The Free Talk Live BBS
Free Talk Live => The Show => Topic started by: Euler on July 04, 2009, 09:23:02 AM
-
I support self-ownership but oppose doctor-assisted suicide. I think suicide is a fundamental right even though I generally think it is a bad idea. I don't think the medical profession should be involved in moral decisions such as suicide. People should be able to have access on the free market for the means to commit suicide. There is no reasons why doctors should be involved. It is even more dangerous when medicine is socialized. DIY.
-
Well, my friend, then you're against self-ownership. You are then of the opinion that you should own everyone else. Plain and simple. Fuck you. If I want an assisted suicide, I want assistance from a doctor and not a fuckin' plumber.
-
No need to swear. I think you didn't read what I wrote. Suicide should be a fundamental right, no qualifications. Right now, I believe people can be put in mental institutions for expressing their intention to commit suicide. I think it's unethical for a doctor to actively help someone commit suicide. Besides, there is no need for a doctor. Suicide is a moral decision, not a medical one.
Voluntaryist Sheldon Richman has a great article on the 1990's Oregon Physician Assisted Suicide Law.
http://www.thepriceofliberty.org/04/06/24/fffoundation.htm (http://www.thepriceofliberty.org/04/06/24/fffoundation.htm)
-
Okay, so anyone except a doctor should be able to help you commit suicide?
Dude, that's messed up.
-
Okay, so anyone except a doctor should be able to help you commit suicide?
Dude, that's messed up.
In a free society you would be able to buy all the drugs you needed to commit suicide. You wouldn't have to beg for a doctor's help. We currently live in a society where medicine is dominated by the governmen. It would be very dangerous to put that kind of power in the doctor's (government's) hands. As Sheldon Richman pointed out in the article I linked, in the Oregon Death with Dignity statute, the doctor is the one calling the shots. I would hardly say that qualifies as an assistant. I would never advocate using force to stop someone from contracting with a doctor but that mean I think its right. Using your logic, a priest couldn't theoretically help someone commit suicide but I don't think that would be morally proper.
-
Okay, so anyone except a doctor should be able to help you commit suicide?
Dude, that's messed up.
In a free society you would be able to buy all the drugs you needed to commit suicide. You wouldn't have to beg for a doctor's help. We currently live in a society where medicine is dominated by the governmen. It would be very dangerous to put that kind of power in the doctor's (government's) hands. As Sheldon Richman pointed out in the article I linked, in the Oregon Death with Dignity statute, the doctor is the one calling the shots. I would hardly say that qualifies as an assistant. I would never advocate using force to stop someone from contracting with a doctor but that mean I think its right. Using your logic, a priest couldn't theoretically help someone commit suicide but I don't think that would be morally proper.
1. Doctor =/= State in this instance. Fallacious comparison.
2. I'm unclear whether you're stating that doctors shouldn't perform assisted suicides as a mandated legality or as a personal preference. If it's the former we have a point of contention, if the later, I reserve the right to disagree, but "whatever".
-
1. In our current and ever more fascist health care system, doctors are agents of the state.
2. The latter. I don't think doctors should be helping people kill themselves. People should do it themselves.
Medicine and morals shouldn't be mixed.
-
Unfortunately, many who are to the point of expressing their desire for suicide no longer have the functionality to do themselves in. Are they doomed to continue to suffer simply because they lack the ability to swallow or pull a trigger?
Doctor assisted suicide should neither be mandated or prohibited. However, there should be ample documentation and witnesses to the fact that the patient really did want to end their life. In many doctor assisted suicides all the doctor does is set up the dosage, the patient has the control to deploy the drugs or not. If they choose to not go through with the suicide the doctor then unhooks them.
-
Unfortunately, many who are to the point of expressing their desire for suicide no longer have the functionality to do themselves in. Are they doomed to continue to suffer simply because they lack the ability to swallow or pull a trigger?
Doctor assisted suicide should neither be mandated or prohibited. However, there should be ample documentation and witnesses to the fact that the patient really did want to end their life. In many doctor assisted suicides all the doctor does is set up the dosage, the patient has the control to deploy the drugs or not. If they choose to not go through with the suicide the doctor then unhooks them.
Why should a purported healer, a doctor be involved in this enterprise? Can't a pharmacologist, a pharmacist or a chemist set up the dosage?
-
Why should a purported healer, a doctor be involved in this enterprise? Can't a pharmacologist, a pharmacist or a chemist set up the dosage?
Pharmacologists, pharmacists and chemists are types of doctors. A doctor is someone with a doctorate. You can get a doctorate is physics or chemistry as much as a docorate in medicine.
Also, while you haven't mentioned it, you're alluding to the "do no harm" aspect of of the Hippocratic oath like it's damn religious scripture. To this my responce would be that sometimes, leaving people alive is more harmful than letting them die.
Also, I'm still not seeing what the moral aspect here is; Person X wants to be killed in the hands of a skilled medical doctor, Medical Doctor A obliges. Matter over.
-
Besides, there is no need for a doctor.
yeah, its not like anyone has ever failed to kill themselves properly, or that a trained doctor would know how to dose people right to give them a peaceful, effective suicide.
I'm sure people who are in the mental state to want to kill themselves don't want to go through the ordeal of having to try twice.
There are numerous accounts of people trying to kill themselves using guns, only to be badly brain damaged and disfigured, but survived.
Also many people who opt for assisted suicide are paralyzed or disabled in a way to make suicide impossible without help, besides biting their tongue off and bleeding to death.. Funnily enough, not everyone's friends and relatives are up for the idea of killing a loved one, so having a doctor do it is a good alternative.
Its no more unethical for a doctor to help someone commit suicide than it is for a drugstore clerk to give someone meds to overdose on, or a gun smith to sell a gun to kill themselves.
If someone wants to end the misery of their life, then helping them is compassionate, not unethical.
-
Pharmacologists, pharmacists and chemists are types of doctors. A doctor is someone with a doctorate. You can get a doctorate is physics or chemistry as much as a docorate in medicine.
Also, while you haven't mentioned it, you're alluding to the "do no harm" aspect of of the Hippocratic oath like it's damn religious scripture. To this my responce would be that sometimes, leaving people alive is more harmful than letting them die.
Also, I'm still not seeing what the moral aspect here is; Person X wants to be killed in the hands of a skilled medical doctor, Medical Doctor A obliges. Matter over.
I thought you knewI meant Medical Doctor when I used the term doctor. Do those of you who favor doctor assisted suicide see no difference between someone killing themselves and a doctor killing them? Minarchist Mark was the most sensible on this topic on Monday's show.
-
I support self-ownership but oppose doctor-assisted suicide. I think suicide is a fundamental right even though I generally think it is a bad idea. I don't think the medical profession should be involved in moral decisions such as suicide. People should be able to have access on the free market for the means to commit suicide. There is no reasons why doctors should be involved. It is even more dangerous when medicine is socialized. DIY.
I see no dichotomy in Euler taking this position, provided he does not support force to prevent Doctors from assisting suicide. I'm opposed to feces as a building material, but I do not actively seek to prevent others from building a house out of crap.
-
Pharmacologists, pharmacists and chemists are types of doctors. A doctor is someone with a doctorate. You can get a doctorate is physics or chemistry as much as a docorate in medicine.
Also, while you haven't mentioned it, you're alluding to the "do no harm" aspect of of the Hippocratic oath like it's damn religious scripture. To this my responce would be that sometimes, leaving people alive is more harmful than letting them die.
Also, I'm still not seeing what the moral aspect here is; Person X wants to be killed in the hands of a skilled medical doctor, Medical Doctor A obliges. Matter over.
I thought you knewI meant Medical Doctor when I used the term doctor. Do those of you who favor doctor assisted suicide see no difference between someone killing themselves and a doctor killing them? Minarchist Mark was the most sensible on this topic on Monday's show.
Why does it matter? It would be easier for me if I'm suffering from a terminal illness to have a knowledgeable practitioner in medicine or some guy with a gun who can do the job just as well. Either scenario same thing. I save my family medical bills and I'm saved from my suffering. Why would you deny someone the right to contract with another?
-
OP is an idiot.
-
In Libertopia I plan on being a suicide technician. I'll be competing against those lame-ass suicide booths. And who cares if I fuck up, what's the worst that could happen? My patient lives? I'd like to see them bring that shit to arbitration.
I imagine my office would be very similar to the suicide offices in Soylent Green. You pick the music, you pick the scenery, and then when you're all relaxed, I kill your ass.
-
Suicide isn't all that difficult. Certainly, it does not require a trained medical professional to carry it out. In fact, there is already a private organization dedicated to this purpose. http://www.finalexitnetwork.org/default.htm (http://www.finalexitnetwork.org/default.htm)
As Ian likes to point out, "the market will provide."
-
In Libertopia I plan on being a suicide technician. I'll be competing against those lame-ass suicide booths. And who cares if I fuck up, what's the worst that could happen? My patient lives? I'd like to see them bring that shit to arbitration.
I imagine my office would be very similar to the suicide offices in Soylent Green. You pick the music, you pick the scenery, and then when you're all relaxed, I kill your ass.
Yeah, but how incompetent would you have to be to get sued for it?
*zap*
Patient: Oww! That hurt. Can you hurry it up?
Suicide Tech: Hmmm. Why didn't that work?
*zap*
Patient: Oww! What the hell dude?!?!
Suicide Tech: Dammit! Not again
*BLAM BLAM BLAM BLAM*
Patient: AHHHHH! FUCK MAN!!! Do you even know what you are doing?
*suicide tech reaches for a baseball bat*
-
OK tuttle, first of all why in the hell would I try to kill someone with an electric collar?
-
Well, my friend, then you're against self-ownership. You are then of the opinion that you should own everyone else. Plain and simple. Fuck you. If I want an assisted suicide, I want assistance from a doctor and not a fuckin' plumber.
Why are you such a douche bag all the time?
-
Having watched my brother's unconscious body waste away because it would have been "unethical" for a doctor to hasten his demise, I can tell you it took all my strength not to just put a pillow over his face. Fortunately for us, he died rather quickly after the food and water were withdrawn, but shit, why? The end result was the same. Withdrawing food and water is a very slow fucking way of dying, why not just slam a gram of the same shit they were (uselessly) giving is for his "comfort." His brain was fucking DEAD. Ot at least the pre-frontal cortex, and all the higher functions. He was not aware of any "pain." His body was going through rudimentary autonomic death throws, so they juiced him up with Demerol and Verced so WE wouldn't have to see him twitch and writhe. Why not double the fucking dose and put and end to the misery? His mother couldn't hack it and locked herself in the garage with a bottle of Xanax, a big glass of wine and a running automobile. She figured out how to do it without a doctor, but my brother couldn't act on his own behalf. It would have been nice if a doctor had taken some initiative in ending my brother's life, rather than simply stopping feeding him.
-
Yea i'm sure everyone has some story like that. I remember being my grandpa and how he was effected by cancer. We always had to have a family member over there to help him clean up his shit and piss. Give him baths, etc. Everyday he was in pain and looked like shit. We all just wanted to end his suffering. He didnt deserve to go through all that. It wasnt only painful for him but for us as well. Emotionally taxing and it wasn't easy financially.