http://slog.thestranger.com/slog/archives/2013/01/14/support-physician-assisted-suicide Comments On: I'm a Supporter of Physician-Assisted Suicide... by Dan Savage en-us Copyright 2013 The Stranger. All rights reserved. This RSS file is offered to individuals, The Stranger readers, and non-commercial organizations only. Any commercial websites wishing to use this RSS file, please contact The Stranger. webmaster@thestranger.com (The Stranger Webmaster) Sat, 25 May 2013 00:00:01 -0700 Sat, 25 May 2013 03:00:00 -0700 Foundation http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss Posted by ine]]> Sun, 20 Jan 2013 08:12:58 -0800 The Stranger
Some people luck into a good life. Most people have to work for it, and sometimes they still don't achieve it; sometimes our very efforts to obtain a good life are what make us miserable. Despite these unfortunate outcomes, we should still have the option to try, since people who make no effort at all generally end up having a pretty miserable life.

The very same things can be said of an easy death.
Posted by Keey]]> Thu, 17 Jan 2013 06:39:04 -0800 The Stranger
Not all disabilities are equal. If you want to make this claim back it up. Where are the numbers on how many people who, after living over half their life sighted and then lose their sight after already being deaf and want to die after it later change their minds?

I highly doubt any such statistics have ever been collected and so such an assertion is more what you hope happens rather than what anyone knows happens.

So a person who does not want to live must be forced to live in a state of partial sensory depravation and loss of independence for a year of what, to them, is suffering to satisfy someone that they are or aren't suffering and won't change their minds?

Sorry, but if were facing suffering and someone else told you that you only had to suffer in an unbearable state before you would be allowed to end it I doubt you would be so accepting.
Posted by Fortunate]]> Wed, 16 Jan 2013 19:59:00 -0800 The Stranger
Wait 10 years and they almost always think that was stupid of them, are glad that they didn't/weren't able to commit suicide, that life is well worth living, and test as feeling just as satisfied with their lives as they were before they ever got disabled. Only a small percentage still feel terrible about the disability.

The only sensible response to this situation is to impose waiting periods. Not a 10-year long waiting period; that's too much. But 1 year of living with a (non-painful) disability before the doctor will help you off yourself? Absolutely. It's irresponsible not to tell them that, if they want help doing it, they need to prove this isn't just a passing desire.

If you want a doctor's help killing yourself, then your rights aren't being violated if that doctor imposes some restrictions on how she'll give that help. And a doctor has no business going along with someone's desire to die in these circumstances without requiring a substantial waiting period.
Posted by Danadana]]> Wed, 16 Jan 2013 19:41:19 -0800 The Stranger Posted by Helix]]> Wed, 16 Jan 2013 13:14:09 -0800 The Stranger Posted by wiccaantje]]> Wed, 16 Jan 2013 06:37:38 -0800 The Stranger
It is inhumane to think "if they want to kill themselves, then let them go ahead" when for many that feeling may be curable.

I agree that those with terminal illnesses should be allowed an option to die with dignity (my mom's last months of brain cancer were a nightmare).
Posted by debug]]> Tue, 15 Jan 2013 11:10:48 -0800 The Stranger want to not live any more, and b) make suicide as painless as possible for those who want to die.
Posted by John Horstman]]> Tue, 15 Jan 2013 10:27:27 -0800 The Stranger
Also with the gay teens, my point is that their suicide is due to the actions of others (ostracism and bullying), not that their homosexuality is due to the actions of others. These twins, however, are not committing suicide due to the actions of others; nobody is bullying them or ostracizing them, nor is anyone else turning them blind.

You could possibly point to societal notions of disability as a force that is driving them to suicide, but I don't think it's that cut-and-dry. These men aren't seeking suicide because they will feel inferior to able-bodied people. They're seeking suicide because they have imagined what their lives will be like after losing their sight on top of their hearing, and they've decided that it would be torturous. You may disagree, but that's why nobody should force you to make the same decision under the same circumstances.

For all those crying "ableism," respecting the choices of disabled people is not ableist. Even if we find their choices to be based on unenlightened (to us), "incorrect" (to us), socially-inspired notions of what it means to be disabled. Even if they were making a mistake, it's their mistake, and their right.
Posted by Bonefish]]> Tue, 15 Jan 2013 10:02:20 -0800 The Stranger
That would be a valid point if people were saying these twins SHOULD die due to their disability.

What these twins said, and what some of us are saying, is that for US this disability is not something we would want to deal with and death to US is a more attractive alternative.

Sorry, I wouldn't want to live in a state of not being able to hear or see, probably having to be institutionalized, at the very least losing all real independence, and basically having to live in my head alone 24 / 7 except for the brief periods I would be able to have interactions with the very few people who would be able to effectively communicate with me, in the hopes that I might just possibly be able to wring just a bit of joy out of my few years left. That is not my idea of a life.

If someone is in that position and they want to fight the fight and try to live a decent life in that state them more power to them. I fully support them.

But if someone is faced with that prospect and they chose not to their choice should be equally respected. It is not their job to be forced to exist in a state they consider intolerable to make other people happy or to prove the worth of disabled people everywhere. They aren't paragons, they are individuals as we all are, and we all should get to make that choice.
Posted by Fortunate]]> Tue, 15 Jan 2013 07:45:01 -0800 The Stranger Posted by MinnySota]]> Mon, 14 Jan 2013 23:15:04 -0800 The Stranger
But on the other hand it's such an irrevocable business to leave up to fallible humans and human institutions. Like, it seems that an intensive 2-year process could almost work the other way: ie. once you have invested a lot of money and the time of multiple highly paid professionals in convincing people you want to die you might be LESS likely to admit your having second thoughts.

Or if your family is poor and insurance will pay for euthanasia but not treatment.

Or if you are elderly and your entire family pressures you to agree to euthanasia and make you feel so guilty that you (seemingly) readily agree.

Tough one.
Posted by chi_type]]> Mon, 14 Jan 2013 21:03:00 -0800 The Stranger
Dude. We're all going to be dead. Soon. And for a long time. Maybe even people with handicaps can wring some joy out of the few years we get to shuffle around on this planet?

Posted by fubar]]> Mon, 14 Jan 2013 20:58:18 -0800 The Stranger
1. There are requirements to be met to insure this is not a rash decision. Here, especially because they broke their own rules to accommodate these twins, there was nothing rash about it.

2. None of your friends or family have to find you dead. That is the most dickish part of suicide. Might as well write on your note, "Whoever finds me, fuck you, asshole!"

3. It's successful. It's hard enough to get right with all of your senses. I'm guessing when you're deaf and blind, trying ANYTHING you've never rehearsed before would be a recipe for failure.
Posted by Free Lunch]]> Mon, 14 Jan 2013 20:48:29 -0800 The Stranger Posted by Dr. M]]> Mon, 14 Jan 2013 20:05:35 -0800 The Stranger
28--Gay teenagers do not kill themselves because some malicious person TURNED them gay. They kill themselves because INSENSITIVE ASSHOLES TELL THEM that they are worth less (worthless) because they are not "normal."

Would I want to kill myself if I lost my sight and hearing? Quite possibly. But then, I also thought about killing myself over issues such as "I am never going to finish my dissertation," "I am never going to get a job," "I am never going to have a girlfriend." I made it through all of these challenges, partially through mental health services.
Posted by LML]]> Mon, 14 Jan 2013 19:30:19 -0800 The Stranger Posted by sirkowski]]> Mon, 14 Jan 2013 19:22:27 -0800 The Stranger
1. Abortion is time-sensitive and suicide is not. The longer a woman waits to terminate a pregnancy, the more invasive, expensive, risky and ethically problematic the act becomes.

2. Waiting can sometimes solve the problem that the prospective suicide faces. Many people who contemplate suicide are in the throes of a recent event or recent news and will be able to deal with the emotions that make them want to die in time. A man who learns that he will be deaf may want to die at first but then change his mind after he learns sign language. Women who want to terminate their pregnancies usually have reasons that do not disappear, get better, or go away over time (unless you make her wait so long that she gives birth).
Posted by DRF]]> Mon, 14 Jan 2013 18:42:37 -0800 The Stranger
It's super tough to be a gay teenager too (totally different kind of tough; hear me out) and we don't want them to commit suicide. Why? Because it gets better. For someone dealing with a disability 1. it's possible that some treatment may one day mitigate or reverse it and 2. it's possible to get used to it and wring all possible satisfaction out of one's albeit limited life. Two men in this situation could have spent those two years learning a new sign language, one they could do by touch. (Um, and why did they have to rely on a sign language that no one outside their family could understand? Does Belgium not have a national sign language or a deaf subculture?)

With the two men able-bodied, I have to wonder why they went for euthanasia instead of just suicide.

Ageism is in play here as well as ableism. Imagine if they were 95-year-old twins instead of 45-year-old twins.
Posted by DRF]]> Mon, 14 Jan 2013 18:31:42 -0800 The Stranger Posted by TampaDink]]> Mon, 14 Jan 2013 18:25:02 -0800 The Stranger Posted by StuckInUtah]]> Mon, 14 Jan 2013 18:18:03 -0800 The Stranger
It is THEIR decision to take their lives. The doctor does not have to agree and could refuse.

It is MY life, I don't tell other people how to run theirs and if I want to end MY life, its MY decision.
Posted by JJinAus]]> Mon, 14 Jan 2013 18:00:30 -0800 The Stranger Posted by Mike in Olympia]]> Mon, 14 Jan 2013 17:56:09 -0800 The Stranger i think the slippery slope argument truly applies here. we have to be careful not to corrupt the medical profession.
Posted by onion]]> Mon, 14 Jan 2013 17:43:20 -0800 The Stranger Posted by Gamebird]]> Mon, 14 Jan 2013 16:56:59 -0800 The Stranger