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arguments against euthanasia - Referat
arguments against euthanasia
¯Legalisation of euthanasia might lead to assaults on individual autonomy.
Persons may be subjected to pressure to ask for their own death by being
made to feel guilty for the burden they impose on family and carers. Further,
professional carers (doctors, nurses) may be pressed into taking life against
their own judgements.
¯A person’s expression of a desire to end his life may be influenced by a state
of depression. A person’s capacity to make an informed and competent
decision may be difficult to ascertain.
¯Another problem appears if others are empowered to make decisions for the ill
or incapacitated person. When some advantage may accrue to the carer on the
death of the helpless person (for example independence, money, property)
then there may be more motivation to make independent arbitrary decisions,
without taking account of the patient’s wishes.
¯The power can be misused to get rid of specified individuals or groups.
¯It could be difficult to discover, after a person’s death, whether that death had
occurred from “natural causes” or as a result of correctly (or incorrectly)
carried out procedures of euthanasia.
¯There could also be a failure to bring about an easy death. An acceptable
method may fail to kill the person within a reasonable time and so may cause
more suffering.
arguments for euthanasia
¯It’s within the rights of a human being to choose whether to live or to die.
¯They have a right to decide whether quality or sanctity of life is most
important to them. Euthanasia would allow them to do so, without placing
other people in legal jeopardy.
¯Caring for or watching someone suffer, without any chance of relief or
recovery, can become difficult to tolerate for the carers and watchers, both
emotionally and physically, so that the carer’s only prospect of relief resides
in the death of the patient.
¯The perceived impropriety of making use of high technology and expensive
medical procedures in cases where the only positive outcome is the temporary
lengthening of life, without improvement in quality of life or prospect of
recovery is often seen as an argument for euthanasia.
¯Legally, a person who kills another or connives at the death of another, breaks
the law and may be charged with a serious criminal offence (murder or
manslaughter) and may be convicted and punished.
ðPassive euthanasia: withdrawl of life-sustaining treatment
Active euthanasia: putting end to life of a person who, due to disease or
extreme age, can no longer lead a meaningful life.
ðMost opposition to the decriminalisation of voluntary euthanasia arises from
religious groups. They believe that only God can give and take away life.
ðA slippery slope – voluntary will soon lead to involuntary. There is no
evidence for this argument at all. VE as an individual choice is entirely
distinct from murdering people who are judged (by others) to have to worth.
ðIf euthanasia was brought into the open and strictly controlled there would be
less chance of abuse.
ðThe majority of people who support the idea of euthanasia do so because they
are thinking in terms of putting dying patient out of intolerable pain.
ðI think it’s natural to hope that when the time comes I shall die peacefully
with dignity and without prolonged suffering.
ðEuthanasia doesn’t mean getting rid of the old, the infirm and the unwanted.
That’s one of the most common misunderstandings and misinterpretations I
have to dispose of.
ðEuthanasia helps patients to die with dignity rather than have their lives
prolonged by medical technology by no clear purpose.
ðMoreover I think that loss of independence is likely to be a much more
significant catalyst than pain.
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