It has been a very interesting experience to debate assisted suicide here in the UK. I had in-depth exchanges with three different advocates, one a Member of the Scottish Parliament, one a bioethicist from, I believe, the University of Glasgow, and Dr. Libby Wilson, the head of an assisted suicide advocacy group here, who was apparently charged with assisting the suicide of someone using the helium method–although she says she merely talked on the phone about it.
The debates here were far deeper than the ones we usually have in the USA. We didn’t have to waste time on the nonsense that assisted suicide isn’t really suicide or that it would only be limited to the terminally ill, although that is the MSP’s stated position. In fact, we were able to engage at length the fundamental question raised by this movement–whether death on demand for other than transitory desires to die is a human right. For as Dr. Wilson stated, permitting it for the terminally ill, neurologically degenerating, or seriously physically disabled–as proposed previously by MSP MacDonald, and likely to be in her upcoming bill–is a “good first step.”
So, what we have really, in this debate, are divergent and incompatible world views. What is each of our–and society’s–duty to the ill, disabled, and despairing who “want to die.?” I say, that we should value their lives, even if they can’t at the particular moment. That means suicide prevention, interventions to make life more bearable, love and inclusion to help the suicidal make it to a hoped-for new dawn.
In contrast, my opponents here said, generally speaking, we should help them die. And it became very clear, especially in the debates with the bioethicist from Glasgow and Dr. Wilson, that the “helping” would, in the end, become a very broad license, to enable–in Dr. Wilson’s words, those with serious conditions to give their families “the gift” of no longer being a burden. Think of the message that attitude sends to the suffering among us!
I was rather stunned by the inability (refusal?) of some–both debaters and questioners–to recognize the value of a life that has difficulties. The fear of suffering from these folk was palpable But I was also encouraged that the young who spoke up seemed to be rejecting the “autonomy ubber alles” meme that under-girds assisted suicide ideology and opens the door to abandoning the elderly, chronically ill, despairing, and dying to the belief that they and their loved ones are better off if they are in the grave.
But it is a difficult thing: The clear flow of the culture at the moment is toward disdaining suffering at all costs, even when that means ending the sufferer, perhaps even when the sufferer has not asked to be ended.
Tonight I will be giving a speech at the Hotel Cadogen near Sloan Square in London, entitled, “The Culture of Death in the United Kingdom: A Perfect Storm.” I enjoyed meeting some of this site’s friends in Scotland and hope local SHSers can attend the event tonight.
Then home tomorrow, and on to the next. There is much to do and to say about many issues in the weeks to come.
November 16th, 2009 | 8:14 am
If life without suffering is the only life worth living, then we all must simply do ourselves in without a moment’s hesitation!
One thing we know about suffering, is that we all experience it. The question, then, is not whether we will avoid suffering, but whether suffering has any meaning at all.
For those with faith, the answer is easy…well, at least easily available! For those without faith…I don’t see how they could ultimately find an answer which would sustain them.
November 16th, 2009 | 11:28 am
“So, what we have really, in this debate, are divergent and incompatible world views. What is each of our–and society’s–duty to the ill, disabled, and despairing who ‘want to die.?’ I say, that we should value their lives, even if they can’t at the particular moment. … In contrast, my opponents here said, generally speaking, we should help them die.”
I’m particularly interested in the assertion that “[w]e should value someone’s life even if they don’t value it themselves.” Translation: “We know better than you what’s best for you. We believe we have a right to interfere with your autonomy because your worldview differs from our own — and, of course, ours is superior. We have a superior claim to your body than you have, because we’re ‘right’ and you’re ‘wrong.’”
Sorry I can’t be in the audience when you give your talk about the UK’s “culture of death.” It ought to be an interesting evening.
November 16th, 2009 | 3:54 pm
I’m new to your blog and haven’t done any checking at all, but I was wondering what undergirds your reasons for thinking that life is so important? In other words, if people are nothing but a bunch of electrons and atoms clunking into one another, what makes one thing right and another thing wrong? Thanks. Mike.
November 16th, 2009 | 4:21 pm
I’m interested in your assertions as well, HW.
Let me rework your second paragraph and see if it works better for you:
…”[w]e should properly lower the value of someone’s life based on their suffering, even if they value it highly themselves.” Translation: “We know better than you what’s best for you. We believe we have a right to limit your options for getting help because your worldview differs from our own – and, of course, ours is superior. We have a superior claim to redistribute scarce resources away from your problems, because we’re ‘right’ and you’re ‘wrong’.”
How’s that sound?
November 16th, 2009 | 4:34 pm
I wouldn’t have had a problem, personally, with assisted suicide if there were absolutely no risk of coercion, in other words, if the person ending their lives could truly have sole autonomy over their life and death. What makes me oppose assisted suicide, is the general attitude towards suffering and illness that goes with it. This will have consequences for medical treatment, nursing care for the elderly/disabled, counseling for people with serious illnesses, etc.
November 16th, 2009 | 5:30 pm
Personally speaking Wesley, I honestly believe that you’re on the right track and don’t pay any attention to HW cause he’s entitled to his opinion and when and if he has a good talk with his soul and/or spirit they’ll eventually tell him that there’s more to the flesh that meets the eyes and also that brain cells alone can understand.
Sorry HW, nothing personal but for what “IT” is worth, I’ll be there at your talk in spirit Wesley and many of God’s Angels also cause the flesh is weak and sometime wants to take the easy way out but we must keep helping them if we can.
God Bless,
Peace
November 16th, 2009 | 9:40 pm
Any person who values freedom can see the value of what HistoryWriter is saying. After all, we don’t want someone else telling us what to do with our bodies because of what they believe, right?
Except that there are plenty of areas in which society imposes restrictions on the body, for the greater good.
Except that assisted suicide advocacy is not about being free from other people imposing their moral values on you. It’s not as if a determined person cannot attempt –and eventually succeed– at suicide if she wants to.
Furthermore, to oppose the spread of assisted suicide is not necessarily to advocate interfering in a person’s private behavior. The opposition is merely asking that the entirety of culture NOT be forced into COOPERATING with suicide. And, to be sure, the fallout from this forced cooperation would most likely include other, horrible aspects such as coerced suicide and a further erosion of respect for the suffering, the elderly, and people with disabilities.
November 16th, 2009 | 9:50 pm
Also, while I personally believe that there is nobility (and even spiritual significance) possible in suffering, and I am in agreement with Wesley on this topic, I think that we should always be loathe to speak lightly of the sufferings of others.
I have seen this in pro-life circles when people who have never faced unplanned or health-threatening pregnancies speak about carrying to term, and adoption, as if they are so easy.
I see this in the anti-assisted suicide movement when able, healthy people talk as if those who want to end their lives just aren’t embracing their suffering enough. I am sure that most do not mean it to be condescending. But it is.
Please, think carefully before you speak, about suffering. To act as if you know what another person experiences when disabled or ill or declining: that is a disempowering & uninformed act that actually contributes to devaluing people, rather than advancing the cause of human dignity.
November 17th, 2009 | 7:31 am
….This morning, reading my new First Things over coffee, I realized what I meant to say in my last comment last night:
We should always and everywhere speak about the Good that it is to care for those who suffer.
We must be humble, though, when trying to speak about the suffering of others.
Perhaps if we focus mostly on the message that those who suffer — old age, mental illnesses, disabilities– should never be considered a burden by society, then we will help prevent suffering people from considering suicide in the first place.
November 17th, 2009 | 8:40 am
Kathleen: That’s not what I’m saying; it’s what YOU are saying, and your “reworking” of my statement doesn’t “work” at all.
Some arguments are mono-directional (i.e. they simply don’t work when turned around). If I can use a mechanical analogy: a rotating shaft with a worm gear at its end is able to make a toothed gear turn; turning the toothed gear, however, won’t make the shaft rotate.
November 17th, 2009 | 9:06 am
Hi Victor:
We obviously differ in matters of religious belief, since God, angels, “weak flesh” and soul aren’t part of my working vocabulary. I try to deal with facts, not conjecture.
In my view the meaning of life is: “we’re here because we’re here.” And because, as the saying goes, “s**t happens” so does suffering. Some suffer more than others, yet people who don’t even know them either presume to know how much suffering these folks are able to endure, or worse, try to find some spiritual message for them in the midst of it. I have news for you: suffering is ennobling — if you’re a masochist. For those who aren’t, let them decide when they’ve had enough and want to get off the merry-go-round. Since suicide isn’t a crime, why should assisting it be?
November 17th, 2009 | 9:17 am
holyterror: nobody is suggesting that everyone ought to be forced into agreeing with the concept of assisted suicide. What its advocates desire is that it be legal for physicians (who are willing) to help them by furnishing the necessary drug(s) so that they don’t botch the job.
Since this comes down to a matter of privacy rights and the physician-patient relationship, I have repeatedly asked Wesley to give us his opinion about the constitutional right to privacy, articulated by the Supreme Court in Griswold v. Connecticut; and he has scrupulously avoided doing so.
I suppose no answer is an answer in this case.
November 17th, 2009 | 12:53 pm
Thank you for your excellent and helpful talk on Monday – and for all your good work.
Pauline
November 17th, 2009 | 1:03 pm
Mike, in a sense you’ve answered your own question. Under the idea that Wesley is “nothing but a bunch of electrons and atoms clunking into one another,” that which “undergirds [his] reasons” for anything can in theory be explained completely in terms of physics. So, some atoms clunking into one another led Wesley to type his post, some other atoms led you to type your comment, and still some other atoms led me to type my response. To think that there is some other reason beyond such clunking of atoms (and electrons) is to reject the idea that “people are nothing but a bunch of electrons and atoms clunking into one another.”
November 17th, 2009 | 6:28 pm
Even IF the assisted suicide debate were about personal freedom to choose (as opposed to a matter of duty to society), why is personal choice more precious than life itself? To say so is a value judgement, akin to a religious conviction, imposed on the disabled from outside.
November 18th, 2009 | 12:23 am
Admit it or not, HW, Kathleen has a point. If we legally permit the disabled, the elderly, the depressed or some other category of person to legally seek aid in ending their lives, while the young and able-bodied are prohibited from doing so, are we not establishing the legal precedent that the lives of the disabled are less worth protecting?
And, what message does that send to the disabled who do not see their lives as intolerable, and who want to continue living? It’s a shorter step than you realize from legalizing euthanasia for the disabled to promoting it.
November 18th, 2009 | 8:04 am
HW:
I was not really speaking of the possibility of individuals being forced to cooperate with suicides, although that seems to me to be very real. What I was speaking about, rather, is the fact that *communities* are forced to be complicit in suicides when euthanasia and assisted suicide are made legal.
Law is a reflection of the values of a society, and when the law explicitly states that assisted suicide is legal, then you have a tacit approval of the action.
A person’s private suffering, perhaps leading to an attempt to end her own life, is sad; no compassionate human being should ignore its reality. But when society condones helping out in the attempt to end one’s own life, then it is saying: not only is it a reality that such things happen, butwe believe that it is good for them to happen. At least sometimes…and the definitions of what constitutes a “good” life being there.
See, you can’t legalize assisted suicide without defining who gets to be a recipient of the assistance. And you either say, “Evryone who wants it, no questions asked”, or you start in on the legal machinations over whose life deserves saving — or whose deserves help in ending, depending on how you look at it.
See, HW, your whole “private individuals and their doctors” thing does NOT actually translate
into the reality that is legal euthanasia. Most truly determined people who would like to suicide will look for a way– any way they can find. It happens a lot, and doctors and family members currently admit to helping. I do not believe it is right, but it is a reality. In a sense, it is the most private and personal it can be when it is NOT legal.
However, if you put it into law, then the entirety of social law is invested in it. So, not only is society then a part of assisted suicide– whether its individual members want to be or not– but, you then become involved in legal questions of which individuals “deserve” it, and whether individuals have the right to refuse to be a part of it or not. THAT really enforces somebody else’s morality on people, don’t you think?
This is a point that YOU have repeatedly ignored, although I hope you will not again this time.
November 18th, 2009 | 10:38 am
holyterror:
Thanks for your reply. I disagree with the generalization that “*communities* are forced to be complicit in suicides when euthanasia and assisted suicide are made legal.” *Some* communities may be complicit; others not. In 1954, when racially segregated schools were outlawed, did the residents of Alabama, Mississippi, Kansas and others suddenly become complicit in integration? Jim Crow laws were a “reflection of the values of those societies” but did that make those laws valid? Using the argument that the approval of a “community” lends validity to a law, could we not say that the state of Connecticut was within its rights when it forbade the use of contraceptives by married couples? That, by the way, is the topic of Griswold v. Connecticut, the landmark privacy case that I’ve challenged Wesley to comment on — and about which he remains conspicuously silent.
With respect to defining who gets to use assisted suicide, my position in fact *is* “everyone who wants it, no questions asked.” It is simply a matter of privacy rights. I happen to disagree with body-piercing and tattooing, but also recognize that it is none of my business what other people do with their bodies.
You say that in a sense assisted suicide is the most private and personal it can be when it is NOT legal. You don’t mean “private”; you mean “surreptitious.” Something criminal.Remember, we’re not talking about involuntary euthanasia, which I oppose. We’re talking about someone giving professional assistance to another person in doing something they desire.
Simply because a law protects privacy and so “invests society” does not necessarily force anyone to avail themselves of that protection. I would point out that the Supreme Court’s decision about sodomy between consenting adults didn’t enforce its morality on others, nor did it drive multitudes into the streets madly searching for willing partners.
Summing up, assisted suicide should be treated as a private, voluntary decision made between consenting adults, one of whom is a doctor licensed to dispense the necessary drugs to enable the desired result. Nothing more, nothing less.
November 18th, 2009 | 5:33 pm
HW: Jim Crow laws did make everyone complicit. Every single person had to choose, every single day, to abide them…or not. My great aunt chose every day as an adult to mingle with people who were supposed to be separated from her by those laws. (as a white person she did have more privilege to choose this.) Similarly, when integration was made law, all of society was forced to abide the laws or protest them.
They were issues of access to society though, and not of access to ones own privacy.
Your comparisons are off, every one of them, first because none involve legalizing *the outside help* of someone else to do the action (whih you keep claiming, iroically, is about privacy.) And second, none of your comparisons involve the ending of life, which because of its elemental nature, its finality, makes it completely of its own category. I would even say euthanasia is more definitively penultimate than abortion, because you can make the case (which I ultimately disagree is compelling enough) that the fetus is dependant on the mother for life.
Privacy IS important. But the “surreptitious” nature of suicide ought to be there. Why not? Well, why care if anyone kills herself? Why ever intervene? Whose life is worth saving?
So, in addition to comparing unlike things, you do not address a terribly important issue: the implications and effect of legalizing assisted suicide. Why do you think that “private business between consenting adults” is all it is, or will be? Abortion is now viewed as private business and basic health care, and it is common to hear doctors who do not pratice it or refer for it described as being unprofessional, less-than-doctors. Why should this not happen with suicide?
And again, I ask you: Do you not believe that legalizing assisted suicide will in itself demand definitions of who can receive it? Or place burdens on physicians, pharmacists, etc. who do not wish to cooperate in it? Or– and this is especially significant– do you really believe that changing the law to say that assisting in a sucide is ok will NOT imply and propogate any message that there are some lives not worth living?
November 18th, 2009 | 5:42 pm
**edit: chemical/artificial birth control DOES require the prescription of a doctor, so, in that it does need outside help. (although NFP is cheaper and easier, and needs no doctor visit, lol!) But the Groswold vs. CT case was not about ending life and therfore fails to be significantly like assisted suicide.
November 18th, 2009 | 10:41 pm
Thank you for your reply HW and I guess that we’ll need to agree to disagree as I believe that spiritual and reality fact go hand in hand.
But! I will be praying for both of U>S that we learn what God truly wants and not simply earthly Judges who enforce laws put into effect by certain people and think that “IT” is some kind of Holy Scripture and should be followed without questions or conjecture.
Peace
November 18th, 2009 | 10:43 pm
Of course Griswold was about privacy, but ending life remains an ancillary issue in that some contraceptives (particularly those that prevent implantation of a fertilized ovum) are regarded in some quarters as abortifacients. For that reason some pharmacists continue to claim “conscience rights” in refusing to fill prescriptions for them.
Now unless you’re willing to go on record as saying that government has a right to supervise activities in the bedroom, don’t stand there and tell me that it has a right to supervise my activities on my deathbed. My life is mine, not Uncle Sam’s.
That said, who should be the judge of whether that life is worth living, if not I? Are YOU going to decide for me whether I’m suffering enough? Is Wesley? Or maybe one of the neighbors? The implication seems to be that if one doesn’t make a decision with which you agree they’re doing something wrong; that others presume to know more about what’s good for me than I. Mind, this is the same argument conservatives are using against health care reform. Does that shoe feel uncomfortable when it’s on the other foot?
The reason I keep asking Wesley for his take on Griswold is that I’d like him (just once) to be completely candid and tell us, without mincing words, if he believes that the state has a right to intrude upon marital privacy by proscribing the use of contraceptives.
Ignoring the question won’t make it go away; No answer IS an answer. How about it, Wesley? Feeling courageous, or has jet lag got you down?
Wesley J. Smith Reply:
November 18th, 2009 at 11:49 pm
It’s been many years since I read Griswald, indeed since law school in the 1970s. So, it is hard to come out in agreement to it as I don’t remember how the case was reasoned. As I recall, it was about the state proscribing from married couples contraceptives. (My, how quaint.) In the general sense that I don’t think the state should intrude on the decision as to whether married couples decide to get pregnant, I agree with Griswald. But I am not going to debate contraception, if that is your game. And I certainly don’t think that the general right to privacy that Griswald started, extends to assisted suicide. And guess what: The US Supreme Court agreed 9-0.
November 19th, 2009 | 4:11 pm
“Of course Griswold was about privacy, but ending life remains an ancillary issue in that some contraceptives (particularly those that prevent implantation of a fertilized ovum) are regarded in some quarters as abortifacients. For that reason some pharmacists continue to claim “conscience rights” in refusing to fill prescriptions for them.”
I am unfamiliar with the way this case was presented, so please someone tell me: was the abortiacient possibility of birth cotrol even part of the dsicsussion? And was that part of ANY discussions of birth contro at the time?
“Now unless you’re willing to go on record as saying that government has a right to supervise activities in the bedroom, don’t stand there and tell me that it has a right to supervise my activities on my deathbed. My life is mine, not Uncle Sam’s.”
So, here you jump to “aha!”, as if you hve shown definitively that Griswold, and the entirety of privacy rights in the U.S., are the same as end-of-life issues. Your only actual attempt at argument is “my life is mine.”
Which of course is true.
And if you re-read it, you might see that my argument is that government is intruding when it makes laws *legalizing* assisted suicide. It is much more likely to get into your deathbed when it is invested in making regulations and laws about suicide.
“That said, who should be the judge of whether that life is worth living, if not I? Are YOU going to decide for me whether I’m suffering enough? Is Wesley? Or maybe one of the neighbors?”
I think that I have already said repeatedly that, my position is that there is no appropriate person to measure another person’s suffering, and in fact no means to do so. Again, government involvement in end-of-life matters, except to outlaw taking others’ life, is interefering more than any other scenario, as it implicates everyone.
I am not able to copy and paste the nex portion of your answer, so I can’t but it is actually confusing to me. It’s the part about health care, and shoes. What? Are you calling me a conservative, also? I might have to ask you to fight a duel over me for that one. :)
Lastly, why are you so obsessed with Wesley and contraceptives? I keep getting this feeling that you like to put people in a political box, as if that is possible, and as if everything that people believe deeply is ultimately only political. As a Catholic, I personally know this to be untrue, and it seems like a smart person hanging around this place might eventually be able to figure that out.
November 19th, 2009 | 4:16 pm
Sorry about all the typos, btw. I have a sticky keyboard and very small snatches of time in which to write, so sometimes I do not proofread. Please do not take it personally.
Wesley J. Smith Reply:
November 19th, 2009 at 4:22 pm
No one should worry about typos. They happen. Thanks.
November 20th, 2009 | 3:26 pm
[...] We have become a culture that tells the elderly, people with disabilities, and others who need care and support that they are “burdens.” Indeed, in my recent debate in Edinburgh with Dr. Libby Wilson, my opponent explicitly supported legalizing assisted suicide so that the ill and disabled could give their families the “gift” of not being a burden. [...]
December 2nd, 2009 | 3:39 pm
[...] very clear, the assisted suicide agenda is not narrow. It is very broad. Activists here–unlike their counterparts overseas–just generally lack the candor that would permit us to have a true debate about the means and [...]
December 3rd, 2009 | 11:27 pm
HW: should we butt out even if the suffering could be mitigated, but the person is seriously misinformed? Seems to me there is a lot of heat surrounding end-of-life pain and suffering, and not much light.
Also…”You say that in a sense assisted suicide is the most private and personal it can be when it is NOT legal. You don’t mean “private”; you mean “surreptitious.” Something criminal.”
If it is explicitly banned. My own opinion notwithstanding, lawmakers could be entirely passive and neither ban nor codify assisted suicide. Enshrining it in law is an active statement, and law does have a role in molding cultural thought that cannot be ignored.
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