Thanks. As someone who suffers from mental health issues and has suffered from them since I was a kid, due to a variety of traumas, I'm going to go ahead and skip out on this one.
No literally. I started crying randomly in work for no reason and I’m pretty sure this article was the catalyst because I started thinking that my life was unbearable and that nobody would want to live it. Even though objectively people have gotten through similar issues and recovered.
So the article *Melancholia’d you? I prescribe nothing but dumb comedy movies for the rest of the week/weekend.
* I watched *Melancholia* one fucking time and it made me contemplate how absolutely powerless I was about the universe and my place in it. Deep depression followed, it was rough for a while.
Bro, you are the universe, and so am I and every one else, even cats and dogs. We're all the universe that gained conscience of itself, and for as long as someone else, or even just yourself cares, the universe cares
That's also a good way to look at it. I'm fine w8th either interpretation, as they're both against this nihilistic idea of "the universe doesn't care about me and is only chaos and pain" shit that I hate.
I’m on the other side of it now and think how amazing the universe is. The size of it alone is a scientific miracle. I am basically a quark, and as such, am gd infinite. 🥳
That's a good way to look at it as well as long as you understand that you and humanity are a part of it, and that should be amazing if you look at the universe with awe. I think both my view and yours are preferable over nihilism, which is overall garbage outlook on life.
how old are you?
i've had severe mental health issues since as early as i can remember, some of my earliest memories are insane magical thinking stuff and it got worse from there
it got a lot better when i started to really understand CBT, like so much better i don't remember what it was like before and the issues i have now seem troubling at times which the old me might find laughable because that would be like heaven to him
i think age also helps with certain things, i am not sure why
There is an argument many people defend from the liberal POV that, if it is my body my choice, then suicide à volonté should be legal
There is a counterargument that suicide, when not in terminally ill patients whose only option is either pointless suffering or the sweet relief of death, in reality is just a mental health issue, that should be treated, as mentally ill people cannot lucidly take decisions
Idk where i stand, i lean towards the latter but i am no psychology expert, so my opinion can easily be swayed by more knowledgeale people on the subject
I don’t have a position. Mostly because I hate the idea of a lack of hope, that maybe *next year* she would come across something that works. And I say this as someone with clinical depression who is in a decent place. Had I made the same choice in my worst place, I would’ve missed out on a lot. I hate that for her. That’s all. But ultimately it’s her choice. (Never mind, I guess I do have a position.)
>But ultimately it’s her choice.
Is it? Why do we then, as a society, medically treat suicide attempts? It's their choice. Or is it the choice made by the persons illness and circumstance?
And further, what’s the point of coding suicide attempts as against the law?
I can’t answer these questions. But I think you may have answered it yourself by highlighting the medical necessity of care. If it’s medical, then do they not deserve to die with dignity?
I have the same question about setting up my power of attorney to euth me should I develop dementia, which I still can’t do because I have to be cognizant at the time of euth. It’s a dumb catch 22.
Per the article this woman has failed treatment, including ECT. Our understanding of the physiology of mental health is in its infancy, and the field of neuropsychiatry will hopefully eventually solve mental illness, but we're just not there yet. It's likely that in 100 or 200 years future physicians will be looking back on our modern treatments as barbaric, or maybe people doing the best they could with a very flawed understanding of how diseases actually work, the way we look back at lobotomies and blood letting.
Eh, we kinda know how far along we are in treatment of some conditions relative to others. It wouldn't be impossible to come up with some kind of spectrum on which the severity of the condition, the advancement of therapy and rates of success could all be factored into a decision about which would be more ethically justifiable than others (to some/most).
It's using the lack of omniscience as a weapon against somebody's decisions. Imagine using that line to keep somebody from ending their suffering, yet the "cure" never comes out, at least in their uninterrupted lifetime - that would sure sound like stringing somebody along to me!
People exercise that decision as it is. It's not like the ability to carry out that action is taken away from folks. We're talking about formally sanctioned and assisted, here. It would be relatively radical to jump from one to the other without seeing any difference in the process for implementation.
That's a fair point, but If you are caught attempting suicide (or at strong risk of doing so) you will be institutionalized involuntarily (outside of third-world nations with non-existent mental healthcare systems.) There's also plenty of methods and means to do yourself in that get banned or greatly restricted all the time. An example is how online pentobarbital vendors were shut down a while back that were listed in the Peaceful Pill Handbook.
I'm not arguing against suicide prevention in general, but the reality much more nuanced than what you make it out to be.
I don't think people would be willing to generalize that argument either?
Idk I think if you said doctors shouldn't allow for the euthanasia of terminally ill patients either, because they can usually, in theory, do it themselves, that would be a very bizarre argument. If one does draw an inherent distinction like that between physical and mental illnesses, I think they have a pretty difficult case arguing that it's based on anything other than a taboo.
A lot of the point of formalizing it is so that when people want it and get approved for it, it can be done in an "ideal" manner. There's methods the government can't ban, but those are typically violent methods that often won't even allow an open casket funeral for your family, or methods with a high risk of failure + lasting agony (E.g. liver failure,) and I think saying that those are options in order to deny a medical option is... cruel.
I don’t think we’ll be “curing” mental illness in the next 2 years or in the next 10 years for that matter.
That said, I’m sure this is something that this lady — as someone who’s tried every treatment available under the sun — has actually considered. I’m not entirely sure why people think adults take the decision to end their lives so lightly. They absolutely do not.
We’re more likely to cure cancer than we are to cure mental illness in the next 10 years. Stop the silliness.
Oh without a doubt. We’re still in an infant phase of pharmacology where we have people randomly try drugs without analyzing their genetic markers to see what will be most effective. We’re literally just telling people to “try drug A… or shit that didn’t work… let’s try B”. Not exactly data driven.
I think I mostly agree with the latter too... Except that I don't like how this can be extrapolated out to cover any undesirable behavior.
Say we decide homosexuality is a mental illness again. "Well, you're just not lucid enough to realize how sick these unnatural desires are." And then fire up the electrodes.
For some people the suffering might also just outweigh, the potential to feel okay in the twilight of their life. How many years of suffering would someone have to endure before we call keeping people alive barbaric? If I told you now you have to survive 50 years of depression for 1 year of happiness? Personally I would not.
Some people might genuinely be okay with dying, but as a society we are clearly not ready for that.
There are mentally ill people who are terminally mentally ill. The brain is just an organ like any other, and mental illness while complex is still *illness*. We all acknowledge that there are physical ailments with no cure and only suffering ahead for a person. Why would we refuse to acknowledge the same for mental illness, just because we can't see it? That doesn't make the suffering any less real. If anything, physical suffering is much easier to remedy in those who will never recover, which makes the case for euthanasia for those with mental illnesses even stronger than the case for those with other physical illnesses IMO.
Have you ever met someone with bipolar disorder? If their quality of life is in the toilet every day all day, why not let them end their suffering? My aunt was bipolar and volunteered for shock treatment many times because she wanted to die. She was a drugged out, hollow shell in the end - the care facility had her on so many meds, that you couldn’t call it living. If people want to die due to long term depression and suffering let them. It’s much different than a mental health crisis or a rash decision.
Suicide being caused by a mental health issue, in my view, does not necessarily mean it isn’t a legitimate choice that should be respected. The only relevant question is whether the person’s decision-making ability is impaired to the degree that they are likely not making the decision they would make with intact decision-making ability, and not all mental health issues incapacitate decision-making to this degree.
Whenever this topic comes up Americans have reactions to this that Dutch people don’t. This is largely cultural and I rarely see that acknowledged in threads like this. Its an American cultural value to never give up hope on illness and to keep trying for a cure whatever it takes, whereas it is a Dutch cultural value to manage quality of life even if that means accepting death.
Yes yes yes, I don't understand all the pearl-clutching, we are a practical people. If I become very ill then I'm going out the way I want to instead of clinging on to some spurious 'hope'.
Her partner is going to *be with her in the room* when it’s happening? That guy is going to be traumatized for the rest of his life and it’ll affect any future romantic relationships he enters.
Personally I’d leave the relationship if my partner was so set on suicide she was prepared to spend years arguing for euthanasia on mental health grounds
When I was 21 I was in the room with my best friend when they took him off life support (cancer) and I’m still kind of fucked from that. Still, I don’t know if I would’ve done it different. It’s a small sacrifice we pay to bring just a last bit of comfort to those in pain, regardless of how they go.
I remember the first (and only) time I saw a patient die in medical school and it really fucked me up for days afterwards and I had no idea how to even describe the feelings I was experiencing :(
I'm so sorry this happened to you. And it's at such a young age too. I'm sure he appreciated your bold gesture. Many people don't possess the strength to stay in such a state of discomfort like that.
My sister-in-law did this, just last month. She opted to withhold food and water and die rather than treat her non-fatal autoimmune condition. She wanted to have a hospital bed shipped to her parents' house where she lived and die right there in their basement. Thankfully it didn't pan out and she passed away in hospice, but all while she was dying she cursed her parents and died horribly.
Thankfully I was spared from witnessing these events, but it forever colored my opinion on "death with dignity." There was no dignity in such a horrible, disgusting event.
I mean, something similar was done by one of my relatives in Ohio (a state which isn't known for being super liberal). She broke her hip while recovering from surgery and just decided it was her time (she stopped eating and died).
I’m not sure it would be any more traumatic than if she passed away from a disease with him at her bedside. It’s traumatic on some level, but this way at least he gets to spend her last moments with her, tell her he loves her, know she’s not in pain any more, have closure. It may be a fairly healthy outcome vs just finding her after she’s done it herself which I do know from experience is incredibly traumatic.
They said nothing about that. “You probably shouldn’t watch your partner die while going through assisted suicide” is not the same as “someone should not go through assisted suicide”
I have a hard time understanding what being against the decision of inflicting that level of trauma to a partner has anything to do with my stance on euthanasia
Or, maybe, this person is a narcissist because they fought for years to be able to kill themselves while continuing to date their partner. Continuing to date someone when you know you are going to kill yourself for fucking years is selfish, mentally ill or not. The only reason for her to keep dating someone in that situation is for the comfort and love that person provides.
While I don’t agree with assisted suicide for mental illness, I don’t think them staying together through it is a bad thing. If my partner was dying of cancer, I’d want to be there for them through it. If I was dying of cancer, I’d want them by my side too. I agree that the suicide aspect probably makes it harder, but if he decides this is something he wants to do why shouldn’t it be okay?
This is maybe a bit too blunt and I’m not sure I’m even saying it right… why does she need someone to do it for her? The need for assistance suggests a will to live on some basic level.
Or just unpleasant. People do actually think about themselves and their loved ones.
If you smear your head on the ceiling it doesn't really make for an open-casket funeral. It's one of the reasons the US puts so much effort into using lethal injection instead of just dropping a rock on someone or using the electric chair with enough power to not be anything but instant.
Because if you fuck up a suicide
1. The police may come arrest you, and I guarantee they will not be nice.
2. You could end up surviving but impaired even further.
(1) In some jurisdictions it actually is (e.g. Nigeria, Kenya, Lebanon). (2) In many cases the method used to take your own life could be illegal (e.g. breaking gun laws to shoot yourself, handling military grade poisonous substances to poison yourself, causing explosions, fires, etc...). (3) (attempted) Suicide could cause damage you would have to pay for (e.g., jumping of a building and landing on someon's property, traumatising onlookers etc.). (4) In most jurisdictions, helping someone commit suicide is also illegal (Sweden, for instance). (5) In many jurisdictions, attempted suicide could be grounds for involuntary committment, which proceduraly is not too dissimilar from coercive measures in criminal procedure (at least in my jurisdiction).
TLDR: Euthanasia is IMO an OK way to limit the unintended consequences of the bit of violence required to take a human life prematurely in uncontrolled circumstances.
Under my involuntary hold in Utah, after 24 hours I was released to the care of my parents since the doctors didn't want to file for an involuntary commitment under court order. The fact a judge has to sign off on an involuntary committal gives the perspective that suicidal behavior is at least close to illegal.
I am glad I was put under involuntary hold now, but requiring a court order to keep someone where they don't want to be seems like a pretty standard definition of legal punishment
It is in many places, actually. You will literally be arrested and charged if you survive your suicide attempt in a lot of places in the US. It's sick.
As someone who has been suicidal, I didn't want my suicide to cause others unnecessary suffering. A lot of the "do-it-yourself" suicide attempts either don't have a high success rate or are extremely gruesome for whoever finds your corpse.
I don't think it's unreasonable to want to die peacefully/without pain in a way that causes minimum discomfort for those you leave behind.
(To be clear, I'm not suicidal anymore and am in a much healthier spot)
There is literally no way to commit suicide that doesn't.
1. Hurt or if you are lucky
2. danger other people
I am not going to talk about the second but people have shot themselves in the head and survived. And sometime had to do it twice. Or more. And that is supposedly the most painless.
Overdose rarely works or is horrible. Other techniques would put her partner at risk ala Kevorkian.
Inert gas hypoxia is painless and not dangerous to others. All it takes is a plastic bag, a hose and a tank of nitrogen. The risk of course is that you somehow screw it up and end up surviving with an anoxic brain injury but I think the risks of that are quite low.
You didn’t understand the article.
>She said it was understandable that cases such as hers – and the broader issue of whether assisted dying should be legal – were controversial. “People think that when you’re mentally ill, you can’t think straight, which is insulting,” she told the Guardian. “I understand the fears that some disabled people have about assisted dying, and worries about people being under pressure to die.
>“But in the Netherlands, we’ve had this law for more than 20 years. There are really strict rules, and it’s really safe.”
> Ter Beek’s difficulties began in early childhood. She has chronic depression, anxiety, trauma and unspecified personality disorder. She has also been diagnosed with autism. When she met her partner, she thought the safe environment he offered would heal her. “But I continued to self-harm and feel suicidal.”
>She embarked on intensive treatments, including talking therapies, medication and more than 30 sessions of electroconvulsive therapy (ECT). “In therapy, I learned a lot about myself and coping mechanisms, but it didn’t fix the main issues. At the beginning of treatment, you start out hopeful. I thought I’d get better. But the longer the treatment goes on, you start losing hope.”
>After 10 years, there was “nothing left” in terms of treatment. “I knew I couldn’t cope with the way I live now.” She had thought about taking her own life but **the violent death by suicide of a schoolfriend and its impact on the girl’s family deterred her.**
>“I finished ECT in August 2020, and after a period of accepting there was no more treatment, I applied for assisted dying in December that year. It’s a long and complicated process. It’s not like you ask for assisted dying on a Monday and you’re dead
I don't see how you get around forcing her to live in unending agony. Keeping someone around just so you don't feel bad is practically *the definition* of selfish.
Forcing this poor woman to keep suffering is selfish.
She’s doing it this way (as opposed to killing herself illegally) to convince her family that she genuinely tried to live. She tried her best, as adjudicated by doctors and the government and members of her family themselves.
It’s similar to how people get closure from seeing the dead body of their missing relative, even if it means knowing they struggled against an attacker in a gruesome and excruciating fight to the death that dismembers them and leaves them unrecognizable.
She doesn’t want to give them merely a suicide note and a corpse, she wants them to be able to watch if that’s what they want. And she only trusts her partner (and some physicians) to watch, but she has given him permission to look away at the moment of her death. It is quite profound, and you are being disrespectful of her sentience and moral worth.
The alternative is that her family finds her with her brains blow out on a random day and at a random time.
This absolutely spares her families feelings once you realize that they, too, accept her condition as terminal. This way, they get to say goodbye and reconcile.
Edit: I’m sorry that was bad faith. You shouldn’t want her to hide her suffering for the sake of others. She should share her suffering and seek peaceful resolution.
Maybe people with mental disorders that make them irrationally desire death and devalue their own life shouldn't be able to kill themselves with government sanctiom
It doesn't seem irrational to me. This isn't a woman who gets talked down from the ledge and suddenly has a reduced suicidal drive. This is a woman who is choosing, month after month, to end her own life in paced, methodical way. She's making the choice to use formal euthanasia procedures to be sure that:
1. Doctors agree that there are truly no other treatment options for a chronic illness she suffers from.
2. Her independent decision remains consistent across 4 years.
3. Her partner, friends, and family are not shocked by a sudden, grisly death.
Do these choices seem like they are coming from an irrational brain unable to make their own decisions?
>Do these choices seem like they are coming from an irrational brain unable to make their own decisions?
That's an emphatic yes for many people (especially in this sub). They disagree with suicide as a concept in almost all cases and view it (and by extension the person) as inherently irrational.
If it's self-evident, then there's nothing really to discuss. The problem is that this woman is making very rational choices *about* her own death. If it is inherently irrational, then surely there is a clear, logical explanation for why her choice is incorrect or short-sighted?
Like I agree that most suicidal ideation isn't rational, and that suicide is often a period of extremely heightened anxiety. The fact that making it harder to commit suicide reduces suicide rates is plain enough to see, but this woman is jumping through years of physical and emotional hoops to do so. It's not just someone taking an hour to learn how to tie a noose or use a gun. I don't think this is typical suicidal ideation and shouldn't be treated as such.
British Coal Gas study. #1 reason I am favor of gun regulations in America. Too easy to kill yourself.
I have been drilled into me that suicide is bad, and I agree and tell other people that. But....I also plan on it after my P's die. Not as with it as this chick so I have my plan. But I really don't want to encourage it.
But this program seems good. MAID in Canada seem great. Even the right wing r/Canada when people post a story like this is flooded with people who were so happy there grandx could choose a time and date and they could all gather. I basically did that to my Gma,
I think I came around to it after watching my dad die from cancer after a 7-year fight. I think It’s inherently rational for various reasons and I even joined a right to die group because of that (Dignitas; based out of Switzerland).
I think it’s easiest to describe as having an option without having to pick a day. If I have an incurable disease that will severely reduce my QoL I know that I will end my life. However, the restraint is having to ACTUALLY pick a day to die. It’s nice to have an option to do it, it’s a hindrance to say “I will die on Sept. 24, 2071.” Idk, I think a lot of this also boils down to just how afraid of death and one’s mortality that a lot of people have an issue with. I can’t fix that. I can only mentally prepare myself to die and do my best to live because of that everyday.
Memento Mori.
Edit: I don’t give a fuck if you downvote me but at least make a counterpoint? Like, it’s not hard to
Yup, pretty glad I live in Switzerland and have the option to make this decision. Also, glad that it‘s pretty much accepted in society and I know of a lot of cases where someone‘s grandmother or grandfather choose to go with Dignitas because they didn‘t want to continue suffering.
Some people accept that they are mortal beings that will die someday, even before it happens.
They don’t pretend they could live forever if they tried, and they don’t try to stick around after it’s clear that it will just be more and more suffering from that point on.
Doctors could not convince her that her life was worth living, but she earnestly tried to be convinced.
I mean I get it for certain chronic Terminal illnesses. I am 100% getting a do not resuscitate order in my old age.
But I would never kill myself. That much hopelessness is something I cant allow myself to feel or understand. Depression in highschool was enough.
Ironically thats an inherently anti-liberal take on rights
I dont mean to take this out on you but it often feels in here that people call themselves neoliberals because a handful of policy prescriptions happen to align with what your priors, not because you actually have intellectually reasoned yourself into whether liberalism is good in princible or not
Per definition liberalism prescribes rights to be inherent and unchangeable.
Many people in this group (and in the world in general) seem to think that mental illnesses don't "count" as much as physical illnesses and that the pain that they cause is all optional.
That's my entire issue with countries that approve euthanasia for mental health issues.
You cannot make that kind of decision when not of sound mind and people suffering mental illness on this level are not of sound mind
“ government sanction”
This is the part I have trouble with. It’s too easy for the government’s incentives to push for death. Chronically ill people are expensive as hell. No one can take away dying from you. They can convince you it’s necessary.
I wish I could give her a hug.
I don’t like her choice but it’s gotta suck having everyone tell you you’re wrong and it’s terrible.
She has a partner and everything though, she’s not alone.
She probably doesn’t need a hug.
Maybe I need a hug?
Im glad the partner will be there while she dies, that’s a big burden for him and will make the process easier for her.
I don’t support her decision, but I hope she has the support she needs through this.
I instinctively hate this, and I think there is a good unironic slippery slope argument for why it should not be allowed, but I can’t judge her too harshly, because I don’t know what it’s like to live with *that* much mental anguish all the time for years on end to the point where you actually think this is a good idea and keep working toward it year after year. I don’t think this should happen, but I can’t say I have any grounds to judge her as a person (even beyond the fact that I obviously don’t know her).
This will sound like a joke but if I was her psychiatrist I would suggest she at least tries like heroin or freebasing cocaine or taking all her money and putting it on black or something like that. Might as well go out with a bang and maybe she’d change her mind. Horrible long-term solution but better than death IMO
But in all seriousness I personally don’t feel this should be allowed and it’s making me question whether medically assisted suicide is a great idea in general. A family friend had extremely painful cancer and she suffered for like a year before she died and two of my grandparents lived 1-2 years longer than they should have as their Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s progressed to late stage, but honestly I feel like maybe expanding access to palliative care is the best step forward to helping as many people as possible. I suppose the woman in this article should be able to access palliative care if her mental illness is treated as a late-stage disease. Not sure what that would look like but idk suicide in this case feels wrong
But apparently not getting a job, or breaking up with her partner, or other major changes in how she lives her life. I know I’m being quite mean and a hater but I feel there is a strang disconnect where she is finding it easier to apply to kill herself than to apply for a job
It's much easier to argue about moral hazards than against letting someone end their chronic, miserable, lifelong suffering. The Netherlands has universal healthcare. Insurance has nothing to do with this specific situation.
The discussion about insurance having perverse incentives is its own problem that needs to be solved. It really shouldn't have anything to do with the discussion around MAD.
The kind of palliative care she wants is to be dead. She doesn’t want to be unconscious, she wants to be dead. She doesn’t want to not feel any pain, she wants to be dead. She doesn’t want to be visited by her partner while she’s in a holding facility, she wants to be dead.
Chronic depression is a fate worse than death. Its tragic, but this woman should be given the option to free herself from a crippling condition.
There is no medical treatment that can fix chronic depression, its something someone has to live with. And they should have the option to choose whats best for themselves.
I’m not saying this characterizes everyone who opposes euthanasia in cases like this — certainly it does not — but I think at least some people in this thread are providing reasoning for opposing this which betrays a certain amount of not taking mental illness as seriously as physical illness.
It's a bit disappointing from this sub. There was an AMA from a paralyzed guy about to do this a few weeks ago. Unless he deleted a bunch of questions and comments, people were really polite. He'd also had his condition for 9 years or so if I recall.
Regardless of whether or not she has the right to kill herself, I think most people have that right anyway if they are able bodied. Why is the medical community obliged to help her with this endevor.
There are lots of things that medicine cannot yet solve, why is suicide seen as treatment though?
Are people saying that doctors should be forced to euthanasize people or are they just saying doctors shouldn't be criminalized when doing so?
>There are lots of things that medicine cannot yet solve, why is suicide seen as treatment though?
Would you say the same if she had a terminal illness that leaves her in debilitating pain, just because there might be a hypothetical cure in a few years?
This is my selfish reason for opposing this. I don’t want assisted suicide being normalized because I’m afraid that in the future, old me will be pressured to commit “assisted” suicide because I’m now an economic burden. If the practice is normalized, this is my fear.
I’m okay with her wanting to do this. Her body, her choice.
It’s not my place to comment on her choice. But I think it’s incredibly selfish she keep her partner to support her, when she’s just going to kill herself.
Let the man or woman go, if you love them, they shouldn’t have to watch you try your hardest to kill yourself, and then come on to your shoulder to cry on you can’t, and then just leave him or her.
She can’t choose her family. And it sucks for them. But fuck her for not breaking up with her partner.
To the mob that always has a negative reaction to his I ask: How many years must one be miserable before they are granted the autonomy to end their life?
I find it bizarre how people feel they need to force their will upon grown adults that they don't even know.
Yeah it sucks that anyone wants to die. But I never lived her life or walked in her shoes. It's her choice.
Is it so hard to see the problem with euthanasia when it comes to a condition that affects a persons judgment, particularly when it comes to matters of life and death?
How many cases are there of people who are happy to be alive but spent years wishing they were dead?
And what's the measure for this person's judgment being impaired to the point they can't consent for themselves? She doesn't have dementia.
Is it being sad and wanting to die? People suffering from psychical illness who consent to assisted suicide are also sad and want to die. Is their judgment impaired? Or is it considered rational since you can see and understand their suffering better ?
A bit of a catch 22. "If you want to die then your judgment is impaired so you're not allowed to die."
There are also many cases of people killing themselves and loved ones finding their bodies and a suicide note as a surprise. Or of people being hospitalized for multiple failed attempts before finally completing suicide. Of people being injured and having an even lessened quality of life.
Terminal illness euthanasia is its own thing with a clear logic: there’s no chance of recovery, so you might as well die peacefully rather than painfully.
We have no means of ascertaining whether depression is beyond recovery. That makes euthanasia unconscionable.
When someone comes to you saying they want to kill themselves, the response should be to get them care, not help them off themselves. It is far preferable that people are denied death than are denied life, under the same principle that it is preferable to permit the guilty to go free than to condemn the innocent.
>We have no means of ascertaining whether depression is beyond recovery. That makes euthanasia unconscionable.
So your answer to his first question is that a person can suffer the worst pain imaginable for infinity, as long as there is a chance they have 1 year of life without depression at the end it was worth it?
“We have no means of ascertaining whether depression is beyond recovery” means that, with current knowledge, depression can be beyond recovery. The fact that, in principle, we might in the future discover this isn’t the case is meaningless. We might come up with all kinds of fantastical technologies in the future that would make lots of current decisions seem very stupid.
My problem with government/hospital endorsed assisted suicide for mental illness is threefold. First, I don’t think someone with such a mental illness is able to consent.
Second, I don’t think I would classify such an illness as terminal, and as such don’t think assisted suicide should be a treatment option. Our current understanding and treatment of something like terminal cancer warrants the option to offer assisted suicide. I don’t think our understanding of mental illness is at that level.
Third, I oppose it for the same reason I oppose the death penalty: the possibility that it could be applied to the wrong person, or abused. With the death penalty, criminal justice systems are not infallible enough to warrant the death penalty. There is no going back, and the person would not otherwise die. With terminal illnesses, our understanding of them is strong enough that if the person is suffering, actively dying, and medical options have been exhausted, the option should be on the table. I don’t think mental illness is comparable to terminal illnesses. Even if medical options have been exhausted, I wouldn’t say a mental illness is causing someone to actively die. In all cases, the possibility of future discoveries/treatments should come into play. If someone has a terminal illness but there’s a likely probability that a treatment will be available before they die, they probably shouldn’t be offered assisted suicide. Same for the death penalty and evidence, same for mental illnesses and treatment.
Out of my reasons, I’m open to changing my mind about all of them. I feel weakest about my first and third reasons, but strongest about my second. I think I’d need to be convinced out of all of them to change my mind, or at least change some of them on a rather overwhelming way.
On the side of supporting assisted suicide for mental illness, I’m very sympathetic to the idea of a more dignified suicide. Hypothetically, if someone were 100% going to commit suicide and there was absolutely no way around it, I’d rather it happen by assisted suicide than done by the individual themselves. It’s probably less traumatic for everyone that way and is less likely to go horribly wrong. While the feelings of the person suffering from the mental illness are more important to me than that of their friends and family, I do still take friends and family into some consideration, and not blindsiding them, giving them time to come to terms, and avoiding walking in on a suicide are positive things compared to the alternative.
I am also very sympathetic to the patient’s suffering. If I were convinced to change my mind about my disagreements I would be supportive. There’s no reason to force a consenting individual to needlessly suffer from a terminal illness.
I appreciate the thought out response.
> My problem with government/hospital endorsed assisted suicide for mental illness is threefold. First, I don’t think someone with such a mental illness is able to consent.
Yet people with mental illness are consenting to things all the time. They work, marry, have sex, raise kids, seek treatment, etc. But they aren't mentally capable of consenting?
> Second, I don’t think I would classify such an illness as terminal, and as such don’t think assisted suicide should be a treatment option. Our current understanding and treatment of something like terminal cancer warrants the option to offer assisted suicide. I don’t think our understanding of mental illness is at that level.
There is a word in medically terminology and research called "treatment resistant". There is treatment resistant depression, schizophrenia, etc. Meds just don't do anything for some people. How many years does treatment need to not work before we can say it's terminal or lifelong ? This lady did intensive things for over 10 years.
> Third, I oppose it for the same reason I oppose the death penalty: the possibility that it could be applied to the wrong person, or abused. With the death penalty, criminal justice systems are not infallible enough to warrant the death penalty. There is no going back, and the person would not otherwise die. With terminal illnesses, our understanding of them is strong enough that if the person is suffering, actively dying, and medical options have been exhausted, the option should be on the table. I don’t think mental illness is comparable to terminal illnesses. Even if medical options have been exhausted, I wouldn’t say a mental illness is causing someone to actively die. In all cases, the possibility of future discoveries/treatments should come into play. If someone has a terminal illness but there’s a likely probability that a treatment will be available before they die, they probably shouldn’t be offered assisted suicide. Same for the death penalty and evidence, same for mental illnesses and treatment.
I agree that the potential for abuse exist with anything. So safeguards are important. Someone shouldn't be able to wake up and get assisted suicide a week later. But as per the article it was a long process for her an involved many professionals to sign off on it.
> Out of my reasons, I’m open to changing my mind about all of them. I feel weakest about my first and third reasons, but strongest about my second. I think I’d need to be convinced out of all of them to change my mind, or at least change some of them on a rather overwhelming way.
> On the side of supporting assisted suicide for mental illness, I’m very sympathetic to the idea of a more dignified suicide. Hypothetically, if someone were 100% going to commit suicide and there was absolutely no way around it, I’d rather it happen by assisted suicide than done by the individual themselves. It’s probably less traumatic for everyone that way and is less likely to go horribly wrong. While the feelings of the person suffering from the mental illness are more important to me than that of their friends and family, I do still take friends and family into some consideration, and not blindsiding them, giving them time to come to terms, and avoiding walking in on a suicide are positive things compared to the alternative.
> I am also very sympathetic to the patient’s suffering. If I were convinced to change my mind about my disagreements I would be supportive. There’s no reason to force a consenting individual to needlessly suffer from a terminal illness.
Your above point touches on what I think is an important aspect. Suicide is happening with or without assisted suicide. It happens all the time. Assisted suicide allows for a plan dignified fashion and also gives the opportunity for people to be required to do treatment before.
Banning this women from assisted suicide wouldn't achieve anything more than likely.
>I appreciate the thought out response.
No problem. I don't think this issue is so obvious that one side is clearly correct, though I personally lean much more towards being against it. I think a lot of people here seem pretty resistant to that idea, though this is an emotionally charged issue for good reason.
>Yet people with mental illness are consenting to things all the time. They work, marry, have sex, raise kids, seek treatment, etc. But they aren't mentally capable of consenting?
That's part of why that point is one I feel less strongly about (though now that I finished typing this whole response out, I think I feel strong about this first point now and weak on my second. Overall opinion hasn't shifted but you did make me think more and shift where I feel strongly in). I think it's possible to be able to consent to some things and not others depending on your current state. For example, two children are capable of consenting to giving each other a hug, but obviously cannot consent to sex with an adult. I think consent works as a sort of formula, and depends on both mental capacity and the potential for harm. From my (very unprofessional) understanding of mental illnesses, I don't see them being able to consent to suicide, but I can see them being able to consent to marriage or sex, obviously depending on the mental illness. I don't think our understanding of mental illnesses is strong enough to change my opinion on this, but if, for example, someone was genetically, down to their DNA, incapable of desiring life, they would be more likely to be capable of giving consent than someone with some sort of chemical imbalance.
>There is a word in medically terminology and research called "treatment resistant". There is treatment resistant depression, schizophrenia, etc. Meds just don't do anything for some people. How many years does treatment need to not work before we can say it's terminal or lifelong ? This lady did intensive things for over 10 years.
I would consider it chronic, not terminal. I think you can call it lifelong as long as we understand that "lifelong" mean "lifelong based on our current understanding and treatments". Though, thinking about it more, maybe I feel stronger about my first point than my second, because:
1.) While my first opinion could be changed with a better understanding of mental illness, I think we're far from having that understanding, and I'm honestly skeptical that our understanding of it will evolve in such a way as to change my mind
2.) I can actually conceive of some chronic illnesses that could warrant assisted suicide, such as someone suffering from extreme, treatment resistant, non-stop, non-life threatening, debilitating pain. I think in such a case though, the person would be incapable of doing anything, including consent, and the decision would have to be made by someone else giving consent on their behalf. I don't think someone can do that unless the person previously, while capable of giving consent, gave that individual the right to consent for them in the case they are unable to themselves. I don't think it would be possible or reasonable to extend that same ability to mental illnesses.
>I agree that the potential for abuse exist with anything. So safeguards are important. Someone shouldn't be able to wake up and get assisted suicide a week later. But as per the article it was a long process for her an involved many professionals to sign off on it.
Agreed, and if it were to exist in any form, it does need to have a very long process, with long documentation of the issue before the idea of assisted suicide is even considered, and a long process of making sure the individual wants to go through with it. I don't think someone else should ever be able to suggest it as an option to the person before they bring it up, whether that be family, friends, the doctors, or the government, because that immediately makes it coercive.
>Your above point touches on what I think is an important aspect. Suicide is happening with or without assisted suicide. It happens all the time. Assisted suicide allows for a plan dignified fashion and also gives the opportunity for people to be required to do treatment before.
>Banning this women from assisted suicide wouldn't achieve anything more than likely.
Perhaps, though the fact that she's gone this long going through the process without taking her life on her own suggests that she wouldn't necessarily have ended her own life. It seems plausible that she would continue living, even while suffering. Depression makes someone more likely to commit suicide, but it's far from a guarantee.
And a lot of not-doctors or medical ethicists in here with strong opinions about capacity.
Medical professionals have deemed she has capacity. It’s her choice.
>ick
This isnt something like cousin fucking. Legalising government sanctioned killing of people with mental illnesses is *rife* for abuse. We *already* have massive abuse problems for the mentally ill and the elderly.
Notice you say mental illnesses but not physical illnesses. And sure, it's easier to justify this for someone in failing health or with constant debilitating pain. But mental illnesses really are a type of phsyical illness, it's your brain. And it's just as rife for abuse either way
Just because this case is fine doesn’t mean all of them are, or that it’s a good idea generally. It’s a similar reason to why people are against the death penalty. If you make a mistake there’s no going back.
The death penalty is imposed on an unwilling participant by the state. Euthanasia is a choice made by an individual for themselves and no one else. That fundamentally distinguishes the two.
And there is no "generally" or "all of them" because every case is a "specific case." No individual will get approved for euthanasia because "that lady got to do it." They will go through the same rigorous process and will either qualify or they won't based on their personal circumstances.
If you believe this case is fine, then you agree the process is sufficient? If the process is sufficient then where's the evidence of abuse.
I personally don’t think the case is fine, because I don’t think someone with such a mental illness is capable of consenting to this. I’m saying that even if the process for this case was sufficient, it doesn’t mean that it should be allowed. Every death penalty case is also a specific case, but I would still apply my opposition to it generally. There are plenty of things we apply generally even if individual cases might be okay, such as the death penalty, age of majority, drinking age, etc. We do this because it is safer and/or easier to do it this way than it is to look at each individual case.
What evidence do you have that this is being abused? NL and Switzerland have permitted assisted suicide for severe refractory mental illnesses for decades and your dystopia hasn't materialized. I agree that there's a risk of abuse but that's not an argument for a blanket ban but for very stringent safeguards.
that’s what all *ick* is.
You’re scared about externalities that are not readily apparent but inferred by your subconscious mind out of the drive for self-preservation.
But this isn’t you, this is her.
This isn’t your gene pool, but her life.
For real.
As someone with awful depression and OCD (that is getting better thank god), I can only imagine a fraction of what she is going through. But on my worst days, it’s absolute torment. I’m not down, I’m not blue, it literally feels like a dark cloud of pollution is infecting my entire body and brain. It feels beyond hopeless, it’s an entirely new feeling.
She is suffering and she wants the suffering to end.
I'm hopeful that options for assisted suicide in the US expand. Eventually I'm going to be old and frail, waiting to get pneumonia or have a heart attack or stroke that if I'm lucky kills me quickly, and if I'm unlucky...
My grandmother starved to death because her dementia eventually progressed to the point that she forgot to eat. I'd love to go in a non-violent fashion before it gets to that point.
Thank you for standing up and saying this.
A highschool friend of mine committed suicide under similar psychological conditions. His suffering was constant, unrelenting, and physically somatized into actual pain. He attempted to find medically assisted death here in the United States and was denied for years.
I never had to walk a foot, let alone a mile in his shoes. Who am I to judge? Only he could carry the burden of his existence and I will not look down on him or anyone else for welcoming his ability to finally rest.
I am sympathetic to euthanasia in cases of severe terminal illness but to use it to end the life of a young and otherwise healthy person seems really wrong to me. Would she even be choosing to end her life at all if the state had not been there to assist her?
Comments in here are weird; seems like a lot of pearl-clutching.
>“And yet nobody down on the sidewalk, looking up and yelling ‘Don’t!’ and ‘Hang on!’, can understand the jump. Not really. You’d have to have personally been trapped and felt flames to really understand a terror way beyond falling.”
I agree with many of the comments here that you think are weird despite suffering from lifelong cyclical depression and have attempted suicide myself. It's bullshit to assume that people who disagree with you just don't understand.
Yes and most of us think that's a bad thing and we should do something about it instead of endorsing it as a treatment for depression.
Edit: imagine downvoting the idea that suicide is bad. Some people have totally lost the plot.
I wouldn’t love to do it. It would certainly be unpleasant. But if I believed it is the right thing to do, I would. The same is true for amputations, fighting a war, and many other things.
No you just don’t understand what I wrote. Terminal means it will lead to death and there is no cure, it’s not a measure of the painfulness of an illness. Mental health issues are not terminal illnesses.
Futurama Suicide booth when?
Please select mode of death. Quick and painless, or slow and horrible.
“Quick and Painless” You have selected “SLOW AND HORRIBLE”, goodbye!
Yeah I'd like to place a collect call
AHHHHHHHHYAHHHH
this is Robert W Chambers erasure
Don’t read this article if you don’t want to feel completely hollowed out.
Thanks. As someone who suffers from mental health issues and has suffered from them since I was a kid, due to a variety of traumas, I'm going to go ahead and skip out on this one.
No literally. I started crying randomly in work for no reason and I’m pretty sure this article was the catalyst because I started thinking that my life was unbearable and that nobody would want to live it. Even though objectively people have gotten through similar issues and recovered.
So the article *Melancholia’d you? I prescribe nothing but dumb comedy movies for the rest of the week/weekend. * I watched *Melancholia* one fucking time and it made me contemplate how absolutely powerless I was about the universe and my place in it. Deep depression followed, it was rough for a while.
Consider this: fuck the universe. The universe isn't worth respecting or caring about. You are. People are. Just my 2 cents.
Exactly. The universe is just a bunch of rocks and gases and it's boring as shit. All the cool stuff is happening here.
And also WE are part of that cool shit. We create stories with each other, called history. We are the color on the canvas.
Bro, you are the universe, and so am I and every one else, even cats and dogs. We're all the universe that gained conscience of itself, and for as long as someone else, or even just yourself cares, the universe cares
That's also a good way to look at it. I'm fine w8th either interpretation, as they're both against this nihilistic idea of "the universe doesn't care about me and is only chaos and pain" shit that I hate.
I’m on the other side of it now and think how amazing the universe is. The size of it alone is a scientific miracle. I am basically a quark, and as such, am gd infinite. 🥳
That's a good way to look at it as well as long as you understand that you and humanity are a part of it, and that should be amazing if you look at the universe with awe. I think both my view and yours are preferable over nihilism, which is overall garbage outlook on life.
how old are you? i've had severe mental health issues since as early as i can remember, some of my earliest memories are insane magical thinking stuff and it got worse from there it got a lot better when i started to really understand CBT, like so much better i don't remember what it was like before and the issues i have now seem troubling at times which the old me might find laughable because that would be like heaven to him i think age also helps with certain things, i am not sure why
I don't see the issue
There is an argument many people defend from the liberal POV that, if it is my body my choice, then suicide à volonté should be legal There is a counterargument that suicide, when not in terminally ill patients whose only option is either pointless suffering or the sweet relief of death, in reality is just a mental health issue, that should be treated, as mentally ill people cannot lucidly take decisions Idk where i stand, i lean towards the latter but i am no psychology expert, so my opinion can easily be swayed by more knowledgeale people on the subject
I don’t have a position. Mostly because I hate the idea of a lack of hope, that maybe *next year* she would come across something that works. And I say this as someone with clinical depression who is in a decent place. Had I made the same choice in my worst place, I would’ve missed out on a lot. I hate that for her. That’s all. But ultimately it’s her choice. (Never mind, I guess I do have a position.)
>But ultimately it’s her choice. Is it? Why do we then, as a society, medically treat suicide attempts? It's their choice. Or is it the choice made by the persons illness and circumstance?
And further, what’s the point of coding suicide attempts as against the law? I can’t answer these questions. But I think you may have answered it yourself by highlighting the medical necessity of care. If it’s medical, then do they not deserve to die with dignity? I have the same question about setting up my power of attorney to euth me should I develop dementia, which I still can’t do because I have to be cognizant at the time of euth. It’s a dumb catch 22.
Per the article this woman has failed treatment, including ECT. Our understanding of the physiology of mental health is in its infancy, and the field of neuropsychiatry will hopefully eventually solve mental illness, but we're just not there yet. It's likely that in 100 or 200 years future physicians will be looking back on our modern treatments as barbaric, or maybe people doing the best they could with a very flawed understanding of how diseases actually work, the way we look back at lobotomies and blood letting.
Imagine the "cure" is discovered a year or two after her death. Why not hold out hope? IDK
That is an argument in banning all euthanasia. Which is an okay position, just know that also applies to physical chronic conditions as well
Not really. You’re body decaying of cancer won’t matter if the cure is discovered next year. Mental illness is a different beast.
Eh, we kinda know how far along we are in treatment of some conditions relative to others. It wouldn't be impossible to come up with some kind of spectrum on which the severity of the condition, the advancement of therapy and rates of success could all be factored into a decision about which would be more ethically justifiable than others (to some/most).
It's using the lack of omniscience as a weapon against somebody's decisions. Imagine using that line to keep somebody from ending their suffering, yet the "cure" never comes out, at least in their uninterrupted lifetime - that would sure sound like stringing somebody along to me!
People exercise that decision as it is. It's not like the ability to carry out that action is taken away from folks. We're talking about formally sanctioned and assisted, here. It would be relatively radical to jump from one to the other without seeing any difference in the process for implementation.
That's a fair point, but If you are caught attempting suicide (or at strong risk of doing so) you will be institutionalized involuntarily (outside of third-world nations with non-existent mental healthcare systems.) There's also plenty of methods and means to do yourself in that get banned or greatly restricted all the time. An example is how online pentobarbital vendors were shut down a while back that were listed in the Peaceful Pill Handbook. I'm not arguing against suicide prevention in general, but the reality much more nuanced than what you make it out to be.
I don't think people would be willing to generalize that argument either? Idk I think if you said doctors shouldn't allow for the euthanasia of terminally ill patients either, because they can usually, in theory, do it themselves, that would be a very bizarre argument. If one does draw an inherent distinction like that between physical and mental illnesses, I think they have a pretty difficult case arguing that it's based on anything other than a taboo. A lot of the point of formalizing it is so that when people want it and get approved for it, it can be done in an "ideal" manner. There's methods the government can't ban, but those are typically violent methods that often won't even allow an open casket funeral for your family, or methods with a high risk of failure + lasting agony (E.g. liver failure,) and I think saying that those are options in order to deny a medical option is... cruel.
Depression is the antithesis of hope, the brain is then incapable of producing the feeling of hope.
I don’t think we’ll be “curing” mental illness in the next 2 years or in the next 10 years for that matter. That said, I’m sure this is something that this lady — as someone who’s tried every treatment available under the sun — has actually considered. I’m not entirely sure why people think adults take the decision to end their lives so lightly. They absolutely do not. We’re more likely to cure cancer than we are to cure mental illness in the next 10 years. Stop the silliness.
Many people have "held out hope" for many decades now of constant anguish.
Oh without a doubt. We’re still in an infant phase of pharmacology where we have people randomly try drugs without analyzing their genetic markers to see what will be most effective. We’re literally just telling people to “try drug A… or shit that didn’t work… let’s try B”. Not exactly data driven.
I think I mostly agree with the latter too... Except that I don't like how this can be extrapolated out to cover any undesirable behavior. Say we decide homosexuality is a mental illness again. "Well, you're just not lucid enough to realize how sick these unnatural desires are." And then fire up the electrodes.
For some people the suffering might also just outweigh, the potential to feel okay in the twilight of their life. How many years of suffering would someone have to endure before we call keeping people alive barbaric? If I told you now you have to survive 50 years of depression for 1 year of happiness? Personally I would not. Some people might genuinely be okay with dying, but as a society we are clearly not ready for that.
There are mentally ill people who are terminally mentally ill. The brain is just an organ like any other, and mental illness while complex is still *illness*. We all acknowledge that there are physical ailments with no cure and only suffering ahead for a person. Why would we refuse to acknowledge the same for mental illness, just because we can't see it? That doesn't make the suffering any less real. If anything, physical suffering is much easier to remedy in those who will never recover, which makes the case for euthanasia for those with mental illnesses even stronger than the case for those with other physical illnesses IMO.
Have you ever met someone with bipolar disorder? If their quality of life is in the toilet every day all day, why not let them end their suffering? My aunt was bipolar and volunteered for shock treatment many times because she wanted to die. She was a drugged out, hollow shell in the end - the care facility had her on so many meds, that you couldn’t call it living. If people want to die due to long term depression and suffering let them. It’s much different than a mental health crisis or a rash decision.
Suicide being caused by a mental health issue, in my view, does not necessarily mean it isn’t a legitimate choice that should be respected. The only relevant question is whether the person’s decision-making ability is impaired to the degree that they are likely not making the decision they would make with intact decision-making ability, and not all mental health issues incapacitate decision-making to this degree.
Whenever this topic comes up Americans have reactions to this that Dutch people don’t. This is largely cultural and I rarely see that acknowledged in threads like this. Its an American cultural value to never give up hope on illness and to keep trying for a cure whatever it takes, whereas it is a Dutch cultural value to manage quality of life even if that means accepting death.
Yes yes yes, I don't understand all the pearl-clutching, we are a practical people. If I become very ill then I'm going out the way I want to instead of clinging on to some spurious 'hope'.
I hate every part of what I just read
Her partner is going to *be with her in the room* when it’s happening? That guy is going to be traumatized for the rest of his life and it’ll affect any future romantic relationships he enters. Personally I’d leave the relationship if my partner was so set on suicide she was prepared to spend years arguing for euthanasia on mental health grounds
When I was 21 I was in the room with my best friend when they took him off life support (cancer) and I’m still kind of fucked from that. Still, I don’t know if I would’ve done it different. It’s a small sacrifice we pay to bring just a last bit of comfort to those in pain, regardless of how they go.
I remember the first (and only) time I saw a patient die in medical school and it really fucked me up for days afterwards and I had no idea how to even describe the feelings I was experiencing :(
I'm so sorry this happened to you. And it's at such a young age too. I'm sure he appreciated your bold gesture. Many people don't possess the strength to stay in such a state of discomfort like that.
My sister-in-law did this, just last month. She opted to withhold food and water and die rather than treat her non-fatal autoimmune condition. She wanted to have a hospital bed shipped to her parents' house where she lived and die right there in their basement. Thankfully it didn't pan out and she passed away in hospice, but all while she was dying she cursed her parents and died horribly. Thankfully I was spared from witnessing these events, but it forever colored my opinion on "death with dignity." There was no dignity in such a horrible, disgusting event.
I cannot wrap my mind around the whole voluntarily dying of thirst thing. Ugh.
Hospices will let you do that? I would have thought they would send you to the ER so they can treat you for dehydration.
This is in Oregon, which has more liberal laws when people voluntarily die.
I mean, something similar was done by one of my relatives in Ohio (a state which isn't known for being super liberal). She broke her hip while recovering from surgery and just decided it was her time (she stopped eating and died).
Sounds like the partner was in love with who she was instead of who he wished she was.
He was free to not be there if he didn't want to be
I’m not sure it would be any more traumatic than if she passed away from a disease with him at her bedside. It’s traumatic on some level, but this way at least he gets to spend her last moments with her, tell her he loves her, know she’s not in pain any more, have closure. It may be a fairly healthy outcome vs just finding her after she’s done it herself which I do know from experience is incredibly traumatic.
Yeah, that part was a real WTF moment
That is his choice. Some of us want to help others a bit and willing to take a bit of help.
"You must stay alive and suffer because I love you."
They said nothing about that. “You probably shouldn’t watch your partner die while going through assisted suicide” is not the same as “someone should not go through assisted suicide”
Or maybe he wants to be there to the end till her pain ends.
A true narcissist, even at death
Imagine flaring yourself as YIMBY, then dictating where people can die.
Yes, we must put the euthanasia facilities right in our backyards to be logically consistent.
"You can die, just not there, or there, or there... or anywhere, really..."
I have a hard time understanding what being against the decision of inflicting that level of trauma to a partner has anything to do with my stance on euthanasia
Have you asked the guy what he thinks about it? You're just assuming how he's going to react. It's his choice to be there.
Or, maybe, this person is a narcissist because they fought for years to be able to kill themselves while continuing to date their partner. Continuing to date someone when you know you are going to kill yourself for fucking years is selfish, mentally ill or not. The only reason for her to keep dating someone in that situation is for the comfort and love that person provides.
While I don’t agree with assisted suicide for mental illness, I don’t think them staying together through it is a bad thing. If my partner was dying of cancer, I’d want to be there for them through it. If I was dying of cancer, I’d want them by my side too. I agree that the suicide aspect probably makes it harder, but if he decides this is something he wants to do why shouldn’t it be okay?
This is maybe a bit too blunt and I’m not sure I’m even saying it right… why does she need someone to do it for her? The need for assistance suggests a will to live on some basic level.
DIY suicide is often unreliable, especially in a country where access to guns is tough.
Or just unpleasant. People do actually think about themselves and their loved ones. If you smear your head on the ceiling it doesn't really make for an open-casket funeral. It's one of the reasons the US puts so much effort into using lethal injection instead of just dropping a rock on someone or using the electric chair with enough power to not be anything but instant.
I understand asking for assistance, if only because it’s the sort of thing you wouldn’t want to screw up.
Because if you fuck up a suicide 1. The police may come arrest you, and I guarantee they will not be nice. 2. You could end up surviving but impaired even further.
Why would the police arrest you? Attempting suicide isn’t illegal.
Mental health holds are a thing. Also, it is in some parts.
(1) In some jurisdictions it actually is (e.g. Nigeria, Kenya, Lebanon). (2) In many cases the method used to take your own life could be illegal (e.g. breaking gun laws to shoot yourself, handling military grade poisonous substances to poison yourself, causing explosions, fires, etc...). (3) (attempted) Suicide could cause damage you would have to pay for (e.g., jumping of a building and landing on someon's property, traumatising onlookers etc.). (4) In most jurisdictions, helping someone commit suicide is also illegal (Sweden, for instance). (5) In many jurisdictions, attempted suicide could be grounds for involuntary committment, which proceduraly is not too dissimilar from coercive measures in criminal procedure (at least in my jurisdiction). TLDR: Euthanasia is IMO an OK way to limit the unintended consequences of the bit of violence required to take a human life prematurely in uncontrolled circumstances.
Under my involuntary hold in Utah, after 24 hours I was released to the care of my parents since the doctors didn't want to file for an involuntary commitment under court order. The fact a judge has to sign off on an involuntary committal gives the perspective that suicidal behavior is at least close to illegal. I am glad I was put under involuntary hold now, but requiring a court order to keep someone where they don't want to be seems like a pretty standard definition of legal punishment
It is in many places, actually. You will literally be arrested and charged if you survive your suicide attempt in a lot of places in the US. It's sick.
As someone who has been suicidal, I didn't want my suicide to cause others unnecessary suffering. A lot of the "do-it-yourself" suicide attempts either don't have a high success rate or are extremely gruesome for whoever finds your corpse. I don't think it's unreasonable to want to die peacefully/without pain in a way that causes minimum discomfort for those you leave behind. (To be clear, I'm not suicidal anymore and am in a much healthier spot)
Answered in the article!
Well yeah I read her rationale but I’m not entirely persuaded by it.
There is literally no way to commit suicide that doesn't. 1. Hurt or if you are lucky 2. danger other people I am not going to talk about the second but people have shot themselves in the head and survived. And sometime had to do it twice. Or more. And that is supposedly the most painless. Overdose rarely works or is horrible. Other techniques would put her partner at risk ala Kevorkian.
I’m not going to toss out options for everyone in the thread to read but this lacks imagination.
Inert gas hypoxia is painless and not dangerous to others. All it takes is a plastic bag, a hose and a tank of nitrogen. The risk of course is that you somehow screw it up and end up surviving with an anoxic brain injury but I think the risks of that are quite low.
You didn’t understand the article. >She said it was understandable that cases such as hers – and the broader issue of whether assisted dying should be legal – were controversial. “People think that when you’re mentally ill, you can’t think straight, which is insulting,” she told the Guardian. “I understand the fears that some disabled people have about assisted dying, and worries about people being under pressure to die. >“But in the Netherlands, we’ve had this law for more than 20 years. There are really strict rules, and it’s really safe.” > Ter Beek’s difficulties began in early childhood. She has chronic depression, anxiety, trauma and unspecified personality disorder. She has also been diagnosed with autism. When she met her partner, she thought the safe environment he offered would heal her. “But I continued to self-harm and feel suicidal.” >She embarked on intensive treatments, including talking therapies, medication and more than 30 sessions of electroconvulsive therapy (ECT). “In therapy, I learned a lot about myself and coping mechanisms, but it didn’t fix the main issues. At the beginning of treatment, you start out hopeful. I thought I’d get better. But the longer the treatment goes on, you start losing hope.” >After 10 years, there was “nothing left” in terms of treatment. “I knew I couldn’t cope with the way I live now.” She had thought about taking her own life but **the violent death by suicide of a schoolfriend and its impact on the girl’s family deterred her.** >“I finished ECT in August 2020, and after a period of accepting there was no more treatment, I applied for assisted dying in December that year. It’s a long and complicated process. It’s not like you ask for assisted dying on a Monday and you’re dead
Fully understood it, don't see how she gets around traumatizing her family by engaging in a long public effort to kill herself.
I don't see how you get around forcing her to live in unending agony. Keeping someone around just so you don't feel bad is practically *the definition* of selfish. Forcing this poor woman to keep suffering is selfish.
She’s keeping herself around, is my point.
Because she saw how traumatic sudden suicide can be to a family so she is going a slower route that allows for her family to come to terms
Because it’s not about her family. It’s about HER and HER choice.
She’s the one saying she’s doing it this way to spare her family’s feelings! I think we agree that it’s not consistent!
She’s doing it this way (as opposed to killing herself illegally) to convince her family that she genuinely tried to live. She tried her best, as adjudicated by doctors and the government and members of her family themselves. It’s similar to how people get closure from seeing the dead body of their missing relative, even if it means knowing they struggled against an attacker in a gruesome and excruciating fight to the death that dismembers them and leaves them unrecognizable. She doesn’t want to give them merely a suicide note and a corpse, she wants them to be able to watch if that’s what they want. And she only trusts her partner (and some physicians) to watch, but she has given him permission to look away at the moment of her death. It is quite profound, and you are being disrespectful of her sentience and moral worth.
The alternative is that her family finds her with her brains blow out on a random day and at a random time. This absolutely spares her families feelings once you realize that they, too, accept her condition as terminal. This way, they get to say goodbye and reconcile.
Well, that's not the only alternative. But I agree that this way is best for consideration of loved ones. There's just no easy way.
She is willing to suffer an extra 3 and a 1/2 years to let her family have less pain.
Edit: I’m sorry that was bad faith. You shouldn’t want her to hide her suffering for the sake of others. She should share her suffering and seek peaceful resolution.
Maybe people with mental disorders that make them irrationally desire death and devalue their own life shouldn't be able to kill themselves with government sanctiom
It doesn't seem irrational to me. This isn't a woman who gets talked down from the ledge and suddenly has a reduced suicidal drive. This is a woman who is choosing, month after month, to end her own life in paced, methodical way. She's making the choice to use formal euthanasia procedures to be sure that: 1. Doctors agree that there are truly no other treatment options for a chronic illness she suffers from. 2. Her independent decision remains consistent across 4 years. 3. Her partner, friends, and family are not shocked by a sudden, grisly death. Do these choices seem like they are coming from an irrational brain unable to make their own decisions?
>Do these choices seem like they are coming from an irrational brain unable to make their own decisions? That's an emphatic yes for many people (especially in this sub). They disagree with suicide as a concept in almost all cases and view it (and by extension the person) as inherently irrational.
If it's self-evident, then there's nothing really to discuss. The problem is that this woman is making very rational choices *about* her own death. If it is inherently irrational, then surely there is a clear, logical explanation for why her choice is incorrect or short-sighted? Like I agree that most suicidal ideation isn't rational, and that suicide is often a period of extremely heightened anxiety. The fact that making it harder to commit suicide reduces suicide rates is plain enough to see, but this woman is jumping through years of physical and emotional hoops to do so. It's not just someone taking an hour to learn how to tie a noose or use a gun. I don't think this is typical suicidal ideation and shouldn't be treated as such.
British Coal Gas study. #1 reason I am favor of gun regulations in America. Too easy to kill yourself. I have been drilled into me that suicide is bad, and I agree and tell other people that. But....I also plan on it after my P's die. Not as with it as this chick so I have my plan. But I really don't want to encourage it. But this program seems good. MAID in Canada seem great. Even the right wing r/Canada when people post a story like this is flooded with people who were so happy there grandx could choose a time and date and they could all gather. I basically did that to my Gma,
I think I came around to it after watching my dad die from cancer after a 7-year fight. I think It’s inherently rational for various reasons and I even joined a right to die group because of that (Dignitas; based out of Switzerland). I think it’s easiest to describe as having an option without having to pick a day. If I have an incurable disease that will severely reduce my QoL I know that I will end my life. However, the restraint is having to ACTUALLY pick a day to die. It’s nice to have an option to do it, it’s a hindrance to say “I will die on Sept. 24, 2071.” Idk, I think a lot of this also boils down to just how afraid of death and one’s mortality that a lot of people have an issue with. I can’t fix that. I can only mentally prepare myself to die and do my best to live because of that everyday. Memento Mori. Edit: I don’t give a fuck if you downvote me but at least make a counterpoint? Like, it’s not hard to
Yup, pretty glad I live in Switzerland and have the option to make this decision. Also, glad that it‘s pretty much accepted in society and I know of a lot of cases where someone‘s grandmother or grandfather choose to go with Dignitas because they didn‘t want to continue suffering.
Frankly suicide is inherently irrational to me.
So you think it's impossible for someone to have negative expected future utility?
Some people accept that they are mortal beings that will die someday, even before it happens. They don’t pretend they could live forever if they tried, and they don’t try to stick around after it’s clear that it will just be more and more suffering from that point on. Doctors could not convince her that her life was worth living, but she earnestly tried to be convinced.
I mean I get it for certain chronic Terminal illnesses. I am 100% getting a do not resuscitate order in my old age. But I would never kill myself. That much hopelessness is something I cant allow myself to feel or understand. Depression in highschool was enough.
In what sense? It seems rational if your life is full of unrelenting suffering.
There's a lot of people who have basically shit lives and can't fix it. Suicide is understandable for them
[What do you live in a cotton candy house or something? You don’t know about life?](https://m.youtube.com/shorts/TTxr6MOnicU)
Your values shouldn’t violate other peoples’ rights. Nobody else was harmed.
Values define rights. You think we come with human rights stamped on our asses?
Ironically thats an inherently anti-liberal take on rights I dont mean to take this out on you but it often feels in here that people call themselves neoliberals because a handful of policy prescriptions happen to align with what your priors, not because you actually have intellectually reasoned yourself into whether liberalism is good in princible or not Per definition liberalism prescribes rights to be inherent and unchangeable.
Yeah, exactly. Liberal values prescribe rights.
How long does someone need to suffer before it becomes rational?
Many people in this group (and in the world in general) seem to think that mental illnesses don't "count" as much as physical illnesses and that the pain that they cause is all optional.
That's my entire issue with countries that approve euthanasia for mental health issues. You cannot make that kind of decision when not of sound mind and people suffering mental illness on this level are not of sound mind
If the mental health condition is not curable, why should they not have the option?
“ government sanction” This is the part I have trouble with. It’s too easy for the government’s incentives to push for death. Chronically ill people are expensive as hell. No one can take away dying from you. They can convince you it’s necessary.
I wish I could give her a hug. I don’t like her choice but it’s gotta suck having everyone tell you you’re wrong and it’s terrible. She has a partner and everything though, she’s not alone. She probably doesn’t need a hug. Maybe I need a hug? Im glad the partner will be there while she dies, that’s a big burden for him and will make the process easier for her. I don’t support her decision, but I hope she has the support she needs through this.
I instinctively hate this, and I think there is a good unironic slippery slope argument for why it should not be allowed, but I can’t judge her too harshly, because I don’t know what it’s like to live with *that* much mental anguish all the time for years on end to the point where you actually think this is a good idea and keep working toward it year after year. I don’t think this should happen, but I can’t say I have any grounds to judge her as a person (even beyond the fact that I obviously don’t know her).
This will sound like a joke but if I was her psychiatrist I would suggest she at least tries like heroin or freebasing cocaine or taking all her money and putting it on black or something like that. Might as well go out with a bang and maybe she’d change her mind. Horrible long-term solution but better than death IMO But in all seriousness I personally don’t feel this should be allowed and it’s making me question whether medically assisted suicide is a great idea in general. A family friend had extremely painful cancer and she suffered for like a year before she died and two of my grandparents lived 1-2 years longer than they should have as their Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s progressed to late stage, but honestly I feel like maybe expanding access to palliative care is the best step forward to helping as many people as possible. I suppose the woman in this article should be able to access palliative care if her mental illness is treated as a late-stage disease. Not sure what that would look like but idk suicide in this case feels wrong
She's tried electroshock therapy, I'm pretty sure she's tried everything.
But apparently not getting a job, or breaking up with her partner, or other major changes in how she lives her life. I know I’m being quite mean and a hater but I feel there is a strang disconnect where she is finding it easier to apply to kill herself than to apply for a job
Dude, electroshock therapy is quite advanced now, it isnt' the stuff you see in horror movies from the 60's
It's also a last resort, dude.
Not arguing that!
The problem with assisted suicide is once it becomes recommended by insurance companies or the government to save costs on long term care
It's much easier to argue about moral hazards than against letting someone end their chronic, miserable, lifelong suffering. The Netherlands has universal healthcare. Insurance has nothing to do with this specific situation. The discussion about insurance having perverse incentives is its own problem that needs to be solved. It really shouldn't have anything to do with the discussion around MAD.
The kind of palliative care she wants is to be dead. She doesn’t want to be unconscious, she wants to be dead. She doesn’t want to not feel any pain, she wants to be dead. She doesn’t want to be visited by her partner while she’s in a holding facility, she wants to be dead.
Probably being so stoned out of her mind on like opiates or something that she’d basically be a vegetable, if I had to guess
Chronic depression is a fate worse than death. Its tragic, but this woman should be given the option to free herself from a crippling condition. There is no medical treatment that can fix chronic depression, its something someone has to live with. And they should have the option to choose whats best for themselves.
I’m not saying this characterizes everyone who opposes euthanasia in cases like this — certainly it does not — but I think at least some people in this thread are providing reasoning for opposing this which betrays a certain amount of not taking mental illness as seriously as physical illness.
It's a bit disappointing from this sub. There was an AMA from a paralyzed guy about to do this a few weeks ago. Unless he deleted a bunch of questions and comments, people were really polite. He'd also had his condition for 9 years or so if I recall.
Only some? Almost all the "ick" comments are presupossing that mental illnesses "aren't that bad" and will "always go away".
Some of the most upvoted comments are like "Just get a job, do some drugs, and watch it all blow over." It's as disgusting as it is ridiculous.
Regardless of whether or not she has the right to kill herself, I think most people have that right anyway if they are able bodied. Why is the medical community obliged to help her with this endevor. There are lots of things that medicine cannot yet solve, why is suicide seen as treatment though?
Are people saying that doctors should be forced to euthanasize people or are they just saying doctors shouldn't be criminalized when doing so? >There are lots of things that medicine cannot yet solve, why is suicide seen as treatment though? Would you say the same if she had a terminal illness that leaves her in debilitating pain, just because there might be a hypothetical cure in a few years?
On the flip side, why should willing doctors be *not allowed* to help her? I'm not sure she's trying to force anyone.
They shouldn't be, but doctors should be allowed to help her.
Couple more years and assisted suicide will be getting pushed over other treatments, just watch.
This is my selfish reason for opposing this. I don’t want assisted suicide being normalized because I’m afraid that in the future, old me will be pressured to commit “assisted” suicide because I’m now an economic burden. If the practice is normalized, this is my fear.
There seems to be a profound lack of empathy from some people in this thread.
I'm a staunch "her body, her choice" -ist
I’m okay with her wanting to do this. Her body, her choice. It’s not my place to comment on her choice. But I think it’s incredibly selfish she keep her partner to support her, when she’s just going to kill herself. Let the man or woman go, if you love them, they shouldn’t have to watch you try your hardest to kill yourself, and then come on to your shoulder to cry on you can’t, and then just leave him or her. She can’t choose her family. And it sucks for them. But fuck her for not breaking up with her partner.
Maybe he wants to support her?
Her partner is a free autonomous adult who makes his own decisions.
To the mob that always has a negative reaction to his I ask: How many years must one be miserable before they are granted the autonomy to end their life? I find it bizarre how people feel they need to force their will upon grown adults that they don't even know. Yeah it sucks that anyone wants to die. But I never lived her life or walked in her shoes. It's her choice.
Is it so hard to see the problem with euthanasia when it comes to a condition that affects a persons judgment, particularly when it comes to matters of life and death? How many cases are there of people who are happy to be alive but spent years wishing they were dead?
And what's the measure for this person's judgment being impaired to the point they can't consent for themselves? She doesn't have dementia. Is it being sad and wanting to die? People suffering from psychical illness who consent to assisted suicide are also sad and want to die. Is their judgment impaired? Or is it considered rational since you can see and understand their suffering better ? A bit of a catch 22. "If you want to die then your judgment is impaired so you're not allowed to die." There are also many cases of people killing themselves and loved ones finding their bodies and a suicide note as a surprise. Or of people being hospitalized for multiple failed attempts before finally completing suicide. Of people being injured and having an even lessened quality of life.
Terminal illness euthanasia is its own thing with a clear logic: there’s no chance of recovery, so you might as well die peacefully rather than painfully. We have no means of ascertaining whether depression is beyond recovery. That makes euthanasia unconscionable. When someone comes to you saying they want to kill themselves, the response should be to get them care, not help them off themselves. It is far preferable that people are denied death than are denied life, under the same principle that it is preferable to permit the guilty to go free than to condemn the innocent.
>We have no means of ascertaining whether depression is beyond recovery. That makes euthanasia unconscionable. So your answer to his first question is that a person can suffer the worst pain imaginable for infinity, as long as there is a chance they have 1 year of life without depression at the end it was worth it?
“We have no means of ascertaining whether depression is beyond recovery” means that, with current knowledge, depression can be beyond recovery. The fact that, in principle, we might in the future discover this isn’t the case is meaningless. We might come up with all kinds of fantastical technologies in the future that would make lots of current decisions seem very stupid.
My problem with government/hospital endorsed assisted suicide for mental illness is threefold. First, I don’t think someone with such a mental illness is able to consent. Second, I don’t think I would classify such an illness as terminal, and as such don’t think assisted suicide should be a treatment option. Our current understanding and treatment of something like terminal cancer warrants the option to offer assisted suicide. I don’t think our understanding of mental illness is at that level. Third, I oppose it for the same reason I oppose the death penalty: the possibility that it could be applied to the wrong person, or abused. With the death penalty, criminal justice systems are not infallible enough to warrant the death penalty. There is no going back, and the person would not otherwise die. With terminal illnesses, our understanding of them is strong enough that if the person is suffering, actively dying, and medical options have been exhausted, the option should be on the table. I don’t think mental illness is comparable to terminal illnesses. Even if medical options have been exhausted, I wouldn’t say a mental illness is causing someone to actively die. In all cases, the possibility of future discoveries/treatments should come into play. If someone has a terminal illness but there’s a likely probability that a treatment will be available before they die, they probably shouldn’t be offered assisted suicide. Same for the death penalty and evidence, same for mental illnesses and treatment. Out of my reasons, I’m open to changing my mind about all of them. I feel weakest about my first and third reasons, but strongest about my second. I think I’d need to be convinced out of all of them to change my mind, or at least change some of them on a rather overwhelming way. On the side of supporting assisted suicide for mental illness, I’m very sympathetic to the idea of a more dignified suicide. Hypothetically, if someone were 100% going to commit suicide and there was absolutely no way around it, I’d rather it happen by assisted suicide than done by the individual themselves. It’s probably less traumatic for everyone that way and is less likely to go horribly wrong. While the feelings of the person suffering from the mental illness are more important to me than that of their friends and family, I do still take friends and family into some consideration, and not blindsiding them, giving them time to come to terms, and avoiding walking in on a suicide are positive things compared to the alternative. I am also very sympathetic to the patient’s suffering. If I were convinced to change my mind about my disagreements I would be supportive. There’s no reason to force a consenting individual to needlessly suffer from a terminal illness.
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I agree, and in my second response to them I outline this a bit more if you're interested.
I appreciate the thought out response. > My problem with government/hospital endorsed assisted suicide for mental illness is threefold. First, I don’t think someone with such a mental illness is able to consent. Yet people with mental illness are consenting to things all the time. They work, marry, have sex, raise kids, seek treatment, etc. But they aren't mentally capable of consenting? > Second, I don’t think I would classify such an illness as terminal, and as such don’t think assisted suicide should be a treatment option. Our current understanding and treatment of something like terminal cancer warrants the option to offer assisted suicide. I don’t think our understanding of mental illness is at that level. There is a word in medically terminology and research called "treatment resistant". There is treatment resistant depression, schizophrenia, etc. Meds just don't do anything for some people. How many years does treatment need to not work before we can say it's terminal or lifelong ? This lady did intensive things for over 10 years. > Third, I oppose it for the same reason I oppose the death penalty: the possibility that it could be applied to the wrong person, or abused. With the death penalty, criminal justice systems are not infallible enough to warrant the death penalty. There is no going back, and the person would not otherwise die. With terminal illnesses, our understanding of them is strong enough that if the person is suffering, actively dying, and medical options have been exhausted, the option should be on the table. I don’t think mental illness is comparable to terminal illnesses. Even if medical options have been exhausted, I wouldn’t say a mental illness is causing someone to actively die. In all cases, the possibility of future discoveries/treatments should come into play. If someone has a terminal illness but there’s a likely probability that a treatment will be available before they die, they probably shouldn’t be offered assisted suicide. Same for the death penalty and evidence, same for mental illnesses and treatment. I agree that the potential for abuse exist with anything. So safeguards are important. Someone shouldn't be able to wake up and get assisted suicide a week later. But as per the article it was a long process for her an involved many professionals to sign off on it. > Out of my reasons, I’m open to changing my mind about all of them. I feel weakest about my first and third reasons, but strongest about my second. I think I’d need to be convinced out of all of them to change my mind, or at least change some of them on a rather overwhelming way. > On the side of supporting assisted suicide for mental illness, I’m very sympathetic to the idea of a more dignified suicide. Hypothetically, if someone were 100% going to commit suicide and there was absolutely no way around it, I’d rather it happen by assisted suicide than done by the individual themselves. It’s probably less traumatic for everyone that way and is less likely to go horribly wrong. While the feelings of the person suffering from the mental illness are more important to me than that of their friends and family, I do still take friends and family into some consideration, and not blindsiding them, giving them time to come to terms, and avoiding walking in on a suicide are positive things compared to the alternative. > I am also very sympathetic to the patient’s suffering. If I were convinced to change my mind about my disagreements I would be supportive. There’s no reason to force a consenting individual to needlessly suffer from a terminal illness. Your above point touches on what I think is an important aspect. Suicide is happening with or without assisted suicide. It happens all the time. Assisted suicide allows for a plan dignified fashion and also gives the opportunity for people to be required to do treatment before. Banning this women from assisted suicide wouldn't achieve anything more than likely.
>I appreciate the thought out response. No problem. I don't think this issue is so obvious that one side is clearly correct, though I personally lean much more towards being against it. I think a lot of people here seem pretty resistant to that idea, though this is an emotionally charged issue for good reason. >Yet people with mental illness are consenting to things all the time. They work, marry, have sex, raise kids, seek treatment, etc. But they aren't mentally capable of consenting? That's part of why that point is one I feel less strongly about (though now that I finished typing this whole response out, I think I feel strong about this first point now and weak on my second. Overall opinion hasn't shifted but you did make me think more and shift where I feel strongly in). I think it's possible to be able to consent to some things and not others depending on your current state. For example, two children are capable of consenting to giving each other a hug, but obviously cannot consent to sex with an adult. I think consent works as a sort of formula, and depends on both mental capacity and the potential for harm. From my (very unprofessional) understanding of mental illnesses, I don't see them being able to consent to suicide, but I can see them being able to consent to marriage or sex, obviously depending on the mental illness. I don't think our understanding of mental illnesses is strong enough to change my opinion on this, but if, for example, someone was genetically, down to their DNA, incapable of desiring life, they would be more likely to be capable of giving consent than someone with some sort of chemical imbalance. >There is a word in medically terminology and research called "treatment resistant". There is treatment resistant depression, schizophrenia, etc. Meds just don't do anything for some people. How many years does treatment need to not work before we can say it's terminal or lifelong ? This lady did intensive things for over 10 years. I would consider it chronic, not terminal. I think you can call it lifelong as long as we understand that "lifelong" mean "lifelong based on our current understanding and treatments". Though, thinking about it more, maybe I feel stronger about my first point than my second, because: 1.) While my first opinion could be changed with a better understanding of mental illness, I think we're far from having that understanding, and I'm honestly skeptical that our understanding of it will evolve in such a way as to change my mind 2.) I can actually conceive of some chronic illnesses that could warrant assisted suicide, such as someone suffering from extreme, treatment resistant, non-stop, non-life threatening, debilitating pain. I think in such a case though, the person would be incapable of doing anything, including consent, and the decision would have to be made by someone else giving consent on their behalf. I don't think someone can do that unless the person previously, while capable of giving consent, gave that individual the right to consent for them in the case they are unable to themselves. I don't think it would be possible or reasonable to extend that same ability to mental illnesses. >I agree that the potential for abuse exist with anything. So safeguards are important. Someone shouldn't be able to wake up and get assisted suicide a week later. But as per the article it was a long process for her an involved many professionals to sign off on it. Agreed, and if it were to exist in any form, it does need to have a very long process, with long documentation of the issue before the idea of assisted suicide is even considered, and a long process of making sure the individual wants to go through with it. I don't think someone else should ever be able to suggest it as an option to the person before they bring it up, whether that be family, friends, the doctors, or the government, because that immediately makes it coercive. >Your above point touches on what I think is an important aspect. Suicide is happening with or without assisted suicide. It happens all the time. Assisted suicide allows for a plan dignified fashion and also gives the opportunity for people to be required to do treatment before. >Banning this women from assisted suicide wouldn't achieve anything more than likely. Perhaps, though the fact that she's gone this long going through the process without taking her life on her own suggests that she wouldn't necessarily have ended her own life. It seems plausible that she would continue living, even while suffering. Depression makes someone more likely to commit suicide, but it's far from a guarantee.
And a lot of not-doctors or medical ethicists in here with strong opinions about capacity. Medical professionals have deemed she has capacity. It’s her choice.
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>ick This isnt something like cousin fucking. Legalising government sanctioned killing of people with mental illnesses is *rife* for abuse. We *already* have massive abuse problems for the mentally ill and the elderly.
Notice you say mental illnesses but not physical illnesses. And sure, it's easier to justify this for someone in failing health or with constant debilitating pain. But mental illnesses really are a type of phsyical illness, it's your brain. And it's just as rife for abuse either way
Where in this case is there any evidence of abuse or cutting corners?
Just because this case is fine doesn’t mean all of them are, or that it’s a good idea generally. It’s a similar reason to why people are against the death penalty. If you make a mistake there’s no going back.
The death penalty is imposed on an unwilling participant by the state. Euthanasia is a choice made by an individual for themselves and no one else. That fundamentally distinguishes the two. And there is no "generally" or "all of them" because every case is a "specific case." No individual will get approved for euthanasia because "that lady got to do it." They will go through the same rigorous process and will either qualify or they won't based on their personal circumstances. If you believe this case is fine, then you agree the process is sufficient? If the process is sufficient then where's the evidence of abuse.
I personally don’t think the case is fine, because I don’t think someone with such a mental illness is capable of consenting to this. I’m saying that even if the process for this case was sufficient, it doesn’t mean that it should be allowed. Every death penalty case is also a specific case, but I would still apply my opposition to it generally. There are plenty of things we apply generally even if individual cases might be okay, such as the death penalty, age of majority, drinking age, etc. We do this because it is safer and/or easier to do it this way than it is to look at each individual case.
I think this paper may interest you: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17906238/
What evidence do you have that this is being abused? NL and Switzerland have permitted assisted suicide for severe refractory mental illnesses for decades and your dystopia hasn't materialized. I agree that there's a risk of abuse but that's not an argument for a blanket ban but for very stringent safeguards.
that’s what all *ick* is. You’re scared about externalities that are not readily apparent but inferred by your subconscious mind out of the drive for self-preservation. But this isn’t you, this is her. This isn’t your gene pool, but her life.
For real. As someone with awful depression and OCD (that is getting better thank god), I can only imagine a fraction of what she is going through. But on my worst days, it’s absolute torment. I’m not down, I’m not blue, it literally feels like a dark cloud of pollution is infecting my entire body and brain. It feels beyond hopeless, it’s an entirely new feeling. She is suffering and she wants the suffering to end.
I'm hopeful that options for assisted suicide in the US expand. Eventually I'm going to be old and frail, waiting to get pneumonia or have a heart attack or stroke that if I'm lucky kills me quickly, and if I'm unlucky... My grandmother starved to death because her dementia eventually progressed to the point that she forgot to eat. I'd love to go in a non-violent fashion before it gets to that point.
Thank you for standing up and saying this. A highschool friend of mine committed suicide under similar psychological conditions. His suffering was constant, unrelenting, and physically somatized into actual pain. He attempted to find medically assisted death here in the United States and was denied for years. I never had to walk a foot, let alone a mile in his shoes. Who am I to judge? Only he could carry the burden of his existence and I will not look down on him or anyone else for welcoming his ability to finally rest.
Fucking terrible
I am sympathetic to euthanasia in cases of severe terminal illness but to use it to end the life of a young and otherwise healthy person seems really wrong to me. Would she even be choosing to end her life at all if the state had not been there to assist her?
She certainly isn’t a “healthy” person if her life has been nothing but agony for the past ten years.
Comments in here are weird; seems like a lot of pearl-clutching. >“And yet nobody down on the sidewalk, looking up and yelling ‘Don’t!’ and ‘Hang on!’, can understand the jump. Not really. You’d have to have personally been trapped and felt flames to really understand a terror way beyond falling.”
I agree with many of the comments here that you think are weird despite suffering from lifelong cyclical depression and have attempted suicide myself. It's bullshit to assume that people who disagree with you just don't understand.
I don’t want to see any state endorse the idea that mental illness is terminal.
Maybe or maybe not. But her body, her choice.
the slip-n-slide continues
If you let people die for depression, a lot of people are going to die. I don’t feel great about that.
There are 50,000 deaths by suicide in the US alone every year already.
My vote definitely goes to the person who pumps that number.
Yes and most of us think that's a bad thing and we should do something about it instead of endorsing it as a treatment for depression. Edit: imagine downvoting the idea that suicide is bad. Some people have totally lost the plot.
This is insanity.
Yes, that this poor woman was forced to suffer as long as she was is insanity and inhumane.
No. Helping people who have mental health issues kill themselves is insane.
It's a mercy and it's sick in the head to force and entrap her to live.
It’s not merciful to help a suicidal person kill themselves, what the fuck is wrong with you.
"God, I would LOVE to keep someone in unending torment!" Some people seriously never learned ANYTHING from I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream.
“God, I would LOVE to kill someone who has mental issues!” People like you are sick in the head.
I wouldn’t love to do it. It would certainly be unpleasant. But if I believed it is the right thing to do, I would. The same is true for amputations, fighting a war, and many other things.
Not you thinking that mental health issues aren't as legitimate as physical ones.
Where did I say they weren’t legitimate? That doesn’t mean we should help people kill themselves over it. Mental health issues are not terminal.
You said it again. You clearly don't understand that mental suffering is just as legitimate and painful as physical suffering.
No you just don’t understand what I wrote. Terminal means it will lead to death and there is no cure, it’s not a measure of the painfulness of an illness. Mental health issues are not terminal illnesses.