Term paper on Euthaniasia

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euthanasia
Euthanasia-Everyone Has the Right to Choose to Live or Die Katie, a thirty-five year old woman was diagnosed with terminal lung cancer. For the past two years Katie has been receiving chemotherapy and taking numerous types of medication to try to prolong her life. All of the treatments and visi

euthanasia
Euthanasia, it is one of the most controversial issues of our time. This controversial issue raises many questions such as: how should decisions be made, and by whom? What should be determined as a matter of law and what left a matter of discretion and judgment? Should those who want to die, or who

ASSISTED SUICE AND EUTHANASIA

Assisted Suicide – the act or practice of helping in taking the life of one who willfully wants to die. Just by definition alone it becomes painfully obvious; this is going to be a controversial subject. A term that goes hand and hand with assisted suicide, one in which I will be discussing at great length is Euthanasia. That is the act or practice of killing or permitting the death of hopelessly sick or injured individuals (as persons or domestic animals) in a relatively painless way for reasons of mercy. The term is from a Greek word meaning “good death”. In case those definitions didn’t make it obvious enough, assisted suicide is usually done by doctors. I’ve done quite extensive research on this subject over the past month and a half and I’m going to give you several facts, and opinions (including my own) on the subject.

In order to understand the great amount of controversy behind the topic, one must first realize its history. Over the past few decades, America has witnessed a strange and keen shift in society's view of life. In the 1960s the shift began as some states began legalizing abortion. In the 1970s, the Supreme Court decision Roe v. Wade put the federal government's stamp of approval on abortion nationwide. Today, the value of life is being obscured at the other end of the spectrum as the courts grant the elderly and sick the so-called "right to die." The right to die theory states that when someone is ready to go, they should be allowed the right to do so.

While abortion and assisted suicide are two different things, many people opposing euthanasia point to the legalization of abortion as the beginning of “society’s downfall” as Nat Hentoff said in the book “Euthanasia” a part of the Opposing ViewPoints series. Other opposers like the late Dr. Leo Alexander who is also quoted by Hentoff said “It is much like Germany in the late 20’s and 30’s. The barriers against killing are coming down.” In my opinion, Dr. Alexander was taking it a bit far, no one is saying go out and kill everybody you don’t like. Nobody is saying go out and kill all the senior citizens. Nor is anyone saying, “Save America money! Kill the ones who cost us!” That’s not it at all. What pro-Euthanasia people mostly want is for the suffering of family, friends, and individual people or victims as the case may be to come to an end, as quickly and painlessly (for all parties) as possible

Upon researching Euthanasia, one can’t help but come across the case of Baby Doe. The most common example used when talking about the moral wrongs involved with physician-assisted suicide. Baby Doe was born in an Indiana hospital on Good Friday, in 1982. Doe was born with a condition called Downs’ syndrome. If you are not familiar with Downs it is a condition which almost always leads to retardation. However, it may be very minor, at birth it is not possible to tell how severely it will effect one’s mental capacity. A common ailment with Downs’ is the inability to get food into the stomach. Surgery is usually needed to correct this. Without the surgery, the child would starve. His parents refused to let the surgery be done. Doe’s father had worked kids who had Downs’ syndrome. He saw how hard it was on the parents of these children, and it hardened his heart toward them. He did not want to have to go through life seeing his child live like that. Thus, he refused to let Doe live. Indiana courts ruled what the parents did was legally sanctioned. Of course, moralists however moaned immensely about what had happened to the baby. They believe this is totally against God’s will. The problem with is this isn’t assisted suicide. This is the parents’ misconduct that lead to the child’s death, not the child itself. Under the unwritten rules of Euthanasia, this child would not legally have been allowed to be killed, because it did not say for it’s self that it wanted to go, and was not old enough to make this judgement.

Euthanasia happens more often in foreign countries than it does here in the United States. In Netherlands NONVOLUNTARY Euthanasia makes up 15% of the deaths, according to one source, while another (euthanasia.com) claims it’s 50% of the deaths. Supposingly, elderly people are afraid to check themselves into hospitals, for fear of being killed against their will. Of course, it’s hard to believe when every source you look at gives you a different number. Regardless, Anti-Euthanasia people use this as support that it should be stopped. What they don’t realize is that most people in favor of it do not at ALL advocate killing against the people’s will. That’s why it’s called physician-assisted SUICIDE. Jay Johnson, whose opinions can be read at http://www.ohiolife.org/euth/liberty.htm, talks of two cases where what he calls Euthanasia was used beyond consent. He tells us of a Dutch doctor’s patient, who was killed after recovering from cancer, because the bed space was needed. He has documentation of this, no proof, but I’ll take his word for it, for sake of argument. He also talks of a “friend of his, who is a doctor”, who went to visit a patient in a nursing home, only to find out that the family of the lady had her killed because they needed her inheritance. Again, no proof, no one interviewed to vouch for this, but I’ll assume it is true. Jay picks out two instances, and bases most of his argument against them and hypothetical situations similar to those. He also says that do to these cases, Euthanasia is an economic issue. He says it wouldn’t even happen, if it doesn’t save us money. Is it fair to base ANYTHING on two instances out of hundreds? No, I don’t believe it is. Every system has flaws. The world has yet to produce a completely perfect procedure in any course of life. The court system frequently slips up. Unwarranted arrests are often times being made. Unneeded taxes are sometimes being charged. Stuff like this happens, and it happens because life is not perfect. However, all the above systems are largely sufficient. Euthanasia is also a needed part of life. My grandmother was one of MANY people who wanted to die years before she finally passed away. She had lost one her sons, to a drug related car accident. Just about a year after this, she refused to take any more of her depressant pills. She had been on them for 25 years or more, and quit cold turkey. She had also lost another son, not literally, but emotionally. Her son, William, quit talking to her and her husband (his father). Many close to William question his sanity. Most think he’s out of his mind. He has not said a word to any family members in 10 years, his kids excluded. This also had a great effect on her. (As a side note, William did not even show to her funeral.) She no longer felt the need to bathe. For the last 6 years of her life, she got into the bathtub only two times! Nobody could force her to get cleaned up, she wouldn’t allow it. Before all this, she was one of the most social people on her block, and was a big family lady. However, for those 6 years, she’d hide whenever company came over. She’d see only my parents and I. Not any of her other grandchildren. She had diabetes, and arthritis, and was constantly in pain. Physically, and emotionally my grandmother was constantly hurting, and never ever happy. Can you imagine that? Can you imagine having to see someone like that? Unless you’ve seen it, and lived through it, then probably not. The point of the story is my grandmother passionately WANTED to die. She was in bad shape in every form possible. She felt there was no longer a place on Earth for her. Maybe she was right, but that wasn’t our decision to make. Doctors of course wouldn’t do anything, because she wasn’t fatally ill. She asked them in a trip to the hospital in 1989, to pull the plug on her. They wouldn’t, and so they let her suffer. They let my family suffer, but most of all, they made my grandfather suffer through six years of this. She would die 4 years later. Sure, we could have put her in a convalescent home, but I know better than to think that would have made her happier. It would have only made things worse. Moralists will tell you we did the right thing. Even my father will tell you we did the right thing. Perhaps deep down he believe that, but I know we did nothing but emotional harm to my parents, my since deceased grandfather, and even myself and my cousins. It wasn’t long after her death that my grandfather started to show similar signs. He fought it, or at least hid it better, but it was obvious that he missed her so much, that he wanted to rejoin her. Since the whole ordeal, one of my cousins attempted suicide, and two have turned heavily to drugs. My grandfather went back to drinking, which as a diabetic, led to his death. Do those events have anything to do with each other? I can’t prove it, but I think the situation with my grandmother contributed. I wonder about people who say physician-assisted suicide is morally wrong. I suppose they think letting people suffer both emotionally and physically is completely morally correct? Don’t put them out of their misery; let them suffer for years and years. But don’t limit their suffering to just the victim, extend it to family and friends so that they can feel the misery to. So that it may negatively effect every one around them as well. This is totally the correct thing...

Opposing Viewpoints Series, Euthanasia, Greenhaven Press, 1990

http://www.euthanasia.com, Euthanasia.com, 1998

http://www.ohiolife.org/euth/liberty.htm, Euthanasia, A Case of Individual Liberty, November, 1995

http://www.cmf.org.uk/ethics/twelve.htm#1, Twelve Reasons Why Euthanasia Should Not Be Legalized, 1997

http://www.rights.org/deathnet/Kfiles_details.html, Kevorkian Files, 1998