Sunday, 4 December 2016

Putting the You in Euthanasia - is it a time we looked again at assisted demise and dropped the religious dogma?

Leaving your body is an incredible experience
I have done it, as many others have

It is a strange conundrum, but we prosecute people who allow an animal to suffer when nothing can be done for it, yet a human can be condemned to a miserable existence because no one wants to have the discussion about assisted demise.

We all know that 'assistance' is used to 'help' some patients, Morphine administered by  pumps to cancer patients OD's them in the end and ends their suffering, but why the hell are we using such a blunt instrument in this day and age?

Recently there have been cases publicised in the media about people choosing to end their lives in clinics where they can elect to die. If that is their choice, fine, but on the other side of this coin is that these people could also elect to help others to live.

They could however elect to donate vital organs to people whose lives could be transformed by this gift.

Does this not make absolute common sense?

Is it not better for maybe six persons to have their lives transformed by the gift from someone who no longer wishes to continue living, than for someone to simply choose to die and benefit no one? Or worse, perhaps denied legal demise, then goes out and commits suicide.

I mean to say, as a Train Driver or Lorry Driver, doing your own job, some desperate person decides to use your vehicle as a means to end their life? These drivers will never forget these incidents and will often be powerless to avoid them. This could all be so easily avoided.

Some people either with diagnosed or undiagnosed mental health issues may decide they are no longer wishing to live on this planet. They may be desperately unhappy for many reasons, to the extent that they feel condemned to life, they may view this world as some sort of open prison, from which death may be the only escape for them to reach peace in themselves.

For them there may be no treatment, no resolution to their plight and inner turmoil. If the core causations can't be resolved, what do they have? a medical cosh? or descent and collapse which ultimately may lead to suicide eventually anyway? This is only putting off the day that they choose to act.

In a road accident, as an organ donor, you automatically elect to help others in the case you are pretty much finished.

It is time we put the 'You' into Euthanasia, that we had an adult discussion and addressed the ridiculous religious dogma of the sanctity of life, when these same religions often condemn people to large families by prohibiting contraception, having families endure poverty, less quality of life, hardship and problems to our environment from overpopulation.

I mean where the hell are they coming from? That they do not allow someone to make an informed decision about themselves and their life and when they can end it if they so choose, but refuse to accept that change to some self imposed dogma such as no contraception and all the problems that entails needs to be made?

Its not about THEM its about their followers. We are the most educated and informed that we have ever been, we are not children but are being treated like them.

My discussion here essentially covers two issues, one that people should be allowed to choose if they want to live or not and secondly, that we need to define some guidelines to prevent the abuse of the situation if assisted demise became legal in the UK, as assisted demise is already legal in some other European countries, at institutions like Dignitas.

With advances in neural interrogation, we can record video of our dreams, so it won't be long before we can perhaps get into the mind and get a definite answer from someone incapacitated as to their wishes. Or perhaps be able to delve into someone's mind to get a definite point of view, when they are mentally incapacitated or comatose.

If as an active person, you suddenly lost all your limb use and became dependent on carers, would you want to live on? Would you see yourself as a burden? Would you decide that your quality of life was nil and pointless to continue with? But be powerless to act?

There is the counter argument that 'there could be a cure, tomorrow, or next week, a month, a year.'

Might.

Might not.

You would have to weigh up the situation on a case by case basis, a person with a sound mind but disabled body might be best placed to decide their outcome.

It is 'their' quality of life that is the issue, not some out of date and perhaps spurious dogma that the law adheres to, grasping desperately to, like a drowning man grasps at a passing twig.

Have you ever left your body? The out of body experience is amazing. I have done it.

What are you seeing now, hearing as you read this? That is your consciousness. That is your spirit. Ask anyone who has had a near death experience in a hospital, where they have left their body and observed the medical staff operating on them.

Yes, they are fully aware, they can feel, see, hear. Out of your body, just as you are now in yours.

When you leave your body and look down, you will see yourself leaving your body, you will see an almost transparent version of yourself emerging from your earth body.

It is a bit scary at first, but then you realise you are still conscious, thinking, aware, feeling.

You are not dead.

When you are 'dead' the earth body is dead, but you are not. 

A friend of mine has advanced dementia, but even though she is now completely reliant on carers and has lost all communication, bed bound and just 'existing' one could ask, what is the point of living on?

I wouldn't want this.

Cases like Dementia have obvious legal implications as to mental capacity. A person who might seem 'normal' and able to function, loses their right to make decisions immediately they are diagnosed, even if this early onset dementia.

But, at this stage, you might be absolutely clear-minded enough to make your own decisions, clearly, logically and surely.

You may be fully aware of your demise and what it will entail, so should you then be able to decide that you should be able to plan your own way out?

I think so. Provided established guidelines are set and met, this would be an adult way of dealing with something we all eventually have to experience.





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