🚀 go-pugleaf

pspat@opera.iinet.net.au (Patrick Canion) writes:

>I acknowledge his right too - he acted in a totally legal fashion.
>What concerns me is the potential for the right to become an
>obligation for those not as self-prepossed as this individual
>undoubtably was.

There is certainly a risk that such an atrocity may occur. The risk of 
this atrocity, however, does not justify the certainty of many others: 

- the certainty of prolonged merciless torture of the dying, 40% of
whom, according to a recent US survey, will experience extreme pain for
many days before they die;

- the certainty of unregulated involuntary euthanasia by benevolent but
mistaken doctors and nurses, who have admitted that euthanasia is
regularly practiced, law or no law;

- the certainty of the emotional and financial devastation that such
prolonged suffering inflicts on the families of the dying.

Obviously there are many risks involved in all this. If a patient is
mentally competent, however, then we can only assume that they themselves
are the most suitable person to weigh up these risks and determine a course
of action. To take this right away from patients is not to eliminate the
risk of an atrocity - it is to guarantee that atrocities are commonplace.

-- 
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