If most of the world is against a thing, asking if said thing might be bad isn’t asking “tough questions”
This is the evangelical Christian myth that is being pushed. Christians do this because they believe there is virtue in suffering.
That is why grandma must choke to death on her vomit while everybody watches and sobs instead of having a celebration of life party with loved ones and then comfortably drifting off to cardiac arrest in her sleep.
All instances that these Christians bring up in Canada where it appears that MAID is being pushed on someone who doesn’t need it turns out to be a nothing story. No one is seriously being sent to their death because they are poor or require expensive care. This is a fear that is being manufactured so that grandma can die painfully. In Christ name amen.
Just because Christians say something for a stupid reason doesn’t mean that the opposite is automatically 100% true. If you read the article, the film isn’t coming at it from a Christian perspective at all but rather a leftist one.
Of course, “grandma” in your example should be allowed to die peacefully. But you can’t use an extreme example to argue for a general case. There’s plenty of room in between the extremes of, “Forcing grandma to live in constant pain” and “On demand suicide for anyone who wants it.”
With those two tactics, you effectively shut down a necessary discussion on the issue - anyone who disagrees must be coming at it from an extreme, Christian perspective and can be automatically dismissed. But when we look at a young, healthy person doing it, we have to consider the broader sociological implications. Like, could the existence and normalization of that option be used as a justification against providing accommodations or trying to understand the source of the problem? Or, could the breakdown of the taboo against suicide lead more people to follow through when they might have otherwise reconsidered and gone on to work through their problems?
Suicide is violence, and very often it is violence that is directed at someone who is not the actual source of the problem. Sometimes it’s the kindest, gentlest people who go down that path, not because of anything inherent to them as an individual, but because of external factors and shitty people.
Most crucially, no matter what laws are enacted, we must fight to maintain the social taboo, and push back against anyone who tries to dismantle it. Whether a person walks into a doctor’s office and blows their brains out, or whether they politely ask to go through a particular procedure and sign all the forms, the end result is the same and should be regarded in the same way - the only thing that’s changed is how it’s dressed up. The idea that if it’s legal and beurocratic, it’s no longer a tragedy must always be rejected, and it’s worth thinking about how to ensure that remains the case when thinking about what laws to allow.
I stopped considering your wall of text when you claimed that old people using medically assisted dying to relieve their terminal illness was an “extreme case”.
That’s just an extremist take. Legal euthenasia was implemented and is used in the overwhelming majority for these exact cases. You have a moral issue with it (as you’ve pointed out) and take issue with me calling it Christian. Your morals against euthenasia (calling it both “suicide” and “violence”) just shows your bias.
You are correct. There is no room for a nuanced discussion when you come at it with such an extreme take. Take care.
You completely misunderstood. I didn’t call it “extreme” to say that grandma should be allowed euthanasia. What I said is that that’s an extreme example, as in, a case where extreme circumstances make euthanasia a reasonable option.
Before I used the word “extreme” I literally said, “Of course, ‘grandma’ in your example should be allowed to die peacefully.” In fact, I even called the idea that she shouldn’t be able to, “an extreme position.” At that point, I can only assume it’s a willful misinterpretation to dismiss criticism. There is nothing “extreme” about my position that euthanasia should be legal but only in special circumstances, it’s literally the moderate position on the issue.
Suffering is sharing in the passion of Christ. Suffering is the kiss of Jesus, a sign that you have come so close to Jesus on the cross that he can kiss you.
–Mother Teresa
I watched my great grandma slowly rot away in a nursing home. Three years. Three years of wanting to die, waking up in a puddle piss and shit every morning, can’t get up after a stroke paralyzed her right side, almost blind, almost deaf, not even granted the ignorance of dementia.
She never wanted to die in a nursing home. She told me on her very first day there, that she just wants it to end. And I could do nothing to help her.
If you or I end up in that situation, if we end up deciding we want to end it, then no matter how much we want to die we won’t be allowed to.
If I really wanted to get the fuck out of there and find something to kill myself with I would be strapped down and force fed if necessary.
If I still had strength they’d get someone big and strong to physically hold me down as they strap me to the bed.
That’s not okay. That’s wrong.
And unfortunately, not even suicide is an option in some cases.
My personal approach to, say, terminal cancer is to get doped up enough to get everything in order and then end it before the cancer can. Use the good weeks I have and avoid the long tail of suffering.
But if you’re ripped from a relatively healthy life by a stroke or accident, there’s nothing you could do.
Here in Germany, you can give a legally binding statement about what to do if you’re incapacitated (Patientenverfügung), but that doesn’t cover things like euthanasia, just organ donation, shutting off machines and stuff like that.
Nådestøt is a word we have in the Norwegian language, it means mercy-blow or mercy-stab.
It’s interesting to think centuries ago men were kinder to their enemies than we are to our sick and old.
They respected their enemies’ suffering and wishes, more-so than we respect the suffering and wishes of a patient today.Oh I think we still respect that by and large. Ask any doctor or just, they’re 100% on board. And I’m pretty sure, most people are in favor too.
The problem is, that life as a concept is framed as so incredibly valuable, that every tiny hint there might be someone “rescueable” being euthanized is an argument for “slippery slope” and thus literally Hitler.
Your second statement is in conflict with your first. No, we don’t respect their suffering or their wishes. We have other priorities that completely supercede them.
What we do is pay lip service while completely overruling them in practice.
Of course this is a conflict, that’s my entire point.
Humans, and especially societies, are always full of internal inconsistencies. If everything would be logical and consistent, we wouldn’t need politicians.
I’m so sorry. Despite the radical anti-human lunatics that fight medically assisted dying, the world is moving towards expanding it. Let’s hope the next generation can choose how they leave this world.
Man I wish it was a nothing story. A friend of mine had MAID suggested to her after she spent only a couple days in the hospital for having a suicidal episode (mental health, long story but she’s doing much better now… so why the fuck was it brought up after only two days there?!). Guess that’s the result of my province’s healthcare being gutted like a fish. Thanks conservative government!
MAID is important, don’t get me wrong. People can keep their fucking gods out of healthcare in general. But saying that mistakes aren’t being made with it is ignoring a problem.
Fetishizing pain is a defense against it. Better to deal with it in other ways.
I’m not saying you don’t know that, just pointing it out.
This is not what the documentary is about though?
It’s about countries refusing to help disabled people who want to live because they tell them to choose assisted dying.
No this is exactly what I’m referring to. These instances where “countries are refusing to help people and instead want to kill them” is the fake fear they are trying to instill. It simply isn’t happening.
There have been extremely publicized instances where it has appeared that way like in Canada, where a rogue nurse went strictly against protocol and did that. They then fired that nurse. Too late though, because hundreds of opportunists like these documentary makers jumped on that story to retell it in a scarier way.
That instance and other similar and rare instances are being made to appear much bigger and more sinister so that they can manufacture a conspiracy theory for people to cling onto. That euthanasia cannot be allowed because it’s going to be used for evil instead of its intended use.
Edit: it appears from your account name and profile that you have a vested interest in this issue and are trying to push the same agenda as these religious radicals. I’m not going to engage any further.
yeah I don’t see them showing the countries were taking care of people better before it was an option. All the same I do prefer the places where its not allowed to be brought up in an individual context except by the patient but the option is available and legal.
Yes of course you don’t see them showing the countries taking care of people. Why would they show you something that runs counter to their argument and agenda? Look critically at this and which groups are behind the push to force the suffering of those that are terminally ill.
Maybe you would like to have your body and/or mind progressively fall apart to prove your “machismo”, but you have zero right to dictate how others deal with their terminal suffering. Mazel tov on your preference.
Perhaps, but my mother has gone and said outright that if she’s a vegetable in pain when she’s old she wants to just die. My great aunt is in a similar situation and has said the exact same thing. Law forbids it though.
It’s ridiculous. We allow our pets to have a more humane death than we allow ourselves. It’s extremely unethical to let someone suffer until their body shuts down when there’s nothing that can save them.
It’s like abortion. If you disagree with it, don’t do it.
It’s not about what we allow ourselves.
It’s about what others disallow us.
I believe that anyone being physically prevented from taking their own life has an ethical right to physically hurt the people violating their will. Claw and punch and spit. Poke their fucking eyes out. Fuck em.
Capitalism is a clear and present danger to people with disabilities.
Assisted dying is just a way for people to try and mitigate some of the problems inherent in capitalism.
If you’re suffering from something that can’t be cured, capitalism isn’t the problem.
You can live in the best socialist utopia anyone can imagine, but if your particular condition can’t be cured or treated, you’re suffering. Suffering is universal.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_model_of_disability
Tl;Dr the model points to the fact that often the most disabling thing about a disability is how society treats the individual. It is not claiming that physical limitations do not exist, just that it is often in fact things like access problems that truly isolate the disabled.
For example, what is at fault when a ramp is not provided to enter a building, the unavoidable disability that requires a wheelchair, or exclusionary design?
You can also see this in action on this very “leftist” community when the fake progressives defend sub-minimum wage.
Sure, pain is a social construct, right?
I’m sorry about your illiteracy.
So ableism it is now? How very progressive.
BTW, I addressed exactly what you’re referring to in the comment above. But you chose to ignore that.
Sure you did, bro. Also, willful illiteracy is not a disability, but keep on going.
Christ some of you people are insufferable.
sometimes societies frameworks are the root cause of societies issues, disabled people aren’t generally a profitable market.
Yeah, I get it, but “caPiTliSM” in every goddamned reply is getting old, and diluting the argument.
There’s some dark humor in people just now noticing that there might be some issues with MAID
It’s been a point of contention within the disabled community for decades. You just don’t know about these things.
I know I’ve heard the dialogue about it since day one I’m just shocked it took this long for this to hit the mainstream
That’s fair, and there’s certainly a weird overlap in the conversation between the people who view it as reducing suffering and those who view it as a cost reduction measure.
Or those who criticize capitalism with every breath they take but still support it in a capitalist society, like it won’t be monetized and used as a weapon against the disabled and enemies of the state.
