🚀 go-pugleaf

Jim Adamopoulos <jadamo@deakin.edu.au> writes:

>> What we have seen however, is the Act being used as an insurance
>> policy against fear. People who are obviously willing to tolerate
>> their level of pain or suffering are "signing up" to be killed later,
>> if the need arises.

>That is how it should be. The process of having got all the signatures
>takes quite a few months to get. 

Bulls**t !
I can believe it may take some time to find a trio of doctors willing
to believe transparent lies, but if the law is used properly it should
have been quite streamlined.

step 1: convince any doctor you have a terminal illness and are suffering
unacceptably.

step 2: get a specialist in your terminal illness to confirm the diagnosis
of the terminal illness.

step 3: get "the" psychiatrist to verify you aren't suffering from clinical
depression. 

step 4: wait 7 days, then someone can sign the papers.

step 5 wait 48 hours, then someone can kill you.

Now its pretty obvious that if a person is willing to accept their
current level of suffering they fail the criteria for step one.

I ask again, why did the doctor sign the papers in the first place ?


How do people know how much they will
>deterioate in the next few months? If what you are saying is the case,
>people can apply for the euthanasia law, when and only when the pain is
>insufferable. 

The suffering must be unacceptable to the patient..
Thats the way the Act is written, but its already being misused.

In the few months it takes to get all the legal
>requirements, how much extra suffering must these people take.

Months only if you have to search for medicos who disregard the law.
The RTI Act itself only requires 9 days to satisfy it.
(less than the cooling off period for door-to-door sales contracts)

>These people know they will die from their disease. What is wrong with
>them "signing up" to have their lives ended (not killed) for when they
>feel they are ready to leave this world?

Whats "wrong" is that it contravenes the law. If you start ignoring
portions of a euthanasia law you are already halfway down the slippery
slope. If the pro-euthanasia can't even keep to the rules when they are
trying to be squeeky clean for the media, what would they get up to once
the limelight of publicity faded to the murky world of dementia wards?

>In my opinion I think people who had "signed up" were aware that they
>could be mentally uncapable in the future. That is when these people
>would no longer like to live and to stop their families seeing them in
>such a condition. 

Thats quite an assumption. People change their minds all the time.


>> If you read the RTI Act you will learn that a signed request is like a
>> sword of Damocles. It is not up to the patient when or how it drops,
>> but the doctor. The patient does not even have to be conscious.

>The patient (or it's legal authority in case of mental incapacity) does
>have to be concious to in fact press the return button to inject the
>necessary medicines. 

Sorry Jim, you are wrong. Yet another victim of the pro-euthanasia lobby's
publicity campaign surrounding the RTI Act. Certainly all deaths which
occured so far used a laptop PC and patient involvement, but the Act
does not specify it be done that way. Nitschke could have quite legally
injected lethal drugs into the IV drip of a sleeping patient 48 hours
after the ink was dry on the papers.

If the act had said what you state and the act was
>still in force, if such a case occured then the courts would make a
>change to the act.

Sorry Jim, courts cannot change an Act of Parliament. Only an amendment
by the enacting parliament, or override by a superior parliament can
change an Act.

Perhaps you should have helped oppose the RTI Act, now that you are
aware of how dangerous it really was.

David Moss,
personal opinion only.
http://www.geocities.com/~dmoss for anti-euthanasia resources.