Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!qt.cs.utexas.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!samsung!olivea!oliveb!bunker!wtm
From: Michael.Marsden@newcastle.ac.uk (Michael Marsden)
Newsgroups: misc.handicap
Subject: Re: EUTHANASIA
Message-ID: <16493@handicap.news>
Date: 28 Jun 91 13:23:21 GMT
References: <16452@handicap.news>
Sender: wtm@bunker.isc-br.com
Reply-To: Michael.Marsden@newcastle.ac.uk (Michael Marsden)
Organization: University of Newcastle upon Tyne, UK, NE1 7RU
Lines: 56
Approved: wtm@hnews.fidonet.org

Index Number: 16493

John.Covici@f460.n101.z1.fidonet.org (John Covici) writes:
>                        [.......] I am saying that the Nazis that push
>Euthanasia talk about patients choice, BUT THEY DON'T MEAN it, so if you
>support this kind of think what you WILL wind up with is government mandated
>euthanasia and nothing less.  Consider this Miniapolis case and take warning.

Why do you seem to assume that

     a) people who want voluntary euthanasia are "Nazis" who want to
force euthanasia upon people? This seems to be an amazingly negative
view of a group of people who to me seem fairly normal.. not that I am
familiar with States politics. Here the pro-euthanasia people tend to
be civil liberties types.. I'm thinking here of "Exit" (who's real
name is "the society for voluntary euthanasia" or something like
that), who have been persecuted by the government, members threatened
with legal action, etc. Hardly the image of totalitarian Nazis!

     b) why should having voluntary euthanasia on the statute books
lead to government mandated euthanasia?? This seems somewhat unlikely
to me. Perhaps I'm being naive, but politicians do whatever is popular,
and killing helpless people against their wills is unpopular. Remember
that people who want to live in these situations, or have children /
dependants, would vote against such a possibility. To a politician,
it would be far too dangerous to try to introduce something like that..
put his/her power under risk? Never!

     I know very little about the Miniapolis case, so I can't comment
on the details. However, I vaguely seem to remember that a girl in an
irreversible coma, who had previously indicated she wanted to die in a
similar circumstance, was left to do so (no water/food?), although her
family disagreed.

     I may very well have made serious errors in that summary, but on
the off-chance that I was correct, I think that the previously
expressed will of the patient takes priority over her family (they
don't own her after all).

     My own views:

     1) statute. I'm in favour of voluntary euthanasia, as long as a
number of conditions are satisfied in each case; if the patient is
unable to confirm the act immediately before it is carried out, and
MAY be capable of doing so in the future (recover from coma / mental
illness / whatever), then it should not be carried out. Furthermore,
the patient must have at some previous point asked for euthanasia (eg,
a "living will"). If the patient IS capable of asking for euthanasia,
and does so, he/she should be interviewed by a psychiatrist to rule
out depression etc.

     2) personal. In the event of some irreversible damage to my
mental processes, subject to the conditions stated above, I would
want euthanasia.

                                     -Mike Marsden