Loudmouth,

Are you saying I should not give an opinion? Pell does, the Pope does, Jensen does, Gillard does and they don’t represent their own members. Largely, I represent Atheists and AFA members on this topic.

Stoning women is wrong in any country. Its support base is prejudice. Prejudice is not the reason people are demanding LVE. This has happened because 80% of people are driven by a sense of empathy, justice and compassion. Your free electricity statistic is irrelevant.

Systems of legal voluntary euthanasia are carefully crafted to cover all contingencies. That is why they work so well without problems. This has all been done before. Stop trying to reinvent the wheel.

There are safeguards in place to allow the coroner to act efficaciously and correctly. Have you read about them?

People with “senility, Alzheimer's, etc” are automatically excluded from LVE and physician assisted suicide. Please do some reading and stop wasting my time on basics.

Still on about the slippery-slope and now with Soylent Green scenarios. That is paranoid nonsense.

“And I'm still baffled what on earth euthanasia has to do with atheism.”

Atheists are annoyed at religion being the main stumbling block to the introduction of a system of legal voluntary euthanasia. Please do some reading on the topic. It would be stranger if the AFA wasn’t involved.

Sorry, Joe, there wasn’t much in that to keep me going. All you are doing is making evidentially unsupported statements. Nothing could ever be resolved if we all did that.

I know everyone has her/his own ideas about everything in existence, but sometimes, when the matter is serious; it pays to do some study on it. Please humour me and do this small favour. You could start by doing a Google on SAVES. Thanks.

David

Somehow a community which is totally callous in the murder of the unborn tries to pretend that they are all about compassion when it comes to receive an inheritance. I realise that this is not the case for the majority but certainly will be for a number as discovered by those working at the coal face in Holland.

Have a read from those dealing with the issue

http://www.hospicepatients.org/euth-experts-speak.html

David I have been following the comments regarding VE,and definately agree with yourself on all of the comments you have made.
If a person wishes to enter a hospice at the end of their life when there is no chance of survival then they must go for it, but that is not what I want for my ending, I prefer a peaceful ending where I decide when I have had enough of pain and loss of dignity through my instructions beforehand, do these people want when they have had a massive stroke to be fed thru a tube in the stomach and with a large bag between their legs to collect all of their body wastes, this could go on for a very long time, let alone the paralysis,loss of speech and loss of mental capacity that a stroke also incurs, they also must remember they will be pulling another feeding tube out of their nose owing to aggravation in a semi unconscious state, this will eventually lead to their starvation, pneumonia and final death, when through VE this could have been a very peaceful ending much earlier. I say once again if that is what you want then I am very happy for you to go down this path and I most certainly hope that you enjoy it at your end of life, surely any one in their right mind whould not want this,(an actual relative of mine this week, luckily through the family they have requested that all life saving procedures be stopped by the medical staff, there is no hope of recovery] so VE should have been the order of the day much earlier, most religious people and others want me to suffer thei way, please let me die the way I want to die.
Ojnab

David,

"Are you saying I should not give an opinion? Pell does, the Pope does, Jensen does, Gillard does and they don’t represent their own members. Largely, I represent Atheists and AFA members on this topic."

No.

Suze,

"Loudmouth "And I'm still baffled what on earth euthanasia has to do with atheism."

"It is very well known that it is predominantly the religious element in our society who lead the push to keep euthanasia banned.
"Therefore, it follows that many atheists would be proponents of legal euthanasia wouldn't it?
"Not ALL religious people want euthanasia to remain illegal, and not ALL atheists want it legal of course."

........

Mmmmmm, nope, still baffled. But I enjoyed your last statement: spot-on, thanks.

You write about Choice, with which I have not the slightest qualm: of course, people should be able to choose. But move a little beyond that: many people may not 'choose'; in a non-perfect world, others may wish it on them: murder does happen occasionally in this wicked world. How does a coronial system tell the difference ?

How does one commit suicide in such a way that nobody else can be implicated, or incorrectly blamed ? If another person is present, even a loved one, how does one, if you like, keep them out of it ? Certainly, a note would be handy.

As for 'assisted suicide', presumably by doctors, provided there were strict protocols in place that would satisfy a coroner (in her/his role of guardian of last resort), evidence of informed consent would still have to be present.

Well, that should rule out Alzheimer's patients, I guess. So no, David, no Solent Green :)

Joe

Ojnab,

Most people agree with you about being forced to suffer at the end of life. It is a bit sad that the opposition to LVE try to simplify MDEL’s (medical decision at the end of life) down to the slippery slope imagined danger.

Decisions at the end of life by oneself, family and Doctors cover a whole range of various situations. It falls on these people the duty to carry out requests for no resuscitation, removing of feed tubes, turning of respirators and overdosing with pain drugs knowing death will occur.

It is the statistics on the non voluntary euthanasia deaths that religions play around with to make a case against legal voluntary euthanasia. It really is outrageous that people who promote themselves as the highest form of morality lie about such things. As one can notice on these forums such distortion by the clergy may be accepted without critical examination by some of the adherents and others.

Religious politicians are particularly susceptible.

Those fortunate enough to know a Doctor who will consider a request for illegal VE is another case in point. The rich and famous may have that luxury but it does not necessarily carry over to everyone.

Ojnab, you are correct. A small percentage of us will be confronted by horrors we never dreamed of at our time of death. We are all in the same lottery. In my opinion, it is beyond foolhardy to be now opposing a system shown to be safe in other countries that any of us could benefit from at that time.

But no, right now, the last and the most important decision of our life is not one we can make legally.

David

From the link given by runner above,

<Carlos Gomez, MD, Ph.D., wrote in his book, Regulating Death - Euthanasia and the case of the Netherlands, the following:

p. 138: "...I remain unconvinced that under current regulations the practice [of euthanasia] is not abused. those in the United States who point to the Netherlands as a public policy model for assistance with suicide have not, I would suggest, looked carefully enough. If the Netherlands - with its generous social services and universal health coverage - has problems controlling euthansasia, it takes little effort to imagine what would happen in the United States, with a medical system groaning under the strain of too many demands on too few resources.">

Australia ihas lost any tradition it may once have had of respecting and valuing the old as legitimate, contributing and worthwhile members of society. Just to take a few examples:

- the aged care system remains broken and there is no political will to build anew, which is necessary;

- government is already proposing that the elderly pay for their own aged care and by reverse mortgages where necessary (amazing how banks realised in advance that reverse mortgages could become 'popular'). This 'user pays' is in fact tax double-dipping by government;

- there is substantial, active discrimination against older people, who may only be middle aged. For decades they have been government's whipping boys for blow-outs in the budget. There is ageism in employment, particularly in federal and state public services where older people, predominately men, have borne the brunt of restructuring and affirmative action policies through losing their jobs. Although skilled and desperate for work to support their families and to prepare for retirement, such displaced 'old' people remain on the unemployment queue much longer than other job seekers and long enough for some skills to become dated; and

- the aged lack choice in their care options and government has demonstrated it prefers to side-step direct consultation with seniors, choosing to negotiate with a plethora of vested interests claiming to represent them instead.
cont.,