Legislation and protocols need to be implemented in Australia sooner rather than later. What happens now is pretty haphazard and actually not in consultation with the patient. If people only knew what is happening as we 'debate' on this on any given day in an Australian hospital near you.

People who do not want to avail themselves of this do not need to, but bear in mind that you had better have very clear Health Care Directives with you. Who knows, maybe the doc who is attending you decides you've suffered enough and drastically ups the meds without realizing you want to suffer to the bitter end, no matter how long it takes. That is the offensive part. Who, but you are to determine whether you have suffered enough? Why does anybody think they have a right to determine anything about my end-of-life decisions or my suffering?

What needs to be understood is that this is about people who want to end their unbearable suffering they are not depressed jilted lovers, going through a bad patch for which a dose of Zoloft might help. This is NOT about depression. This is NOT about old people. Old people have a tendency to die of old age and only require medical staff AND family members to interfere as little as possible with unnecessary life prolonging actions. Like insisting that granny eats when she doesn't want to. Families guilt tripping their elderly dying relatives by making them do stuff they don't want to do. Have blood test, when they don't want to. Just so they'll get better!

And by the way. Stats in other countries show, that only a tiny portion of people who have decided they would like to be able to be assisted in dying actually end up dying this way. By being in control, suffering becomes more bearable and what's left is done living,not obsessing and fear about the end.

Ojnab, thanks heavens there are a few on this thread that can think for themselves and have a conscience, and who realize the amount of suffering that the religiously deranged, black-and-white thinkers, and the cruel people who don't care about the suffering of the dying, cause.

I detest them, one and all! We put people in jail for causing suffering to dumb animals but suffering humans just don't seem to matter.

I feel that most of the critics of euthanasia are scared out of their minds by death, fear that they will miss out on the Big Lotto in the Sky, greatly fear their relatives and friends, and they try to avoid the realities of death because they are immature cowards!

Such people also contribute to a planet filled by war.

A pox on them I say!

Dear Joe,

<<Perhaps what may seem to be a 'moral act' to one person... may seem to be a criminal act to the justice system. How would you distinguish one from the other?>>

There's no need to distinguish:

A moral act could happen to be illegal, just as a legal act could happen to be immoral. While I can talk forever about morality and immorality with my friends who are willing to listen, the state and its laws have nothing to do with morality (in fact, the state itself is an immoral body).

The law considers something a crime only because some legislator decided that it is. That doesn't imply that the legislator had any moral or legitimate right to impose that law on others.

<<And how are you going to prove otherwise?>>

Whenever a person agrees to be killed, then it's not murder to kill them and should not be illegal (it's still likely to be immoral). I may or may not be able to prove consent (for example by presenting a video or a letter-of-consent signed in front of a JP). If I cannot, then I could possibly be wrongly charged of murder: people can make mistakes, so that's a risk I may need to consider.

Look, the only legitimate function of the state is to protect those citizens who wish to be protected by it. If it cannot fulfil this function without occasionally erring and protecting someone who doesn't want to be protected, and if the error is honest, then they may be excused.

Suppose two men agree on a duel, whereby the winner will kill and inherit the other. Suppose also that they signed a release-form in advance and provided reliable witnesses. That would be highly immoral and foolish, but it's not a murder and it shouldn't be illegal (assuming the agreed terms of the duel were met and no cheating occurred).

Yes, it is manslaughter, but as the now-dead person refused to authorise the state to protect him/her from it, the state has no authority to act in this matter on his behalf.

To Paul Russell, Kevin Andrews, Tony Abbott et al:

Q: Why are gulags better than hospices?

A: You don't have to die naturally in gulags.

We don't need morphine. We just need Zyklon ZZZ.

Crap, Yuyutsu: if you killed someone in a duel, you would be up for murder.

The state has an OBLIGATION to protect people, even from themselves.

Joe

Dear Joe,

The only legitimate source of power of a state, is the sum of legitimate powers bestowed on it by willing individuals.

Any actions of the state which do not fall under this category, are immoral violence.

Any legitimate state must be born of an agreement by a group of individuals to combine their powers in mutual self-defence. As such indeed, the state has an obligation to protect people, even from themselves IF THAT'S WHAT THE AGREEMENT STATES - but only those people who are party to that agreement, freely entered.

When a person is unwilling to authorise the state to use their legitimate right of self-defence as his/her agent/proxy, nothing else allows the state to do so.

Yes, if I were to kill someone in an agreed duel, where we both were fool enough to have agreed in advance that the other may kill us if they can and not be punished, then as things stand in 21st century Australia, I would be charged with murder - but that's the same in principle as saying that if I walk in some downtown slum neighbourhood after dark, then I can expect to be raped.