Groningen Protocol

Is death better?

Published on December 1, 2004 By Kemimas In Current Events

There has been some hubbub of late about the Dutch fascination with euthanasia. One thing that perennially pisses me off about this topic is as follows:

To those that would "relieve the suffering" of the terminally ill or the severly handicapped... Do you know what it's like to be dead? You've never tried it for yourself? Then HOW THE HELL do you presume to know that death is better for these poor souls? What if being dead is infinitely worse than the worst suffering whilst alive? And I don't care if you don't believe there's anything, ie consciousness, after death, 'cause you don't know for sure. You're taking a gamble, but others are bearing the risk. How compassionate of you.

I promise I'll get off the death topic with my next post...

Comments

philomedy

on Dec 01, 2004

How do you presume to know that life is better?

Draginol

on Dec 02, 2004

I don't know whether death is better than life. But I do know that the decision shouldn't be left up to a doctor. It should be up to the person or at worst the parent.

It does speak a lot about the culture in the Netherlands. It's a society that apparently is comfortable with having decisions made for them by their "betters". I can't even imagine what would happen to the policitican that would suggest that some doctor could make a decision like that instead of the individual or the parent.

philomedy

on Dec 02, 2004

I don't know whether death is better than life. But I do know that the decision shouldn't be left up to a doctor. It should be up to the person or at worst the parent.It does speak a lot about the culture in the Netherlands. It's a society that apparently is comfortable with having decisions made for them by their "betters". I can't even imagine what would happen to the policitican that would suggest that some doctor could make a decision like that instead of the individual or the parent.

Had you read the article that I did, you would have seen that the decision is left up to the parents. Get the facts straight before coming down on an entire society like that.

greywar

on Dec 03, 2004

Indeed as Philo pithily pointed out this article does in fact state right in the body of the text that it is a parents decision.

Speaking purely for myself I would certainly hope that were I unable to express my wishes and was locked in unbearable agony that someone would do me the kindness of ending my life.

Welcome Guest! Please take the time to register with us.
There are many great features available to you once you register, including:

Richer content, access to many features that are disabled for guests like commenting on the forums.
Access to a great community, with a massive database of many, many areas of interest.
Access to contests & subscription offers like exclusive emails.
It's simple, and FREE!