BBC News - Assisted dying debate: Tony Nicklinson in his own words (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-wiltshire-18398797)

This article certainly provokes thought, albeit a very controversial subject.

Could anyone seriously look this guy in the eye and tell him he is wrong??

Brave, unfortunate and intelligent man.. surely he can make his own decisions, right??? :sad:

This may interest. What if one becomes physically incapable of suicide? Currently likely going to Canadian Supreme Court.
n.b. suicide is not illegal in Canada, but assisted suicide is, much as UK.

Right to assisted suicide 'momentous' says B.C. woman - British Columbia - CBC News (http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/story/2012/06/18/bc-gloria-taylor-assisted-suicide.html)

Not so much of a problem here, thank God.
The ex did it a couple of years ago when the cancers became too bad.
She went about it ib her typical manner, funerral etc. planned down to the last detail. Only strange thing was the changes made to the will in the last couple of weeks It took a court case and nearly three years against her new husband to get our daughter's share out of him

What if one becomes physically incapable of suicide?Unfortunately the only option in a lot of jurisdictions is to get in early, if you're lucky enough. :(
Assisted suicide is still illegal in Australia and AFAIK I am technically in breach of the law by even publishing about it. Or maybe that's only wrt chemical methods, rather than throwing yourself off stuff. :bored:

Only strange thing was the changes made to the will in the last couple of weeks It took a court case and nearly three years against her new husband to get our daughter's share out of him. This is the problem. However it's been a problem with natural deaths ever since humans developed the concept of property. Where there's a will there's a relative.

I don't understand why the availability of suicide assistance given the array of convenient, painless do-it-yourself methods available.

Perhaps its the element of our collective culture that wants to convince itself and us, as they have done with abortions, that it is okay.

Personally, I am much more uneasy with abortion, particularly when done out of convenience. The victim of it has no say and is fundamentally human. I have a problem, too, when someone other than the parents are called upon to pay for it, particularly when they are morally opposed to it.

Suicide, on the other hand is an expression of one's ultimate control over one's own life. I cannot criticize the decision made by, for example, a person who is in chronic, extreme pain; or one who faces a terminal illness that threatens to devastate his remaining wealth, or even impose large financial burdens on his family and heirs.

On the other hand I respect and admire those who face life's seemingly hopeless events and perseveres, never giving up, and continuing to face the challenges with faith in better days ahead. That takes strength and courage. Suicide? Not so much.

On the other hand I respect and admire those who face life's seemingly hopeless events and perseveres, never giving up, and continuing to face the challenges with faith in better days ahead. That takes strength and courage.For sure. Unfortunately mind over matter only extends so far, and too many people are trapped in a failing body with no options to repair it.

All I ever hope for is a quick death that I don't see coming. Of course it's hard on the rellies...
'Hello, this is X from Dept of Y...are you related to Z?'
'Of course. What's the ol' reprobate done now??':E
:eek:...:ouch:...:sad:...:{...[reaction to the description of Z's massive stroke, despite him being the healthiest member of the family].
'Yeah, so-and-so will identify the body'.:(

Hard on the tribe, but easy on Z.
From experience both ways, despite the initial shock it's far easier on everybody that the downward spiral of being inescapably terminally ill with a disease medical science can't yet cure but won't stop trying to treat :ugh:. Some people would prefer to die quietly. I'm one of them. I don't currently have that option because my government considers it a non-issue. Such a non-issue that I'm not allowed to discuss it. :mad:
My secondary options are not foolproof but they're a damned side better than lying in bed while 'experts' try to bully me into prolonging the inevitable.

Tony Nicklinson, 58, from Wiltshire, has locked-in syndrome following a stroke seven years ago.

His barrister told the High Court he is not seeking a new law to allow euthanasia, but just wanted a "remedy".

But the government is to argue that such a ruling would authorise murder.

This legal bid differs from recent right-to-die cases which have focused on assisted suicide.

Instead, Mr Nicklinson's paralysis is so severe that he would have to be killed by someone else, known as euthanasia.

I'm unsure of what rights are available to anyone under Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights which deals with the right to respect for private and family life., but the "right to die" if one chooses to do so and in being assisted to do so, relatively painlessly etc. nowadays in 2012, should be "inscribed in stone".

As usual (and always for at least over the past 500 years, it's the influence of the Church) which has had the upper-hand in these affairs. One might have thought that recent events where Church-folk were indeed caught and prosecuted with their hands (if not upper-hands) in the panties of young children might have made a difference...?!

As a physically able-bodied individual (of sound mind too), I reckon that with my eventual pension entitlements (until they change the rules, yet again) from the UK government and the French government, I should be able to retire on a full-pension aged about 70, which might cover 50% of my outgoings today 'in a future sense)...

I don't wan't to be a burden to anyone. I especially don't want to have to live each day by recuperating discarded fruit and vegetables from the local markets.

I might conceivably ask for a charitable hand-out from my niece in UK who did very well from an Amazon buyout at least a decade ago. Which would see me through a few months in that dismal future which awaits.

Overall though, our western governments have pretty much put us all in the position they envisaged perhaps 30-40 years ago (regardless of party politics - they're all beholden to someone... destroyed whole families and communities (encouraging those without jobs to move to other parts of the country), where together with hefty SS taxes means that at least in the UK in 2012, you're more or less obliged to leave your remaining family to the whims and complete generosity of state benefits.

Going back to my own situation. The time will come when I no longer want to endure this sad existence of never having being able to afford to buy my own house or flat. And merely looking forward to a meagre pension as a 70 year old one day.

All laws should be changed ASAP so that anyone, whether or not handicapped, should have the means to easily put an end to their existence, as swiftly and painlessly as possible, with or without the assistance of 3rd parties (without these 3rd parties being prosecuted for their assistance).

I can understand the reticience of today's governments (hampered as they are by all the religious folks, as well as the banks who might well worry about who's going to repay all the loans taken out by suicides and finally what they, as governments have left to offer their ageing, or even their younger citizens), and to encourage the application of truly human-rights to their citizens, whether they're part of the living or the living-dead... :sad:

given the array of convenient, painless do-it-yourself methods available
as far as I understand, the specific case is about a person, for whom nothing is available due to his physical condition.
And I think we should be at least as generous with humans as we are with our pets - if they have something terminal and painful, they've relieved of it. Terminally.
Then, with the humans, the question is, of course - who would decide it's bad enough.
But even though and even so, I'm for it.

Then, with the humans, the question is, of course - who would decide it's bad enough.The sufferer?

As it stands, Tony Nicklinson's only personal option is to deliberately refuse food and drink so as to starve himself to death. There's something so very, very wrong about that.

It's hard to even do that if you're unconscious, didn't fill out an advance health directive and your next of kin isn't forceful.
http://www.justice.qld.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0007/15982/advance-health-directive.pdf

Otherwise they'll just keep pumping the vitamins in and congratulating themselves for keeping you 'alive'. :yuk:

I had a humdinger argument with the experts re feeding tubes for a relative in the final stages of a degenerative illness, who wasn't going to get any better, who pleaded while she could for no more intervention, who just wanted to :mad:ing die. 'Oh, we can do this, we can do that' said the experts. 'Any of that going to make her better?' I asked. Um no, but it would do something. Apparently.

'What if you cut out her heart, put it in a vat of liquid and feed it supplements?' I asked. 'Would that make you happy'?
Um no. Apparently they don't have the technology and I have an anger management problem. :bored:

They didn't have the technology to make her better either (which isn't their fault) but they wouldn't stop trying to prolong the inevitable. There is something very wrong with the modern interpretation of the Hippocratic Oath.

The nurses were great. "Would she like icecream? Wine? Maybe pizza, we can cut it up and help her eat it? We can read her a magazine if she wants'. Sensible and heartfelt offerings for a person who can hope for nothing more than love, care and their last visitor.
http://www.aeclectic.net/tarot/cards/_img/gilded-00705.jpg


If I ever get a sniff of the same disease, locals will read about a tragic accident (Experienced Solo Bushwalker In Fatal Fall) before I ever reach that situation. The problem is, with that scenario you have to act early enough to avoid the 'I can't do this myself' scenario. This can cost you a few reasonable years of life where you're ill, but functioning. It also inevitably causes distress to the poor buggers who are tasked to find you, and it doesn't work if you're the victim of a sudden stroke or debilitating accident. :(

That's what the current laws force people to plan for. Non issue, remember. :yuk:

The way I think about it is existance or life. Do I exist, or do I have a life. Life is fine, but existance for existance's sake, no thanks.

Doesn't that clinic in Switzerland have a computer programme that allows the person wanting to terminate their life, the ability to start a sequence of events leading to a syringe injecting the chemicals to do the deed? Surely if this guy can communicate with a computer programme, it can't be to difficult to set this up and let him chose to end his own life.

I have the impression that most JBers', don't really like the idea of contributing to a thread like this one which evokes suicide? Or thoughts of etc., which I guess is fair enough. I'd have thought that this thread deserved more responses (at least from those that have a sufficient no. of brain cells to rub together more than once)... :D

No, they're part of that elusive and limited, yet most valued and important worldwide clan amongst our national governments which always have happy families and upbringing. They have a choice of where to live or send their children to school whilst paying the absolute minimum in taxes. Their children do not masturbate before the age of 16 or 18; they don't rely on child-support, even if it's paid out to them unnecessarily and hardly means-tested; they have their own private pension-plans, all of which incorporate the Euro, but nevetheless look forward to a Europe without the Euro (whilst accepting that € billions in dollops provided by various governments in favour of the Euro are used to protect the assets of banks and pension companies at risk of immenent bankrupcy are used to protect their assets - but only theirs)...?!

If one were courageous enough to confront a polar bear today. Trying to explain why he/she was a severely-endangered species because of global-warming, receding ice-caps etc.; you might have got a huge roar of defiance and perhaps an attack, followed by a shot (from behind your shoulder) resulting in the death of that bear, and any futher suffrance.

I'm pretty sure that the Greeks, Portugese, Irish etc. are by now collectively more or less at their limits. They're not polar bears. They might eventually decide to fight back. At which time,
it won't matter then whether you hold Euros, the US$ or £ sterling etc. All that will be left afterwards are those who once financed and indeed held to ransom numerous countries and ordinary people with their capital once measured in the 10s of $ trillions, but reduced to nothing once ordinary folk discovered that they were nothing better than slaves to "offshore-based individuals and investors" with absolutely zero-ties to the countries where these funds were so welcomed or temporarily-invested (especially the UK - the world's greatest offshore tax-haven, ever".

Hope all you especially richer folk have big enough properties on which to grow your own spuds (why not rivers where you can also harvest caviar...?!). I believe that the richest 1% will be able to do so. They'll manage to keep hold of sufficient numbers of servants so that they'll still experience a form of luxury. I'm not sure what if any airlines will still be flying during such turbulent times. But perhaps the richest south Americans of 2020 will nevertheless be able to Y class to Nice for the Monaco Grand prix of the day - replicas of the cars that ran in 2012...?!

I'm so depressed. Hopefully, that's communicated itself to you to.

As far as euthanasia goes, for those with certain conditions like terminal cancer, I am glad to be in a civilised country where such a practice IS allowed.

We wouldn't let a dog or cat suffer in that way, and after watching loved ones slowly die in pain despite the morphine I don't think it is remotely "morally correct" to make a human suffer in that way unless they want to.

Member of my family, both sides, seem to have the ability to fight off the likes of cancer by willpower. Both my grandfathers were given 6 months to live and lasted for 5 and 7 years respectively, and were only under nursing care for the last year. Then, when the battle's lost, they seem to be able to switch off, dying in their sleep within 48 hours of having "decided to go". This usually happened at the loss of control of bodily functions.

Only hope I've inherited both characteristics. Wonder if it is willpower or genetic (or is willpower genetic)?

I listened to the interviews on Radio 4, he's a very brave chap.

Just watched the programme in question; very harrowing. The intelligence you could see in Tony's eyes when he looked at the camera after answering questions just made it all the worse to think that he is helpless.

If I was in his shoes, I'd want to die as well.

He is an articulate intelligent man, who has obviously thought about the impact on his family if he was to take his life. He is no someone who is suffering from a bout of depression who may be 'cured' with help.

I personally think that it is inhumane not to allow him to die.

Does anyone know if the court made a decision, or was it put in the 'too difficult' box?

Putting pets out of their misery is seen as one of the kindest things (and sometimes hardest) an owner has to do. If a human is fully aware of what they wish, then why can they not be assisted?

RIP Tony Nicklinson.

BBC News - Right-to-die man Tony Nicklinson dead (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-19341722)

Sign here

Petition | Tony Nicklinson's right to die: Change the law | Change.org (http://www.change.org/en-GB/petitions/tony-nicklinson-s-right-to-die-change-the-law)

Mr Nicklinson seems to have got his wish, albeit naturally. Sad and inconclusive end to a difficult argument.

RIP

One enjoys vegetables, but only in salads, sauces, etc.

Have had the experience of watching family members linger on for many years in a deteriorating, increasingly mindless state. Clearly self-aware, at times, but locked inside a worm of debility that was slowly, inexorably digesting them whole -- rather like the way certain spiders keep their larder fresh on the half-shell for weeks and more.

Curiously, the oldest relative one knew as a child nearly outlasted them all. She had been crippled by ?rheumatoid arthritis in her 20's, was able to walk only because her hubby was a doctor and surgeon and had access to the best that the WW1 era medical armamentarium had to offer. One leg became some four inches shorter than the other, loose skin shrank tight over knobby knuckles at near every joint, and she became almost completely transparent in skin pigment by her 70's - providing some wonderful insights into anatomy for a very young me, but surely not perfect for her. Even with that, she remained active, engaged, and inherently tough (at maybe 85 pounds fighting weight, just after dinner) up to the age of 96. And she kept her faculties, joie de vivre, etc. right on to the finish line. That one of her sons became a surgeon in a very prominent situation, with access to the newest and advance-of-newest medications, may have helped, but she spent very little time in any hospital... often she lived alone in a country place that was isolated and not at all automated... but close to roots, lifetime acquaintances, and friends. Tough lady by any measure.

She was lucky. Other relations have burned out in depressing ways, seldom really aided (in the existential sense) by health care, but eventually trapped within the net of it so as to no longer have any choices -- none at all.

http://www.gwc.maricopa.edu/class/bio201/hand/Hand_s.jpg


In regard to them I will suggest that it should be - is - quite straightforward, with contemporary knowledge and gadgets, to devise various sets of methods whereby people may be trained - somewhere in mid adulthood - in ways to give responses via brain-waves or muscle-movements to a series of codes and queries, such that an individual who is sentient but incapable of speech or movement may affirmatively consent to voluntary medical termination of themselves at any time and place as may be permitted under law.

The purpose of offering this set of thoughts right now to the global audience of JB is to deliberately put the top level Intellectual Property rights to this approach and class of methods in the public domain, as much as is possible, so that many variants and flavours of this methodology can be devised and made available to our successors in the mortal coil, should they have the need and no better alternative at shuffling-off time.