Forced Exit: The Slippery Slope from Assisted Suicide to Legalized Murder

ESR ^ | June 30, 2003 | Linda A. Prussen-Razzano

[Anthem]

The most important book you will read this year

When I received the preview of Welsey Smith's revised version of Forced Exit: The Slippery Slope from Assisted Suicide to Legalized Murder, to be released this month by Spence Publishing, I was not overly enthusiastic about reading it. Forced Exit deals with the controversial issue of euthanasia, otherwise described as "mercy killing." Typically, I can breeze through over 100 pages an hour with complete retention.

This work was so compelling, so chillingly thorough, and so horrifyingly complete in its review of the issue, it took me several hours to read and absorb it. Where before I had viewed the subject with a rather detached mindset, I am now prepared to make several necessary changes to my legal documents to ensure my future survival.

continues...

[Blood of Tyrants]

Our slow slide down a slippery slope could quickly become a freefall off the edge of sanity.

[Anthem]

Whad'ya mean "become"?!

[Cicero]

About the only defense people have even now is to know your doctor, know your hospital, and never go into a hospital without someone you trust to keep an eye out for you. And think many times about signing any kind of organ donor agreement, or you'll find that your doctors may be working on behalf of some other patient, not you.

If socialism continues to encroach on us, it's inevitable. First the leftists will insist that everyone needs tax-paid medical care. Then they will discover that the system is overburdened and breaking down. then they will work out sneaky ways of killing somebody else. Liberals just love the idea of helping people by making someone else pay for it: with their tax dollars, their jobs, or their lives.

[Anthem]

Is the law that says that not even your relatives can have more than a cryptic description of your condition local here in WA or did Congress pass it?

[mlmr]

The health information protection act and other confidentialiy measurs have made it so that there is no infomation leaving the great healthcare beuracracy and little oversight,

[Cicero]

We have recently been seeing a proliferation of patient privacy rules here in Vermont. I was in the hospital for minor surgery last week and if you want your family or friends to even know you are in the hospital you now have to sign a permission slip permitting the hospital to tell them. If you don't sign the permission you are basically incommunicado.

God knows how that would work out if you were non compos mentis when you went in, or if you neglected to tell your family beforehand and something bad happened while you were there.

[Anthem]

So it was federal...? I think I am beginning to tune out to protect my sanity.

[hunter112]

I am now prepared to make several necessary changes to my legal documents to ensure my future survival.

For those who want to spend their last days as a vegetable on a machine, delaying the inevitable meeting with the "Maker" they so fervently believe in when they had working minds, so be it.

The only thing I can say for sure is this: If we don't deal with a responsible provision for relieving people of their pain and misery, and letting their families get on with living their lives, in the legislative arena, where conflicting values can be sorted out, then we will surely have court-imposed rules to deal with.

[txzman]

The numbers in Holland are absolutely astounding now - including the fact that a good percentage of those killed were not in a state to agree - in other words were handled by family members. Pardon me, but isn't that what the Western world used to refer to as murder?

Have to dig up the stats I just read.

[mlmr]

The privacy rules, to of course, protect client confidentiality, are another step to separate us from our families.

[Anthem]

It's not just in Holland. I know of a tough old guy who lost his life very soon after his assets were pledged to the state (US) where he lived. Why he was placed in a state nursing home, I don't know. But they didn't waste any time getting their hands on his (considerable) assets.

[Anthem]

If we don't deal with a responsible provision for relieving people of their pain and misery, and letting their families get on with living their lives, in the legislative arena, where conflicting values can be sorted out, then we will surely have court-imposed rules to deal with.

Why the legislature? Why not let the families and the free market (including "mercy" hospitals) deal with it?

[Anthem]

God knows how that would work out if you were non compos mentis when you went in,

God isn't the only one who knows, but your family won't.

[hunter112]

Why the legislature?

Three ways for law (which I broadly define as the relationship of a government and the people who live under it) to come into being: 1) Executive fiat, pretty limited in our society, especially being temporary in nature. Don't like the governor's or president's decision--just elect a new one next term. 2) Judicial fiat, much broader application, plus they have this concept of "stare decisis" which is Latin for "standing behind things already decided" and when translated out to common street language comes out as "you're stuck with this crap forever, sucker." 3) Legislative action, which has to be broad enough to garner support from people in both parties, and must be signable by an executive who might be from a different party. Legislated law is by no means perfect, but at least all sides get a hearing, and there is more room for compromise that defines a republic.

Why not let the families and the free market (including "mercy" hospitals) deal with it?

I appreciate the fact that some people are getting compassion while some are not, I'd like to see legislated guidelines that clearly define under what circumstances mercy can be given without making criminals of the medical personnel who deliver it. If we work these questions out in the open light of the legislative process, we might just pre-empt the courts from deciding that it is their right to move society along the "correct" path. If we fail, then they see it as an invitation to step in.

I sometimes wonder if Roe v. Wade would have been the law of the land if most states had restrictive laws that provided for some abortions, and only under the direst of circumstances. Now, we're stuck with a free-for-all.