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Originally posted by Sushipunk Your post though, Lira, brings up a slightly different issue as well - That of euthanasia. Is assisted suicide wrong as well? Is it necessarily different from regular suicide? Now, it seems, is where the context comes into play. For me, anyway, due to another party being directly involved with the death.

I know it's going a bit off topic but this is something I feel strongly on. I believe euthanasia should be legalised in exceptional cases. I'm currently watching the person who did more than anyone else to raise me in extreme pain, needing a lot of painkillers just to be in 'slightly less pain' - their standard of living has dropped considerably in the last 5 years and the body is giving up. Knees aren't working (1 has been replaced), Hips hurt, shoulders hurt and spine is eroding away. Seeing a person with that much independance suddenly be reliant on people for menial tasks isn't nice at all. Things are only going to get worse for them and there becomes a point where you do wonder what sort of life it will leave them with. As it stands they have problems just sitting down, the body begins to hurt, but moving is bad. It's utterly heartbreaking to see happen and only goes to strengthen my thoughts that there will become a time where peolpe should be offered the most humane way out of things as possible. This goes for those who lose mental facilties too. My butcher is good for chat each week & he pointed out to me that we're spending so much on cancer treatments and age prolongment but if a big proportion of those people then get dementia not long after, was the previous treatments as worthwhile and should we not be funding as much ways to prevent or delay it from happening?

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Originally posted by Sushipunk Not really surprised to hear that - You live in a country whose dominant belief is Catholicism, yes? That view may be "logical" but I personally don't find it to be reasonable. Of course, that's just me.

Yes, though the influence of Catholicism has waned quite a lot in my lifetime. Apparently a third (!) of all Catholics either de-converted (e.g. me) or converted to another Christian denomination (protestants or spiritualists).

And tend to argue against this stance myself... as I have shown in this thread

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Originally posted by Sushipunk Heh, I tend to be harsher on euthenasia. Like I said though, it's due to there being a second (or third, or who knows how many) parties involved. Too much room there for feelings, etc., and therefore error. I'll be clear though, I'm ALL FOR assisted suicide under the right conditions.

Oh, I thought of assisted suicide when you said euthanasia, sorry about my mistake.

I don't really know when (and if) euthanasia can be okay, to be honest. It's not like the person whose life is at stake has a say

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Originally posted by Ian I know it's going a bit off topic but this is something I feel strongly on. I believe euthanasia should be legalised in exceptional cases. I'm currently watching the person who did more than anyone else to raise me in extreme pain, needing a lot of painkillers just to be in 'slightly less pain' - their standard of living has dropped considerably in the last 5 years and the body is giving up. Knees aren't working (1 has been replaced), Hips hurt, shoulders hurt and spine is eroding away. Seeing a person with that much independance suddenly be reliant on people for menial tasks isn't nice at all. Things are only going to get worse for them and there becomes a point where you do wonder what sort of life it will leave them with. As it stands they have problems just sitting down, the body begins to hurt, but moving is bad. It's utterly heartbreaking to see happen and only goes to strengthen my thoughts that there will become a time where peolpe should be offered the most humane way out of things as possible. This goes for those who lose mental facilties too. My butcher is good for chat each week & he pointed out to me that we're spending so much on cancer treatments and age prolongment but if a big proportion of those people then get dementia not long after, was the previous treatments as worthwhile and should we not be funding as much ways to prevent or delay it from happening?

I'm truly sorry to hear that, mate. Obviously, I can imagine why you're opinionated on the topic. It's not something I've ever been through, myself.

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Originally posted by Sushipunk I'm truly sorry to hear that, mate. Obviously, I can imagine why you're opinionated on the topic. It's not something I've ever been through, myself.

I was even before the fact to be honest. If we think about our pets, when they get to a point where they have no quality of life left, most of us will do the humane thing and allow them to not suffer any further. We love pets as we love family and I don't see why it shouldn't continue over; When they get to a certain point it should be allowed. You see a frustration in them that things they could do and that we all do daily without thinking twice become a massive ask and who knows how much longer they have 'naturally' - imagine being like it for 10, 15 years. As we get longer and longer in age expectancy it should mean that there is a quality of life to match imo.

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Originally posted by Sushipunk A person's life is their own, to do with as they please. If they don't want to live, then they shouldn't be forced to

So if a person wants to die and straps a bomb to their chest and blows themselves up in a public place, not killing anyone, but injuring many, you'd think that's okay? If not, why is the pain they'd be causing others only relevant if it's physical pain?

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Originally posted by srussell0018 So if a person wants to die and straps a bomb to their chest and blows themselves up in a public place, not killing anyone, but injuring many, you'd think that's okay? If not, why is the pain they'd be causing others only relevant if it's physical pain?

That's a good analogy, but I'm afraid it's not as accurate as it seems (I hope you don't mind me answering this question on Stu's behalf). For the sake of the argument, I'll call the suicidal person S and your terrorist-like character T. Here are quite a few differences:

• Intention: T is out to hurt other people, otherwise they wouldn't have decided to do it in a public place; S, however, may well decide to kill himself in spite of other people, and not because of them.
  
  Concreteness: Imagine T decided to blow themself up among stoics, and imagine S was born in a family full of stoics as well. If S kills himself, there will be nothing about his death that will make the family feel pain; if T strikes at a Stoic Convention, no matter how positive they are, the wounds will send pain signals to their brain.
  
  Control: Suppose S does not want to commit suicide, but come out of the closet. His family is very traditional and this would bring a lot of pain for everyone, unless he decides to bite the bullet and keep his gayness on the inside, hidden from the world. Would it not be correct to say that his family is exercising an excessive amount of control over him? Imagine now T would strap not a bomb, but a sign saying "I'm queer and I'm here!" or something of that sort. It's quite unlikely that anyone will care - and we would be quick to disapprove of anyone who decided to confront him and say it hurts them to know he's a flaming homosexual.

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Originally posted by Lira That's a good analogy, but I'm afraid it's not as accurate as it seems (I hope you don't mind me answering this question on Stu's behalf). For the sake of the argument, I'll call the suicidal person S and your terrorist-like character T. Here are quite a few differences: Intention: T is out to hurt other people, otherwise they wouldn't have decided to do it in a public place; S, however, may well decide to kill himself in spite of other people, and not because of them. Concreteness: Imagine T decided to blow themself up among stoics, and imagine S was born in a family full of stoics as well. If S kills himself, there will be nothing about his death that will make the family feel pain; if T strikes at a Stoic Convention, no matter how positive they are, the wounds will send pain signals to their brain. Control: Suppose S does not want to commit suicide, but come out of the closet. His family is very traditional and this would bring a lot of pain for everyone, unless he decides to bite the bullet and keep his gayness on the inside, hidden from the world. Would it not be correct to say that his family is exercising an excessive amount of control over him? Imagine now T would strap not a bomb, but a sign saying "I'm queer and I'm here!" or something of that sort. It's quite unlikely that anyone will care - and we would be quick to disapprove of anyone who decided to confront him and say it hurts them to know he's a flaming homosexual. Like I said, I understand where you're coming from, but it's a very different scenario.

Those are good points, but think instead of someone with a bomb, someone who simply commits suicide in a public place (jumping in front of a train/car, off a building, etc.). Even though they're causing no physical harm, they're still undoubtedly causing emotional distress to any observers, even if they are complete strangers. There we can see that people don't even have to have a close bond with a person to be affected by their suicide.

Not all people who kill themselves do it in private. In my 4 years of college, I remember one kid jumping out the window of his 8th story dorm room, and another who doused himself in gasoline and lit himself on fire. I hope you're not suggesting that simply because they didn't hurt anyone else, that they weren't committing incredibly selfish acts. The guy lighting himself on fire, sure, I could see an intent to "shock" people, but someone jumping from his building could very well have just seen that as the most effective means to achieve his end. I don't think the intent should be given as much weight as you have given it, because it elicits very negative reactions in many people whether it was intended to do so or not.

In my example I suppose I didn't mean for there to be intent to harm in the suicide bomber's case, but rather (however unlikely) that they just chose that as a means to kill themselves, and the collateral damage was accidental or at least unintended. I didn't mean for it to be taken as an intended "strike."

As for your control argument, I would have to disagree with that entirely. If you flip that around, wouldn't you suppose that if the closet homosexual were to kill himself, that he would be exacting an equally excessive amount of control over them? I don't think the idea that suicide is wrong because it affects everyone left behind is a matter of control. I suppose if the person contemplating suicide decided to not go through with it, then the people might be exercising some form of control over them, but I think that it's pretty clearly unintended, just as suicide can cause harm to others even if it's unintended. Regardless, if the person were to go through with it, who's to say which is worse? Somebody thinking about people other than themselves and consequently having some level of unintended control placed over them, or somebody thinking only about themselves and causing harm for many others?

I guess from a relativistic point of view, you could look at it by the total amount of harm that's caused. Call the person killing themselves Scenario A, and them not killing themselves Scenario B. Scenario A causes harm to the individual and any close relatives, friends, or even strangers. Scenario B causes harm to only the individual. I guess I'm just in favor of minimizing the total amount of distress caused.

Last edited by srussell0018 on Oct-15-2011 at 17:10

Nothing against suicide.

If you think your life does not have a meaning and won't change for better, what's the point of keeping yourself alive anyway?

I just hate those kind of people who have pretty much everything in their lives but always find something to screw it up.

Nobody's life has an inherent meaning. Anybody who can't find meaning in their life is just incredibly shortsighted.