Assisted suicides, Your oppinions?

[Mouse]

Good for you SM. I'm glad to hear your story [img]graemlins/thumbsup.gif[/img]

The point I'm trying to make is that you made the decision about how you would deal with your situation and your wishes were respected. All I ask is that you consider the possibility that someone else might wish to act differently.

Just as I would not try to impose my choice of action on you, I would hope you would allow me to take control of my own destiny when faced with such a decision.

[Faceman]

Thx to Mouse for the addition, I knew I had forgot something.

I agree that everyone should be able to make his own decisions in life but I also think that it is important to speak up if you think somebody is making the wrong decision. Right now in our (and also in public) dicusssion assisted suicide is considered OK if we can understand the pain the person is in.
I'm quite sure that nobody here would agree on helping a student commit suicide
because he thinks he can't live with the constant pain of being bullied at school. If a student decides to take his own life at that point we all clearly see it as a wrong decision and try to hinder him doing it. Now if the same student had lost his legs in an accident why would we suddenly be ok with him commiting suicide.
In both cases HE has decided to but in case one WE think: "He'll get over it" while in case two we agree with his decision that his life isn't worth-while anymore.
IMHO every persons life is worth-while as long as he/she is able to interact with his/her surroundings.
You don't have the right to take your life because it doesn't belong to you alone but also to your family and friends who you may hurt and who you might have been worth a great deal for the rest of your life.
I'm not condemning suicide, I understand that people are under high psychical stress in these situations but I don't think it's the right way as there is always something positive you can still do for the world if you only want. Therefore I can't agree with assisted suicide for people who still have some possibilities. However I can understand Euthanasia with people who are terminally ill and have only a certain time left which is going to be filled with suffering.

[TheCrimsomBlade]

anybody that is near death do to old age,cancer,AIDs or anything that causes unbearable pain do to anything uncureable and wishes to die then who are we to say no.
We're all going to die someday anyway. Think about this: you can't breath without help, every time you move you have blinding pain shoot through your body. You don't remember anybody and your head pounds like your in a steel drum with 10 people beating on it with baseball bats. You can't eat anymore so every bit of food you get is through a Needle in your side because all the veins in your arms have collaps. You no longer have any Idea who you are or who anybody else is. If this was me I want somebody to kill me as fast as possable!

[Stormymystic]

ahhh,lol here I thought you were trying to be mean to me, I would never stand in anyones way of making their own choices, it is just how I feel on it, if someone feels that they can not deal with their illness, then it is their choice, but it makes me sad that people even have to make this chojce, instead of being able to live a long full healthy life but my choice will always remain nit to do it, but if anyone I kow feels they need to, then I will not try to stop them, and will always be there for them when they are in need

and thank you Mouse [img]smile.gif[/img]

[Stratos]

Well here's my opinions, hope they add something to the discussion.

I accept assisted suicides under certain circumstances such as being terminally ill or risk being left in such a state of pain that it seem inhumane to not let them die in peace. But there should be some directives as to do this, it needs to be well thought through ( i.e. that you're in such a pain at the moment but not dying or anything doesn't count), and relatives should of course be consulted. Most relatives would probably respect the wish of the dying person.

The scenario that they would find a cure for the disease two weeks after you commited suicide isn't that likely. If you had a fatal disease you would probably know alot on it and how close the medical science is to finding a cure. If they're that close to finding it then they would already have many functional methods to ease your pain and prolong your life until the cure already at your disposal. Besides there is a point where no cure in the world can change the inevetable.

There's also a difference with a "normal" suicide caused by depression and assisted suicide. In the latter one the person is dying whereas in a "normal" one he or she isn't, just in terrible misery. Also a depressed person can "get over it" ( i.e. get help from medication and counseling) and continue to live a normal life, but the terminally ill can't. He or she is dying fast no matter what.

[Charean]

I watched my father die of cancer. It took only a few months (thank goodness) and not years. If my father had been hanging on in a coma, with no chance of coming out, I know he would choose to die if only to give the family closure and to keep the medical costs down (which can devastate a family just as much as the emotional cost).

Keep in mind that most of these assisted suicides are not done because it is more convenient to do so, but because it is right in their eyes to spare the family more strain.

Coma victims, terminal illness (with no cure in sight) and mental vegetation are a few reasons that this is done.

Living wills are excellent tools, and something that more people should think about. Basically it will outline YOUR wishes should you be in a position that you cannot voice them. This way if you are hooked up to the tubes, you can put in your living will that you want to stay on them until you die. Or you can say that you will stay on them for 6 months and then pull the plug. In either case, it will be what you want, not something someone else has to decide.

Stormy, you have to also realize there are diseases that inflict such agony that no amount of painmedication that doesn't put the patient into a coma will help with. From everything I have heard about Bone Cancer is one of these....the patient unds up in excruciating agony for weeks or moths and morphine doesn't help and all the doctor can do is to put the patient into unconciousness, which doesn't necessarily eliminate the pain.

Obviously we cannot accept assisted suicide for emmotional problems since those are temporary and transient especially in young people who really don't know. However in the case of terminally ill patients who are in agony, I believe it should be their right to die with some dignity and not to suffer.

Guess we will just have to agree to disagree on this issue.

Someone asked what "Christians" believe...can't speak for all of them, but I know the Catholic Church has an official policy against it...but I know for a fact that there have been priests who have given last rights to and forgiven the patient for the "sin of suicide" just prior to the doctor "accidentally upping the morphine level" to apoint where the patient went into a coma and died.

[Stormymystic]

Originally posted by MagiK: Stormy, you have to also realize there are diseases that inflict such agony that no amount of painmedication that doesn't put the patient into a coma will help with. From everything I have heard about Bone Cancer is one of these....the patient unds up in excruciating agony for weeks or moths and morphine doesn't help and all the doctor can do is to put the patient into unconciousness, which doesn't necessarily eliminate the pain.

I was just thinking abou that one, yes there are times that I can agree with it, but the person would have to be in a state of pain that nothing would help them, but just to die because you do not want to live with the fact that an illness will leave your bodily functions a mess, because you would prefer to "die with dignity" I can not accept, if your life is so worthless then why are you put on the earth? I just feel that helping someone kill themselves is just as bad as killing someone, so yes, we all dissagree on this

[dafan]

Originally posted by Stormymystic: I was reading a story in readers digest about Oregon having assisted suicides, and I was wondering what you guys thought about it? Me personaly, I belive it is morally wrong even if you are already dying, to take your own life, why not spend and enjoy your last days with your family, so they can remember you as a fighter? not someone who gives up because the doctor saidthey would die, I have known many termanaliy ill people who were given 6 months to live, live for up to 4 more years, so why take away that time with loved ones because you wish to die "with dignity"?

Well I really would not like to spend my last years not being able to do something on my own... so I'd rather take my life. a life you can't live on your own is not a life worth living... it's only bothering others

[Harkoliar]

personally, it will be my coherent decision whether i should die or not. if i was in the coma.. i will trust my "future wife" to do the right thing for me. i agree that i would rather give the patient death if he/she suffers unbearable agony. its the choices and the effects that should be contributed whether or not the patient will die.