RiverF wrote:Compassionate euthanasia aside, I think I have quite a different objective philosophy (as distinct from personal feelings) about suicide to most people .. certainly those whose opinions I've heard .. insofaras I'm not precious about it really, and not least because suicide is a way to have some control over the inevitable ... and might be particularly pragmatic to undertake when one is still in a position to make it happen.
For most of us, the tragedy of death is the loss of someone we care about, perhaps deeply, even intimately .. or just remotely .. but that is our emotion, our loss, our grief .. not theirs, for they are gone.
But I think another tragedy is that people who want to die must resort to methods that may not be painless and quick ... or worse, in cases of unsuccessful attempts or intervention, may leave the person alive but suffering or disabled in some way.
I fully appreciate why we don't want to make suicide more accessible or easier, and I'm not advocating that we do because I too feel a strong sense of loss and grief at the very thought of someone I care about ending their own life. But I'd feel those things no matter how the person died. And I think my feelings about it are selfish, despite the fact that I'm feeling them for someone else.
I think suicide triggers other emotions that have an even greater influence on how we think about it. Emotions like a sense of responsibility or guilt, that are understandable but not usually fair or reasonable. And emotions about our own physical or mental vulnerability, and our finite time alive which we don't want to be reminded of. And a range of feelings towards the person who has died, for what they have done, to themselves, and to those who miss them.
Not sure where that takes me ... I think pretty much non-judgemental about those who end their lives, and those who care about it.
I think that places in the position of having a very rounded view of humans as mortal beings.
RiverF wrote:Any solution that imposes some kind of disregard or repression of emotions that people experience in relation to suicidal death wouldn't be healthy, but I think some of those emotions themselves are not very useful either.
Healthy emotions come and go. We have the experience, we process it, we move on. Emotions are not always pleasant, but they are informative and formative - in good ways and bad. Emotions just are, and their utility is locked into and defined by our evolutionary past and their usefulness only comes after the fact.
It struck me reading your post that those with a strong anti-euthanasia bent are perhaps attempting to protect themselves (not the party they claim to have regard for) from the those "... emotions about our own physical or mental vulnerability, and our finite time alive which we don't want to be reminded of." And in doing so projecting that on others.
We all want a good, peaceful, non-dramatic death for ourselves yet the anti-euthanasia groups declare that bringing that about deliberately is a devaluation of life - in circumstances where the suffering of debilitating disease and illness might be greatly exacerbated through inaction.
That the anti-euthanasia objector is invariably and dogmatically religious is not a coincidence, nor that many religions teach their adherents to be fearful of death (for the possibility of eternal torture) and that people do not have possession of themselves (we all belong to the Great One). To deliberately, willingly, perhaps even peacefully and non-dramatically, take one's own life is anathema to that kind of sensibility for it demonstrates little fear of death and shows a disregard for those who do fear it, and it is also an act that asserts that one has a fundamental possession of one's own body and being. This is what the pro-life anti-euthanasia objector is really disagreeing with and protesting against, that those that do or would commit suicide, along with those that might help them, demonstrate an improper disregard for the emotions and beliefs of those who object to that action.
Of course, this has just occurred to me - so it might be complete bollocks.
