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Euthanasia and Physician-Assisted Suicide

Essay by   •  October 8, 2010  •  Research Paper  •  2,832 Words (12 Pages)  •  2,335 Views

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Euthanasia and Physician-Assisted Suicide

Individual cases presented to justify legalizing physician assisted suicide fail to deal with underlying medical failures to control pain, creating an illusion of control over death, and not acknowledging the thousands of patients murdered inappropriately. This is an interesting and a very controversial issue in today's society. Euthanasia has negative sides, it can hurt society, and everyone needs to learn more bout it.

The word Euthanasia is Greek in origin. It arrived from the prefix "eu", meaning fear, easy, and fortunate and from the word "thanatos" meaning death. The main idea of Euthanasia is that someone has a conscientious death or a fortunate one. In other words, we attempt to ease one's pain by murdering another human being to give him/her a so-called "easy death" which is illegal and morally wrong. The key element of one human being taking the life of another human being is not present. It is exactly this element that causes euthanasia to be morally wrong (Gay-Williams,288)

There are different cases that might be hard to distinguish whether it is, or isn't Euthanasia. There are murders in "just", war, when trying to protect oneself, and in federal executions. It can be said that one of those is amiss; it would be arduous to prove that they are always amiss. When someone looks at those examples above and euthanasia, he/she can tell their inequality. The person who is murdered above is considered by the murderer as an adversary, an assaulter, or criminally culpable. But the individual in Euthanasia is neither of the three we mentioned (Gay-Williams, 288). As I defined earlier, euthanasia is taking someone's life, either his/her own or of another person to add to that, the human being whose life is confiscated must be a person that is assumed to be experiencing a disease or injury from which regaining life cannot reasonably be anticipated. Ultimately, the attempt must be deliberate and intentional. Thus, euthanasia is purposely confiscating the life of a believed hopeless person, whether it is the person's own or of a relative or friend, it is still euthanasia. It is critical to be apparent about the deliberate and intentional appearance of the death. If a desperate person is injected with the incorrect drug unintentionally, and this prompts his decease, this is wrongful murdering but not euthanasia. Euthanasia cannot be the result of an accident. Further, if an individual is injected with medicine that is intended to be vital to curing his disease or make him well again, and the individual dies in the end, then this is also not euthanasia or wrongful killing. Relating to, when a patient's situation is such that it is irrational to pray that any medical procedures or treatments will preserve his life, failing to administer the procedures or treatments is not euthanasia. If the individual parishes, this will be to the effect of his injuries or disease and not because of his dereliction to acquire treatment (Gay-Williams, 290). The choice not to continue medical treatment after the realization that the patient has a slim to none chance of profiting from it has been characterized by some as "passive euthanasia". This phrase is deceiving and incorrect. In most cases, the individual entangled is not murdered, nor is the decease of the individual intended by the forbearing of increased treatment. The main concern is to spare the individual any increased and unexonerable pain, to protect him from the in distinctions of incurable manipulations, and to elude the additional financial and impeluous problems of the family (Gay-Williams, 291).

Every individual has a genuine desire to recommence his/her life. Our reflex and acknowledgement fit us to defend our self from attacker, run from dangerous animals, and jump out of the way of oncoming traffic. "Our bodies are similarly structured for survival right down to the molecular level." When we have a wound, our capillaries close, our blood clots and fibrogen is made to begin the process of curing the wound (Gay-Williams, 291). Dr. Rod McLeod indicates "the same hopefulness for everybody" containing people with ceaseless motor neuron disease and multiple sclerosis. "My philosophy is each individual has a value," states McLeod. Even in certain cases when someone has a perception of hopelessness. McLeod believes he/she is not doing his/her (doctors) occupation legitimately as humane persons if they relinquish the deathly sick. A community that can think of implying euthanasia suggests an individual's life is not important enough for living, it's pointless. Some of the nature of humanity is to hold dear, everybody we come across. McLeod states, "I suppose party of my belief system is that human beings have an intrinsic value, it's not my job to eradicate" (Dekker,3). "Man as trustee of his body acts against God, its rightful possessor, when he takes his own life." He then debauches the testament to "hold life sacred and never to take it without just and compelling cause." There are also a few versus of the Bible that hold true to this argument. Revelation 9:1-10, an angel is described as opening the bottomless pit to release clouds of locusts. These insects had a body like a horse, hair like a woman's, a face of a man, and teeth like a lion. They were instructed to attack those people who "did not have the seal of God on their foreheads." The locusts were to torment people for five months but not to kill them. They had stingers in their tails like those of scorpions. Verse six says: "In those days men will seek death and will not find it; they will desire to die, and death will flee from them," i.e. they will attempt to commit suicide to end the torment, but for some reason, will be unable to achieve it. One Corinthians 3:17: "If anyone defiles the temple of God, God will destroy him. For the temple of God is holy, which temple you are," This is an interesting passage because it has been interpreted in very different ways by Bible commentators and translators. Some Bible translations, like the King James Version, and New King James, render the second word in this passages as "defile." Rheims New Testament uses "violate." This would seem to refer to an individual engaging in various damaging acts such as illegal drug usage, committing adultery, incest, smoking, etc. One commentary suggests that Paul might have been "thinking ahead to those Corinthian Christians who desecrate god's temple by the sexual immoralities which he severely censures" Chapters 5 8: 6. Another commentary notes that the two words "defiles" and "destroy" in the above passage are actually the same word in the

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