When that assisted dying becomes possible:
Police say sorry after putting down family’s dog by mistake
Soon enough it’ll be:
Police say sorry after putting down family’s Granny by mistake
After all, that is what happened at Gosport Memorial Hospital, isn’t it? 456 times?
For once, a police screwup. Won’t criticise them for – one fewer of these things running around is a good days work.
Granny won’t be put down by mistake. The Scottish inquiry into Covid response made plain what the English one prevented itself from investigating, that the elderly, the frail and the disabled, were deprived of state resources to save them. Now the withdrawal of the winter fuel allowance coincident with the highest electricity prices in the developed world, the thought crossed my mind the government was anticipating reducing social spending, freeing up housing and windfall inheritance tax .
Euthanasia is currently legal in seven jurisdictions: the Netherlands (since 2002), Belgium (since 2002), Luxemburg (since 2009), Colombia (since 2015), Canada (since 2016) and Victoria (since 2017) and Western Australia (since 2019) in Australia. (Annals of Palliative Medicine)
So far there have been no reports of wholesale downputting of grannies…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gosport_War_Memorial_Hospital_1990s_opioid_deaths_scandal
But premature shortening with a burst of morphine might very well be how I will want to end.
And if I’m not fit to say so I hope my wife will be. Granted not everyone has a trustworthy spouse.
The point is that this is one of those topics, not all that common, where there are entirely respectable, sound arguments on both sides.
In general who could be trusted? An arm of government? Don’t be silly. The medical profession? Ditto. The courts? No, sir. So how do those other jurisdictions handle it?
P.S. Why is Oregon not on the list?
The question I’d ask is who is supposed to be losing out here? It can’t be the person who’s dead. Because they’re dead. You can’t be disadvantaged when you’re dead, can you? So isn’t much of the opposition just ME! ME! ME!
Of course it’s a “moral argument”. But so much of morality is just forcing one person’s opinions on others.
@BiS – On that basis, there is no point in persecuting murderers because the only one that has any right to complain is already dead.
@JG
Our Anglo-Saxon forebears thought the same. Murder required compensation for the family of the murdered.
Why do we persecute murders? Because their victim(s) died without their consent & we’d rather that didn’t happen to us.
So far there have been no reports of wholesale downputting of grannies…
* Harold Shipman has entered the chat *
“Why do we persecute murders?”
You mean, “why does the state prosecute murders”. It’s because the alternative is for family members to take revenge for murders, or if they’re not strong enough then alliances with other families for that purpose.
And that has other consequences.
We see this today in areas where the state is not sufficiently present.
@dearieme
Fortunately my daughter is a doctor, and also has my power of attorney. She’ll know what to do and how to get it done. Sorted.
the thought crossed my mind the government was anticipating reducing social spending,
on white people.
I’d ask is who is supposed to be losing out here? It can’t be the person who’s dead. Because they’re dead. You can’t be disadvantaged when you’re dead, can you?
I don’t think that argument worked at Nuremberg.
So isn’t much of the opposition just ME! ME! ME!
Since your life is the only thing you really own, um… yes? Your survival instincts are about you. The individual matters.
Steve. The assisted dying thing is entirely me me me. The important person here is the aspiring corpse They have made their decision. So why are you trying to prevent what they want? Pretty well all of the reasons are bollox. It’s beyond your whit to ensure this is their decision? Someone might talk granny into it? Funny that. The same people will have been quite content trying to talk granny into all sorts of things THEY believe are in her interests. But not this. It’s the usual morals bollox trying to hide behind other reasons. Compelling people to do what you want in your interests. I’d remind you Steve, that according to your book your revered & worshipped acrobat went to his tomb by his own volition. Assisted dying. Since your own religion claims he had the option.
Why do I feel so strongly about this. I suppose reaction to the modern attitude that, despite having largely shaken of the nonsense that is religion, they still can’t come to terms with death being inevitable. You are born, you live, you die. There is nothing else. Why can’t they just accept it?
There’s a fine example of this thinking here.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/10/05/pray-isle-of-lewis-presbyterians-win-sunday-trading-tesco/
No doubt written by the sort of London-centric know-it-all that tell us what our opinions should be. And again disguised in the cloak of religion.
I know absolutely nothing about the Isle of Lewis & am extremely grateful for my ignorance. But I can’t believe Tesco will be proposing a 24/7 store without believing they’ll have customers. So what exactly is the ef’in problem? If they don’t want to shop there no-one’s forcing them to. So why are they trying to prevent other people? They don’t want their way of life changed? Obviously, there may be other people live there very much want their way of life changed. Live with it.
BiS – So why are you trying to prevent what they want?
Because I don’t want people to die, and I don’t think we should be the kind of people who encourage others to end their lives.
I reckon we should offer something better than death to people who are suicidal.
I’d remind you Steve, that according to your book your revered & worshipped acrobat went to his tomb by his own volition. Assisted dying.
I know Christian education fell off a cliff in the mid 20th c, but this is pitiful. Dunce’s cap, laddie.
despite having largely shaken of the nonsense that is religion,
They took on new, and completely self-destructive nonsenses. Not despite tho, because.
Norman,
“ Fortunately my daughter is a doctor, and also has my power of attorney. She’ll know what to do and how to get it done. Sorted.”
You probably know this, but as a public service announcement for those that don’t:
There’s 2 types of powers of attorney:.
The one most people think of is the one that allows the appointed attorney to make financial decisions and have access to bank accounts etc. We had the set up when we heard a story from our niece who was going through the process of finding a home for her father who has Alzheimer’s.
Apparently the financial powers of attorney doesn’t cover health and social issues. She met a family whose parent had been put in to a very expensive home against their wishes and they were having to pay for it. Presumably the council wanted to keep cheaper homes free for cases where they have to pay.
Anyway, if you want someone other the social services and the NHS to make these decisions, including end of life care, you need to also appoint someone to have health and welfare lasting powers of attorney. It can be the same person who has lasting powers as financial attorney.
We’re just going through this process and it is very sobering.
Because I don’t want people to die,
It is none of your business. So butt out.
BiS – It is none of your business. So butt out.
Of course it is, we live in a society and that’s why the deliberate taking of human life is governed by laws.
@BiND
Yup, we were well advised. We have both kinds of PoA. Country and Western.
BiND – I’m sorry to hear that. That’s hard, I hope you keep your chin up.
Steve,
Nothing todo with the cancer, it’s the sort of thing we do anyway but we thought we had it covered.
But thanks anyway.
I know Christian education fell off a cliff in the mid 20th c, but this is pitiful.
No. That exactly what your book claims. Even according to its various interpreters. It even claims said being had the power of prediction. So what followed must be intentional.
Personally, I think the whole thing’s a lot of rot cooked up for the gullible. But it’s your religion so your stuck with it.
Tesco on Lewis: golly, that journo is an ignorant chump. “And the Isle of Lewis is backward, lagging by some 30 years precisely; the Sunday Trading Act was ushered in by John Major’s government in 1994” – aye, and it’s English law, you dimwit; it didn’t apply to Scotland.
Scotland had no need for such an act because there was no restriction on Sunday opening of shops in Scots Law. Such restrictions as existed were either (i) mere custom and habit, or (ii) local government stuff.
There had been restrictions on boozers, of course, including a rule that exempted “bona fide” travellers. Those restrictions must have been swept away decades ago but I don’t know what replaced them.
As a frequent worker round our harbour in my school summer holidays I can remember our Lowland derision of a crew from Stornaway who refused to unload on the Sabbath but were happy to go and get drunk on the Sunday evening. Those bastards cost me my Sunday-working overtime rate.
“according to your book your revered & worshipped acrobat went to his tomb by his own volition. Assisted dying. Since your own religion claims he had the option.”
Not so much assisted dying as ‘suicide by cop’. In the story, the death of the Jesus character at the hands of the Romans was planned, required, necessary and inevitable (for reasons no one has ever been able to explain.) Suicide being so essential and central to this mythology, its advocates can hardly complain when someone schedules a visit to a Sarco pod (which, unlike in Jesus’ case, requires a cogency test) to give themselves a dignified, pain-free exit.
I see it as personal soverignty.
“I don’t want to kill myself, it must be banned!!!” – if you don’t want to do it, then…… just don’t do it.
“No! I don’t want *other* *people* to kill themselves, it must be banned!!!” – what business is it of yours what *other* people to do *themselves*?
“I don’t like gay sex” – so, just don’t have gay sex.
“I don’t like petrol cars” – so, just don’t own a petrol car.
“I don’t like smoking” – so, just don’t smoke.
“I don’t like gambling” – so, just don’t gamble.
“I don’t like tattoos” – so, just don’t get a tattoo.
“I don’t like daily newspapers” – so, just don’t buy daily newspapers.
@wat dabney
it does seem rather preferable to getting yourself nailed to a length of wood. But it does lack theatre. And religions like nothing better than theatre. So maybe Steve would prefer the Nails & length of wood exit with optional sainthood available for a small extra donation. Don’t know how well that’d go down with the punters.
@Steve – “your life is the only thing you really own”
If I really own something, then an essential aspect of that ownership is that I can destroy it in the manner of my choosing.
@jgh – “I see it as personal soverignty.”
Very much so. And furthermore, given the very large proportion of people who agree that there is a level of suffering beyond which they would not want to live, and many medics are no so cold-hearted to condemn someone to torture for the rest of their lives, and assisted suicide is illegal, medics currently assist dying where they think it is necessary. They cannot risk asking openly about a particular patient, due to the illegality, and other medics who suspect that a patient was helps to die are very reluctant to say anything because they do not know enough about the individual circumstances and the illegality means it cannot be subject to open debate. This is how Harold Shipman got away with killing so many – anyone who suspected he had killed a patient probably assumed that the patient had some good medical reason to die – known only to them and their doctor.
We already have assisted dying. Let’s try to turn that into assisted suicide.
@ Ted S Harold Shipman a doctor in the UK did not practice in any of the seven jurisdictions I listed. Did he?
They took on new, and completely self-destructive nonsenses. Not despite tho, because.
That’s something I can’t argue with because it’s entirely true. But they all have something in common with religion. They all depend on belief rather than understanding. I think I can understand why. People want to feel they’re in control & believing in something gives them that illusion. Creating a god who created you puts you in the position of having created yourself. You are your own explanation.
This is the problem with rights: they tend to interfere with each other.
My right to swing my arms around ends at your nose. This is generally accepted.
When trying to introduce new “rights”, they are unlikely to be absolute: there will be circumstances in which they cannot be applied because they interact with other people’s rights. Charles, jgh and others’ might see a suicide pod as their right, but what about my right to not be bundled into it by some future Rachel Reeves who wants to stop paying my old age pension and grab some of that sweet sweet inheritance tax? This bit hasn’t been sorted out yet, and unless/until it is, it surely isn’t too big a deal for the wannabe auto-toppers to book a one-way ticket to Switzerland so that the vast majority who want to live (or don’t want to snuff themselves out just yet) can’t be Voluntarily Suicided for the convenience of the bureaucracy.
my right to not be bundled into it by some future Rachel Reeves who wants to stop paying my old age pension
If you’ve come that far down the road to a tyrannical state, I’d imagine assisted dying schemes would be the least of your worries