Shouldn't everyone have the right to die?

[Seli]

Psychological issues can be solved, and once done so people can go on to lead successful and fulfilling lives.

The issue is to fulfil the requirements of Belgian law (as I understand them) they cannot be.

Denying help would mean forcing people to live in suffering for the rest of their natural life, or until they take matters in their own hands - with all the unintended damage suicides tend to cause.

eta (for real, not for phone stupidity):

I believe having a medical pathway to an administered end of life, for psychological issues, might safe more people than it helps die. Just having the pathway in place will mean that people who want to die, and enter the process that way, will talk to people who can actually help them if they are treatable.

[Seli]

...

I actually think this is a much more elegant solution than to simply diagnose and decide the matter on whether it's treatable or not ( as I said above), but then you have the issue of how much people will listen to you if they realise how close they are to their goal, or whether the amount of time each patient spends in counselling or help is enough to actually overcome their issues before - and if not, would more have been successful?

And as far as I understand that is actually the procedure in place in Belgium, used for both the twins and in this case. Euthanasia isn't undertaken lightly, ever. It isn't the first solution people turn to, it isn't the first procedure doctors look for.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

SCO,

Butt out of other peoples business.

So, if my son or daughter decides to kill themselves I'm being a nosy busybody if I try to stop them or if I encourage them to get psychological or psychiatric help?

[Serious Callers Only]

Correct. Although the correct comparasion was to total strangers seeking to interfere with people who had had that counseling.

[Weeping Sore]

A metaphor from David Foster Wallace has always stuck with me, that a depressed person killing themselves is a person jumping out of a window of a burning building. We ask why they're doing it because we can't see the flames.

In terms of euthanasia, I support it with a reasonable time period of mandatory therapy/ counseling for both the depressed or someone suffering say a catastrophic accident leading to extreme loss of life quality. A terminal illness, particularly if the ill person is in pain, should require a much shorter review period.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

SCO,

So, to clarify, in your opinion, it's wrong to attempt to help my children if they are suicidal?

[Weeping Sore]

SCO,

So, to clarify, in your opinion, it's wrong to attempt to help my children if they are suicidal?

I think you'd probably have to go ahead and be "wrong" in that situation, Scot.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

WS,

Yes. If such an intervention would be wrong then mark me condemned.

[Chun-Li]

You're right to be 'wrong' in that case Scot, but what if you intervened and provided psychological and psychiatric help and they still wanted to die because the treatment failed or if they refuse treatment in the first place?

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Eoe,

I'd continue to be wrong. Who would stand aside and let their beloved take their own life if they were not already terminally ill and in terrible pain?

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Let me change this up a bit. During college one of my roomates was suicidal. He tried givig away his things and claimed he really wanted to die. We had a round the clock watch on him to make sure he wouldn't have the privacy to kill himself until he checked himself into the psych ward of the local hospital.

He's now 20 years later, a successful published writer married and has two children. Were we wrong to prevent him from killing himself and encouraging him to get help?

[Weeping Sore]

Let me change this up a bit. During college one of my roomates was suicidal. He tried givig away his things and claimed he really wanted to die. We had a round the clock watch on him to make sure he wouldn't have the privacy to kill himself until he checked himself into the psych ward of the local hospital.

He's now 20 years later, a successful published writer married and has two children. Were we wrong to prevent him from killing himself and encouraging him to get help?

As suicide is a permanent decision, it makes sense to forestall it until the person has time to weigh all the relevant factors. Factors such as life's not always being unmitigated torture. Sometimes a person needs help hanging on until they're able to get evidence of that.

[TrackerNeil]

Let me change this up a bit. During college one of my roomates was suicidal. He tried givig away his things and claimed he really wanted to die. We had a round the clock watch on him to make sure he wouldn't have the privacy to kill himself until he checked himself into the psych ward of the local hospital.

He's now 20 years later, a successful published writer married and has two children. Were we wrong to prevent him from killing himself and encouraging him to get help?

No, of course not; in fact, you and the others who participated in this "intervention" did this man an incredible service, one for which he is hopefully thankful. I agree with Leap in so far that many people who kill themselves are ill, and people who are ill want to get better. We should do what we can to help them do so. Mental illness is a terrible, terrible thing, and suicide is not the answer.

That being said, I am extremely wary of passing judgment on people who make the decision to end their own lives, or of assuming that I always know better than they. When I fully develop my powers of telepathy I will begin to make such judgments; until then, I'll be more humble.

Almost two years ago a good friend of mine took her own life, and when I heard the news a small part of me was unsurprised. She was one of those people who just could not catch a break, not medically or professionally or personally, and I think that, after a number of bad blows in quick succession, she had just had enough. She was getting psychological help, but her therapist couldn't cure lupus, or cancer, or repair an exploded career, or fix a deeply dysfunctional family. Although I'm not advocating widespread support for suicide, I do wish that this friend hadn't had to sneak off to put an end to things, like an animal crawling off to die.

This is an incredibly difficult topic, and is seriously whacking my emotional buttons. Criminy.

[Weeping Sore]

If a cochlear implant renders a deaf person non-existent, then suicide prevention renders a dead person non-existent. The dead community is unlikely to protest, however, as everyone joins them in the end.

[TerraPrime]

I didn't say that people who are alive are glad to be alive, I said that people who are alive and will continue to be so can one day be happy.

And you, or society, can guarantee this, how? What if someone is convinced to stay alive, and continue to live in psychological misery for the next 10, 15, 25 years? Is your optimism backed by anything that can be substantiated?

So the group of people who prefer death, due to psychological issues that can be fixed, should be denied it, imo. Of course, anyone who chooses to deny anyone this has the responsibility to try to help them overcome this psychological issues.

And what does that responsibility look like, for a society? Free mental health counseling for indefinite period? Only the first 3 years? 5 sessions?

If someone is manifestly NOT happy that they're alive, and has no hope of happiness, then perhaps we should respect their wishes.

That'd be the assumption for people who seek suicide as an option, yes, that they are hopeless about their situations being improved.

Irrespective of our assessment of their future potential for happiness, people should have the right to kill themselves. We should not be judging who should be alive and who is not, except in cases of capital punishment. If someone does not have any depression or psychological dureess wants to kill him/herself, just for shits and giggles, they should be able to. It's their life. We don't own it. We don't control it. They owe nothing to us to stay alive in order to reinforce our own ideas about the value and sanctity of life. Our moral obligation ends with ensuring that they have access to free counseling and emergency pyschiatric help. If they refuse help, or if they decide to end their lives anyway despite counseling and help, then it's their choice to make, regardless of whether the rest of us approves of their motivation.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

TP,

Was it, under your standard, wrong for my friends and I to prevent my roommate from killing himself?

[TrackerNeil]

TP,

Was it, under your standard, wrong for my friends and I to prevent my roommate from killing himself?

I don't want to put words in TP's mouth, but it seems to me that, if one has a reasonable suspicion that a person is not in command on his mental faculties, suicide prevention is justified. I think the question is, broadly, is suicide is a right we should recognize? I would say, in general, hedged with many, many ifs and buts, yes.

[TerraPrime]

TP,

Was it, under your standard, wrong for my friends and I to prevent my roommate from killing himself?

Depends. I don't know the details, or the extent to which the intervention effort was carried. In some scenarios, I can see it as excessive and unwarranted, and not in others.

Besides, it's a bit irrelevant what my opinion is on you and your friends' intervention on this other friend. Broadly speaking, I don't think the world will fall apart with anyone one of us absent. There will be distress for the immediate family and friends, when someone kills themselves, but generally speaking, the world carries on just fine. Humans are plenty and a few hundred or thousands dying voluntarily each day isn't going to make much of a difference.

[Weeping Sore]

I think we can distinguish between public policy and personal response. I think suicide should be legal, and humane assisted suicide available within certain guidelines.

On a personal level, I would do whatever I could to stop someone I loved from committing suicide, particularly if it were a depressed but otherwise healthy person.

During severe depression, it can seem as if the intolerable pain will last your whole life. Killing yourself is the one way to make that come true.

[TrackerNeil]

I think we can distinguish between public policy and personal response. I think suicide should be legal, and humane assisted suicide available within certain guidelines.

Yes, yes, yes...cannot agree enough.