I can't die as I please to, as long as I don't infringe on anybody elses basic human rights, is, according to the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, an unjust law.

It's not about my moral code bothering you, it's your moral infringing on my basic human right. Quite frankly, you can't make the argument that assisted-suicide does anything to infringe on your basic human rights (whether it bothers you or not). I can make the argument that a law stopping me from ending my own misery does infringe on my rights.

To bring it back to the gay marriage comparison, gay marriage, while it may bother some people, does not infringe on anybody's rights. Not allowing gays to get married does infringe on somebody's rights.

Same s**t, different pile.

EDIT TO ADD: Actually, the only argument that anti-gay marriage activists had to stand on, is that marriage is a religious ceremony, so they were trying to argue that forcing them to recognize a homosexual marriage, and to marry homosexuals, was infringing on their basic human right which is "freedom of religion." They did have a leg to stand on, although they lost.

In this case of assisted-suicide / mercy killing, that argument does not apply. It's not forcing somebody who doesn't believe in it to do it. There are no legs to stand on IMO.

 

[observor 69]

Some thoughts:
A number of my family members are nurses in critical care( ICU and Emerg.).
Aside from an argument over mercy killing/euthanasia what they experience on a regular basis is the "quality of life" aspect.
People who without any question have "zero" quality of life due to age, disease etc..
As nurses they have to watch a person continue in this state prolonged by medicine and technology and compounded by family members being indecisive about DNR status.
I have heard the arguments for years but the reality for many nurses is patients who experience a miserable slow exit from "this mortal coil".

 

[TangoTwoBravo]

What this has to do with the Taliban is that they have the exact same attitude. "The infidels can have their laws, this is our country, and we'll do it as we see fit." Is anybody getting any further ahead from them closing their eyes, plugging their ears, and burying their head in the sand?

It's a simple question that you haven't answered, what is the difference between letting somebody die and helping somebody terminally ill kill themselves? That is why the hypothetical situations are being brought up.

Standing by and letting them die is no different in my mind than assisting them in suicide. To me, you either support both, or support neither. So, I say again, what is the difference between letting somebody die and helping somebody terminally ill that wants to off themself?

The other question I have (but please answer the other one first), why is it any of your business if somebody else chooses to die instead of suffering for 6 months? Why should you decide that they shouldn't be allowed to? They're not in anyway forcing you to end your life if you're ever in the same situation. They won't care if you choose to suffer for the 6 months, why do you care if they choose not to? What gives you the right to stop them?

And this isn't about "suicide prevention" in the least bit. We're not talking about making it legal to string up a depressed 16 year old by their neck and kick the chair out from in under their legs for them.

You should drop your Taliban and Swiss red herrings. You have been introducing them to the argument. My point is that we are not debating how the Swiss should handle this issue. They have their laws and we have ours. They have their underlying political consensus and we have ours. What applies to one does not necessarily apply to the other.

As for your questions, I will lay it out my ethical code. I believe that people must consent to have medical procedures performed on them. I believe that it is wrong to help someone take their own life. By the same token it is wrong to take someones life (unless in self-defence or war etc). I am focused here on actions. I also believe that our brain is "us." If the brain is dead we are dead.

By my logic, a person can choose to refuse lifesaving medical procedures. The ethical requirement to obtain consent to perform an action overides any ethical requirement to provide medical care. Thus, it is the individuals right to consent to interventions that is trumping my obligation to help that person. I watch him die, but it is only because he is refusing treatment and I am placing his individual freedom higher than my ethical requirement (a legal requirement may not exist) to help prevent his death. The hospital is withholding care, but only at the request of the individual. I see this as fundamentally different than performing an action that results in death (ie. introducing a poison).

You are saying that watching someone die is the same as killing them, and I don't necessarily see it that way. It would be wrong to encourage a person standing on a bridge preparing to suicide to jump, or to suggest a more lethal point of departure, or to offer to push if he asks me to (he doesn't quite have the nerve and he wants some assistance). Those actions would be unethical and illegal. Watching it happen, especially if he is refusing assistance, is tragic but not the same as actively assisting. While there are certainly crimes of ommision, they usually deal with the failure to perform some mandated duty. While I stop at accident scenes and will ask a distraught stranger at a busstop or airport what is wrong, I am under no obligation to do so.

In the case of a person on a ventilator without any brain activity (I'm not a doctor), the difficult decision to remove the ventilator may seem like it is killing that person. If the patient cannot breathe on their own and has no brain activity, though, I believe that they are dead. We are removing the medical intervention that is keeping the rest of their tissues alive. This is not the same thing as smothering him, or removing all the oxygen from his room when he would have otherwise been able to breathe on his own.

Similarly, starving someone is a crime. The ethical dilemma occurs when someone chooses to starve themselves (either overtly or covertly). I use dilemma because there is a choice between two negative outcomes. Again, barring other information I weigh on the side of the individuals consent and would not force-feed someone.

 

[vonGarvin]

(Keeping on target: therefore I've re-written this post a few times).
I get what you guys are saying.  I do.  I just think that using terms such as "quality of life" to determine if someone should live or not.  The slope is both steep and slippery, and when dealing with human life, we ought to tread carefully. I mean, the extreme, and I mean EXTREME is to unilaterally declare that so-and-so's life is of zero quality, and therefore we ought to end it. 

OK, so, the person decides, we give them the revolver, and we leave the room.  Ah, but so-and-so is too weak to operate a gun.  No worries, here's a razor blade.  So-and-so has no arms?  Hmm...this is a dilly of a pickle....When does going to someone and ending their life "on their behalf" become mercy, and taking another's life stop being murder?  I hate to invoke Godwin here, but some salacious regimes in the past have also endorsed euthanasia.  The whole thing is one large Pandora's box, and I'd rather keep it closed, thank you very much.


As for youth in Asia, well, that's a different story ;D

 

[ballz]

You should drop your Taliban and Swiss red herrings. You have been introducing them to the argument. My point is that we are not debating how the Swiss should handle this issue. They have their laws and we have ours. They have their underlying political consensus and we have ours. What applies to one does not necessarily apply to the other.

The Swiss are very relevant to this debate and how you can try and ignore it is beyond me. It is a culture not too far from our own that has legalized assisted-suicide and has established guidelines.

Furthermore, if you don't care that the Swiss do it, why do you give a rat's ass if somebody in Newfoundland does it? Or if somebody down the street does it? THAT is no more your business than somebody in Switzerland doing, and doesn't affect you anymore than that either. What is the fricken difference? Neither is forcing you to consent to anything you don't want to do.

I am placing his individual freedom higher than my ethical requirement

And what is it exactly you are doing when you prevent a man from ending his own pro-longed suffering by speeding up his inevitable death? You certainly aren't respecting his freedom to make up his own mind then.

You are saying that watching someone die is the same as killing them, and I don't necessarily see it that way. It would be wrong to encourage a person standing on a bridge preparing to suicide to jump, or to suggest a more lethal point of departure, or to offer to push if he asks me to (he doesn't quite have the nerve and he wants some assistance). Those actions would be unethical and illegal. Watching it happen, especially if he is refusing assistance, is tragic but not the same as actively assisting. While there are certainly crimes of ommision, they usually deal with the failure to perform some mandated duty. While I stop at accident scenes and will ask a distraught stranger at a busstop or airport what is wrong, I am under no obligation to do so.

Okay, cut this crap. That is a ridiculous example of assisted suicide. When I made that comparison I was specifically saying "If you don't intervene in that scenario, it is wrong, and you are just as guilty as if you killed him yourself" and you know that's what I was saying. Don't try and take that analogy and compare it to this.

We are talking about legalizing it for a consenting terminally ill person, who is going to die regardless, but is suffering a prolonged, painful, and indignified death, and is unable to commit the deed themself because of physical limitations.

What is the difference in this person, who is doomed anyway, consenting to be terminated because "if I could do it myself, I would," and unplugging a ventilator due to prior consent being given????

I weigh on the side of the individuals consent and would not force-feed someone.

I'm hoping you don't understand me as much as I'm not understanding you so that I can take comfort in the fact that we're just not getting through to each other due to communication barriers or something. Quite frankly I'm officially giving up.

You're all about an individual's consent yet if someone is literally begging to have their life ended due to the physical pain and agony they are suffering, you think it's more ethical to ignore their consent and last wishes and let them suffer? I give up.

I just think that using terms such as "quality of life" to determine if someone should live or not.  The slope is both steep and slippery, and when dealing with human life, we ought to tread carefully. I mean, the extreme, and I mean EXTREME is to unilaterally declare that so-and-so's life is of zero quality, and therefore we ought to end it.

The PERSON has to determine this. Nobody else's opinion matters. This is not a bunch of family members sitting around deciding whether to off their loved one or not. They have no say. It is their loved one that decided it. I hope you both watched the damn video I posted because it does not seem so. 

OK, so, the person decides, we give them the revolver, and we leave the room.  Ah, but so-and-so is too weak to operate a gun.  No worries, here's a razor blade.  So-and-so has no arms?  Hmm...this is a dilly of a pickle....When does going to someone and ending their life "on their behalf" become mercy, and taking another's life stop being murder?  I hate to invoke Godwin here, but some salacious regimes in the past have also endorsed euthanasia.  The whole thing is one large Pandora's box, and I'd rather keep it closed, thank you very much.

As was done in the video that I posted, hold a cup and a straw with a lethal dose of a drug in it up to the person's mouth. If they drink it, they go to sleep and die. No revolvers or arms needed. If they're at the point that they can't drink under their own power, they're probably at the point where you can unplug a few things and let them die anyway.

The act of giving them a loaded revolver and walking out of the room, and holding a cup of poison to their mouth with a straw, is not different. In both cases, it is assisted suicide. It is also assisted suicide if there's no poison around, and the person has no arms, and he consents to you shooting him, so you do. Quite honestly, poison or bullet, or any other method, is irrelevant.

It becomes murder when the person doesn't want you to shoot them in the head, or doesn't want to drink the poison, and you shoot them or force the poison down their throat.

The key factor here is obviously CONSENT.

 

[mariomike]

Similarly, starving someone is a crime. The ethical dilemma occurs when someone chooses to starve themselves (either overtly or covertly). I use dilemma because there is a choice between two negative outcomes. Again, barring other information I weigh on the side of the individuals consent and would not force-feed someone.

The wife and I were watching NCIS the other night and Ducky said the Bread and Water punishment was not to starve the prisoner, but to turn the bread into a brick like substance inside your digestive tract. Maybe that's where the term "- - - - a brick" came from?
My understanding is that you can be force fed under the Mental Health Act. Political hunger strikes are another matter.
Regarding Force Feeding, this is what Wiki has to say on the subject:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Force-feeding

 

[Bruce Monkhouse]

The Swiss are very relevant to this debate and how you can try and ignore it is beyond me. It is a culture not too far from our own

Are you frikkin' kidding me?  Everything else you typed was skimmed over after reading this kife.

Starting out a discussion by comparing us to one of the most xenophobic societies in the free world isn't the best way to get the right attention.

 

[ballz]

Never heard anything about Swiss xenophobia until now. Never actually heard of the word xenophobia now too.

I always thought they were known as a "haven of peace and neutrality." I'll keep reading of course.

So I've written like 8 or 9 lengthy posts in this discussion and I wrote one apparently ignorant statement so nothing I say is now credible?

Sorry I'm not perfect bud.

 

[Bruce Monkhouse]

No, but when you have someone like myself who would be considered a 'swing voter",  words, or especially the way they can be taken, can mean a lot.

 

[Fishbone Jones]

Folks

Time to sum up. As happens everytime this, and a couple of other (abortion) subjects comes up, it ends up in a slugfest.

We've been through this stuff before and no one gets their minds changed, or enlightened. You've all dragged your same arguements around and around, with no added points or weight.

It only degrades into an internet 'Oh Yeah?' 'Yeah!' arguement. It normally ends with people on warning.

So once again, sum up. This one is heading for a lock also, before the inevitable happens.

Milnet.ca Staff

 

[ballz]

Well they have 4 national languages, immigration rate not far from our own, 20-25% of the workforce were not born in Switzerland, and they're politically neutral. I see things like "haven for peace" showing up quite often.

Everything I do see about them and xenophobia seems to be talking just as much about the UK, France, etc. as the Swiss.

I'll keep reading but I dunno doesn't seem like they're planning the next holocaust by any means.

-------------------------

RG, I'm done/satisfied. My thoughts are pretty clear and don't need another synopsis.

 

[TangoTwoBravo]

Furthermore, if you don't care that the Swiss do it, why do you give a rat's *** if somebody in Newfoundland does it? Or if somebody down the street does it? THAT is no more your business than somebody in Switzerland doing, and doesn't affect you anymore than that either. What is the fricken difference? Neither is forcing you to consent to anything you don't want to do.

And what is it exactly you are doing when you prevent a man from ending his own pro-longed suffering by speeding up his inevitable death? You certainly aren't respecting his freedom to make up his own mind then.

Okay, cut this crap. That is a ridiculous example of assisted suicide. When I made that comparison I was specifically saying "If you don't intervene in that scenario, it is wrong, and you are just as guilty as if you killed him yourself" and you know that's what I was saying. Don't try and take that analogy and compare it to this.

We are talking about legalizing it for a consenting terminally ill person, who is going to die regardless, but is suffering a prolonged, painful, and indignified death, and is unable to commit the deed themself because of physical limitations.

What is the difference in this person, who is doomed anyway, consenting to be terminated because "if I could do it myself, I would," and unplugging a ventilator due to prior consent being given????

I'm hoping you don't understand me as much as I'm not understanding you so that I can take comfort in the fact that we're just not getting through to each other due to communication barriers or something. Quite frankly I'm officially giving up.

You're all about an individual's consent yet if someone is literally begging to have their life ended due to the physical pain and agony they are suffering, you think it's more ethical to ignore their consent and last wishes and let them suffer? I give up.

The PERSON has to determine this. Nobody else's opinion matters. This is not a bunch of family members sitting around deciding whether to off their loved one or not. They have no say. It is their loved one that decided it. I hope you both watched the damn video I posted because it does not seem so. 


As was done in the video that I posted, hold a cup and a straw with a lethal dose of a drug in it up to the person's mouth. If they drink it, they go to sleep and die. No revolvers or arms needed. If they're at the point that they can't drink under their own power, they're probably at the point where you can unplug a few things and let them die anyway.

The act of giving them a loaded revolver and walking out of the room, and holding a cup of poison to their mouth with a straw, is not different. In both cases, it is assisted suicide. It is also assisted suicide if there's no poison around, and the person has no arms, and he consents to you shooting him, so you do. Quite honestly, poison or bullet, or any other method, is irrelevant.

It becomes murder when the person doesn't want you to shoot them in the head, or doesn't want to drink the poison, and you shoot them or force the poison down their throat.

The key factor here is obviously CONSENT.

I see that this is getting summed up, but I will try to clear up my position and then exit the stage. I would ask in the future, though, that you refrain from the rather insulting tone that you took towards the end.

I care about Newfoundland because it is part of Canada. I am a Canadian. I care about what goes on down the street because it is in Canada. I am interested in what other cultures do, but just because another culture does or doesn't do something doesn't mean that I have follow suite. We should judge based on our own situation - not a foreign nation.

Regarding consent, there is a world of difference between my respecting an individual's withholding of consent to perform a life-saving procedure on him and my accepting his consent for me to kill him. Just because I don't give in to someone's wishes for me to take an action doesn't automatically mean that I am violating their freedom of choice. I argue that while it is ethical to seek consent for medical care it is unethical to agree to someone's asking to kill them. Both involve choices, but there are different actions involved. In the first he is telling me not to do something. In the other, he is asking me to do something.

By the ethical code that I am trying to articulate, I respect the individual's decision on the provision of care/assistance.  His desire for me to end his life for him, though, does not free me from the ethical code that we don't go around killing people except in self-defence/war.

The individual is free to decide that they want to die. I am not going to help them, however, on the ethical grounds that I have laid out above. Perhaps you think I am hard-hearted or uncaring about suffering? Many ethical decisions involve two unattractive outcomes.

I would respect a request by someone to let nature takes its course, which is basically what someone withholding consent is doing. What I wouldn't do is sanction action on our part to intervene with the goal of killing the individual who would otherwise live without our suicide-assistance intervention.

Cheers

 

[Michael OLeary]

Everything I do see about them and xenophobia seems to be talking just as much about the UK, France, etc. as the Swiss.

Let's give that the Google test:

Results 1 - 20 of about 1,160,000 for switzerland xenophobic.

Results 1 - 20 of about 300,000 for "united kingdom" xenophobic

Results 1 - 20 of about 262,000 for france xenophobic

Results 1 - 20 of about 179,000 for canada xenophobic

 

[vonGarvin]

I apologise for taking this off the natural path once or twice, but I'll sum up, and in no way do I wish to denegrate anyone or their position.
My position is solely that life is special, and taking a life is something that is a very serious matter.  As for Euthanasia, I do believe that others have made good points that counter my beliefs.  Even though I would support capital punishment, I cannot for the life of me condone euthanasia.  If it were the case, to get back to Capt Semrau for a moment, then I *could* see the argument that he was committing an act of mercy, and not murder IF (HUGE IF) he did indeed fire rounds into a dying Talib.
Anyway, IMHO, other than the odd tangent, I am rather well pleased with this thread overall, and I commend the moderators for actually moderating us and keeping us on target.

 

[Fishbone Jones]

You're all welcome.

That's it Gents.........til the next time

Milnet.ca Staff