A Protocol for Dying
It seems against protocol to argue with a dying man, but refraining also seems disrespectful to Pieter. I always open the comment section hoping that someone will disagree with the article in a thoughtful way; perhaps it&#x27;s my turn, since I disagree so intensely. Presumably others would like to at least hear the counterpoints.<p>Euthanasia is bad from a practical standpoint, and an evil, because:<p>1. Objectively speaking, euthanasia is suicide, and the killing of an innocent person. If Schwartz killing himself (out of despair for his future, fear of suffering in prison, or otherwise) was a tragedy, why is Pieter&#x27;s upcoming suicide not a tragedy? Is it because his certain death is closer? (This view promotes the idea that a &quot;disabled&quot; life, where one is &quot;unhappy&quot;, or must be cared for at great expense, or is suffering, or (extrapolating) is cryogenically frozen, is not valuable in and of itself; but it is.)<p>2. Suicide increases the risk that friends and family will commit suicide. A search will yield numerous studies: &quot;2.1-fold increased risk of committing suicide&quot;[1], etc. If you kill yourself, you are indirectly killing the people closest to you.<p>3. If you are against the death penalty because we might execute an innocent person, you should be against Euthanasia because we might kill a non-consenting person. This is already the case:<p>&gt; &quot;these laws and safeguards are regularly ignored and transgressed in all the jurisdictions ... about 900 people annually are administered lethal substances without having given explicit consent, and in one jurisdiction, almost 50% of cases of euthanasia are not reported ... some jurisdictions now extend the practice to newborns, children, and people with dementia. A terminal illness is no longer a prerequisite.&quot; [2]<p>Please, when you hear someone speak in flowery language about the dignity of choosing death, take a moment to evaluate what they are actually suggesting, and to research why people are opposed. Many seem to think that the only people against euthanasia are the religious whose reasoning is roughly &quot;well, my religion randomly chose to mark this as evil, therefore it is&quot;, which is just not the case.<p>[1] <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.psychiatrictimes.com&#x2F;articles&#x2F;relationship-suicide-risk-family-history-suicide-and-psychiatric-disorders" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.psychiatrictimes.com&#x2F;articles&#x2F;relationship-suicid...</a><p>[2] <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov&#x2F;pmc&#x2F;articles&#x2F;PMC3070710&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov&#x2F;pmc&#x2F;articles&#x2F;PMC3070710&#x2F;</a><p>(...finally, this is likely a very poor protocol for dealing with death - people deal in different ways, and not all people will look back fondly on having to smile all the time, or on expressing &quot;false&quot; hope and being told that, actually, objectively speaking, they should not have hope. Also, a totally minor point, but we are not like Lego houses - we do not need to be utterly destroyed for others to live.)