davywavy: (Default)
[personal profile] davywavy
As I was on the way to work a few weeks ago, the train I was on came to an unexpected halt. I looked out of the windows on both sides, but it was as I'd feared - we weren't at a station and that could only mean that the railways were buggered up again. The driver came over the tannoy and apologised but he didn't have any reason as to why we'd been stopped, and it was only after an hour of sitting there reading, playing golf on my phone, twiddling my thumbs and wondering how long it would be before the stouter people in my carriage resorted to cannibalism in lieu of McDonalds that we were told the reason; apparently a suicidal passer-by had taken the opportunity to vault nimbly in front of the train ahead of us, and we could expect a long wait whilst the police collected all the bits together for identification.
As and when I pop my clogs I hope my obituary is more positive than the collected irritation and contempt displayed by my fellow passengers. An elderly lady a few seats away summed up the general feeling quite well: "If they'd only gone to that clinic in Switzerland", she said, "they'd've saved everyone a lot of trouble."

With the recent deaths of Sir Edward Downes and his wife at the Dignitas clinic in Switzerland and the recent announcement by Jack Straw that he was requesting the Director of Public Prosecutions to make a statement 'clarifying the law' on assisted suicide (leaving aside the embarrassment of our elected representative publicly passing the buck to civil servants on difficult issues), the right to die is back in the news. A poll carried out last week suggests that some 75% of the population support the legalisation of assisted suicide, but I'm still unconvinced.
The current system on assisted suicide which the UK has is one of 'don't ask, don't tell'; everyone knows it's illegal, but then again everyone knows that sometimes doctors slip a bit too much morphine into the syringe and, in the main, there aren't many complaints about this unless the doctor gets a bit carried away and overdoes it. Overall, this system has worked pretty well until now (with obvious, Harold Shipmman-shaped, exceptions) and it does give a clear mechanism of law for what to do when things do go wrong.

The moral grounds of changing the law to legalise assisted suicide are considerably shakier than might first appear as well. Where is the line to be drawn? People who have X wrong with them can choose to die, but people with Y cannot? Who is to decide on deserving cases, and on what legal grounds are those cases to be made? If a person has to be of 'sound mind' to opt for assisted suicide, then how could anyone opt for it when suicidal impulses and desires for death are amongst the foremost in the diagnostic criteria for mental illness? On the other hand if someone has to show severe depression and a desire for death, then the law would equally cover that 19 year old goth who hates you all and wants to die.
Perhaps of most concern is that people with severe, long term illness are the weakest and most vulnerable, and I don't think it's possible for anyone to take a disinterested position regarding the death of a near friend or relative. The complexity of human relationships is such that a dispassionate view is impossible and the danger of those vulnerable people being put into an untenable position is a very real one.

The thing which I find most worrying of all about this debate is that it effectively mandates the power of life and death into the hands of a third party and I can see no argument whatsoever that any organisation, public or private, should have that power over people outside of times of war. Let's face it, the state has repeatedly demonstrated that it cannot be trusted with your phone number - blithely assuming that 'appropriate safeguards' (I'm learning the terminology) will ensure that the law is applied only in cases of need and compassion is kinda frightening to me and I'm prepared a stump up a sizeable cash bet as to the speed with which that assumption would be proven wrong if assisted suicide were legalised.
At present, assisting a suicide is a crime which is frequently not prosecuted; this allows the exercise of judgement, and judgement (as opposed to calculation) is not wholly rational. To frame a law, we must put in place rules of calculation and in so doing remove the place of judgement - as that is what laws do.

But, hey, what do I know? What do you think?
(deleted comment)

Date: 2009-08-07 09:38 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com
It's a condition of my will that no person involved in my death (i.e concerned relatives who nodded and said "Yes, turn the machine off, it's what he would have wanted") is to get anything.

Date: 2009-08-07 10:22 am (UTC)
From: (Anonymous)
You don't have anything.

I could be flippant, and advocate suicide booths on every street corner, I could comment on the reduced life expectancy of those on benefits being effectively a suicide lottery for the unemployed, or I could propose I like the system we have, as government with principle is (to my mind) preferable to being ruled with an iron fist, and sometimes the law is too much of a blunt instrument and only twelve just men will do.

But what do I know?

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 10:24 am (UTC) - Expand

Date: 2009-08-07 10:26 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] robinbloke.livejournal.com
That sounds like a get out clause for any of your (sadly-departed) debt to me ;)

Date: 2009-08-07 09:50 am (UTC)
From: (Anonymous)
I was discussing this with Duncan earlier in the week. Basically, if I helped someone to commit suicide, I should want to stand trial for murder. That ought to be the price I was prepared to pay for such an act - in fact if I cared at all for the person I'd helped to kill, I should not regard it as much of a price at all. I would want to be judged by 12 human beings with their own experience of life and tragedy, deciding on its own merits whether my own case was so exceptional that they were prepared to forgive what I'd done. And if they didn't, I should sooner have them send me to prison than have a kindly State patting me on the head saying "that's all right, we condone assisted suicide these days. It makes things so much neater for everyone."

H

Date: 2009-08-07 10:02 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com
But think of all the spiffy new jobs that would be created!
We could have Termination Faciliation Officers, and your local Quality of Life Inspectorate could assess you twice a year to see if your life had declined to a point where you qualified for free state-subsidised euthanisia, and then Bereavement Trauma Councillors could come round and explain to your relatives how it was for the best and it's what you wanted really.

I sniff a market opportunity!

Date: 2009-08-07 10:05 am (UTC)
From: (Anonymous)
You're not convincing me here, you know

H
(deleted comment)

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 10:43 am (UTC) - Expand

Date: 2009-08-07 10:06 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com
And then there's the merchandising spinoff opooruntunities! Assisted Suicide sweets! Tombs - Help you bereave more easily.

Blimey, I'll make a fortune.

Date: 2009-08-07 10:05 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] robinbloke.livejournal.com
Everything would be simpler with the Futurama suicide booths...

Date: 2009-08-07 10:07 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com
I have to say, I was thinking about them as I was writing and wondering whether I should pu them in.

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] robinbloke.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 10:10 am (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 10:16 am (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] robinbloke.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 10:24 am (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 10:25 am (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] robinbloke.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 10:28 am (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 10:31 am (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: (Anonymous) - Date: 2009-08-07 10:25 am (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] robinbloke.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 10:27 am (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 10:30 am (UTC) - Expand

Date: 2009-08-07 10:27 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] annacara.livejournal.com
That happened to my and norm, coming back from a London Game.

They decided to jump infront of the just after West Ham, We were stranded for over two hours until they sorted it out.

I just pity the train drivers.

Date: 2009-08-07 10:29 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com
Yes, that always struck me as the grimmest part of the whole deal and a big reason why I show no respect to suicides - the lack of concern over the effect on others.

Apparently London underground drivers get three months off and mandatory brain-doctoring if they get one under. I'm normally rather shirty about the cushy working conditions in LUL, but in this case I'll make an exception.

(no subject)

From: (Anonymous) - Date: 2009-08-07 10:46 am (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 10:48 am (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] gnommi.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 11:26 am (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] gnommi.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 10:54 am (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 11:01 am (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] gnommi.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 11:04 am (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 11:06 am (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: (Anonymous) - Date: 2009-08-07 11:12 am (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 11:13 am (UTC) - Expand
From: [identity profile] thefish30.livejournal.com
"No animal shall kill any other animal without cause." -- Animal Farm

Debates about the morality of suicide in theory aside, "right to die" will in practice become "obligation to die". First among those directly involved, on the down-low; and then, once everybody has had a generation to get used to the idea, in law. If the belief is that continuing to live in the face of illness or pain is nothing more than your personal choice, then it can be made out to be a selfish choice. You will be hogging resources ($$$) that other (younger, with more voting years ahead of them) people could be using.
From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com
That's the thing, isn't it?
ID cards won't be compulsory - until we've got used to them, and then they will be.
Euthanasia won't be compulsory - until it's an accepted part of society, then it will be.

I find that not standing on slippery slopes in the first place is better than finding myself at the bottom of one, wondering how I got there.

Date: 2009-08-07 11:29 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] crocodilewings.livejournal.com
I was reading an article the other day (which now stubbornly refuses to be Googled) about the distinction between cultural taboos which serve a vital social function (like murder) and ones which are essentially fashions of the era (like age of consent). It occured to me that the definition of a vital social function was very much dependent on the society in which it existed, and the distinction isn't quite as useful to draw as we might think.

In a society where no-one's going to live beyond 40 and every able-bodied person is of use to the community, suicide is quite a handy taboo. In a society which can't find a productive use for millions of its members but can keep them alive for the better part of a century, that taboo is going to go out of fashion pretty quickly.

One way or another, I think these problems are going to stop mattering before we find an aesthetically comfortable solution for them.

Date: 2009-08-07 11:31 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com
I've long been convinced that population demographics are going to make this century no bundle of laughs, and I think that if we can't put a lid on our population than Lovelock's Gaia (not the hippy-dippy one) will do it for us.

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] crocodilewings.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 11:40 am (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 11:43 am (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] crocodilewings.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 11:58 am (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 12:01 pm (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] crocodilewings.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 12:06 pm (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 12:08 pm (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] crocodilewings.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 12:12 pm (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 12:13 pm (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] crocodilewings.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 12:25 pm (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 12:31 pm (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] crocodilewings.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 12:42 pm (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-07 12:43 pm (UTC) - Expand

Date: 2009-08-07 11:39 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] raggedyman.livejournal.com
I honestly have no conclusion on this topic. It's something that I've been looking into for quite some time (I was first introduced to the concepts when I was 12) and I just still end up going 'err... well... the thing is... dunno' on which side is right. They both have incredibly strong arguments for and against, and standing on any side of the line causes problems that the other side solves.

possibly not the answer you were looking for but the one I have

Date: 2009-08-07 11:41 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com
I sympathise. On the one hand, I'm a flag-waving enthusiast for individual liberty and the right to self-determination. The reason I come down anti on this point is because I'm an even bigger fan of not letting the state have power of life and death over the people. It should be the other way around.

(no subject)

From: (Anonymous) - Date: 2009-08-07 01:13 pm (UTC) - Expand

Evolving morality

Date: 2009-08-07 02:00 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] applez.livejournal.com
The tension between individual freedom and community responsibility is never fully resolved. In the absence of a law for all that is clear for all cases, I will default to the less-satisfactory living will. Whether the assumption, in absence of such a document, is to protect health at all costs, or various layers less than that, even assumed organ harvesting unless opted out, is a cultural question.

Date: 2009-08-07 04:41 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] elbly.livejournal.com
As someone with a debilitating and bloody painful condition (one other than marriage that is) I have to say I welcome the debate being raised. Currently I'm medicated and my life looks peachy keen, but I'm painfully aware that the drugs could stop working.

I've already decided I'd make a short trip to Switzerland if the worst happens - but I really wouldn't want my family to risk being prosecuted.
From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com
The thing is, as the legal system currently tackles cases like that, they wouldn't be prosecuted anyway. The DPP looks at the case, decides a prosecution isn't in the public interest, and that's that.
The problem in formulating a legal approvals system is that laws are absolutes and the DPP (being an actual human being) possesses two things which bureaucracies do not; judgement and compassion.

Date: 2009-08-07 10:18 pm (UTC)
ext_3057: (Default)
From: [identity profile] supermouse.livejournal.com
This post makes me glad all over again that I added you to my reading list.

I think you make great points very well and I would have to think long and hard to come up with a good response. You have, at the very least, got me checking and questioning my assumptions.

Date: 2009-08-10 09:33 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] davywavy.livejournal.com
The reason I like English common law is that the basis of law is "Everything is permitted except where specifically forbidden". This is unusual amongst legal codes, as most places have a system of everything being forbidden except those rights granted by the state. That's the reason I disagree with teh idea of things like a written constitution and bill of rights for teh UK; we don't need them and all they'd do is hive off more authority over the individual to the state.

The exception I make to this rule is when it comes to killing people. Most of the time I prefer permitted unless forbidden. In this case, I'll happily go with forbidden unless permitted.

(no subject)

From: [identity profile] supermouse.livejournal.com - Date: 2009-08-10 05:50 pm (UTC) - Expand

Date: 2009-08-08 08:51 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] moomin-puffin.livejournal.com
I certainly think that there are times when assisted suicide is the right thing for some people. I don't know how on earth it would be fairly managed legally though :(

Date: 2009-08-10 05:52 pm (UTC)
ext_3057: (Default)
From: [identity profile] supermouse.livejournal.com
I wouldn't have dreamt I'd be saying this, but I think Davywavy might be right - it's better managed by people looking the other way and deciding not to prosecute when they could, rather than not being able to prosecute. I'm still not absolutely sure, but the post was very persuasive...
Page generated Jul. 30th, 2025 05:37 pm
Powered by Dreamwidth Studios