[throwaway324324]

Your stepfather apparently violated your mother's directive based on the desperate belief that his spouse could recover, and she did not. This is absolutely tragic.

Then your stepfather presumably refused kill his spouse (due to hope, moral beliefs, cowardice, etc.) by unplugging her from standard, non-extraordinary life-support. She eventually died a painless death.

For which of these does he deserve to suffer for, more than he has already?

A DNR is not an order to cease basic life-support post-resuscitation. For example, I don't want extraordinary measures, but I also absolutely do not want anyone to euthanize me if I somehow end up semi-vegetative.

[exolymph]

> I also absolutely do not want anyone to euthanize me if I somehow end up semi-vegetative.

Just out of curiosity, why not?

[throwaway324324]

Because I would be participating in killing a living human. It's our duty to avoid intentionally doing that, even if it really hurts.

Technically it's the same reason that I don't want someone to euthanize me right now. The value of my life does not derive from feeling happy or otherwise using my senses. Nothing important changes when I have brain damage (or cancer, or depression). All I have to do is be human, and my life has a certain type of value that makes it wrong for anyone to intentionally end it.

If I try to build in loopholes, or start messing with semantics, or if I compromise because something is going to hurt, I end up being unable to act from reasoned moral principles, which is something else I value.

(I have a similar curiosity, if you'd oblige, about what makes euthanasia any different from simple suicide - I actually asked that earlier, but all I got was downvotes.)

[hadagribble]

Thanks for that explanation. I can't speak for the OP (or anyone else), but my take on the difference between them is that euthanasia is suicide, but only once all other options have been exhausted.

I don't see "simple suicide" (i.e. not in the face of terminal disease) as immoral or wrong. The tragedy though, is how often it happens because of poor social support systems, such as lack of access to mental health support systems or, in some parts of the world, bad debts to loan sharks.

These are often relatively spur of the moment, avoidable situations and, IMO, more of an indictment of society than a moral failing of the person. Euthanasia is different in that it is usually a well-considered decision, once there is little hope of any change for the better. I don't see any value in forcing people to live through misery without anyone having a clue on how to improve their life.

(I don't expect you to necessarily agree with this point of view, but I hope it helps understand another perspective.)

[throwaway324324]

Thanks - yeah, I agree, we need better palliative care, better social support in general. I understand your perspective, but I do have trouble following it through - I need to be able to say "at this point, a life loses that value, and it becomes permissible to kill". I don't see that happening with consent, because dueling to the death is rightly illegal. I also don't see how we can get somewhere by counting up something (like suffering, failure to contribute back to society, whatever) that then makes it permissible to kill a person. And if I try to combine both, I end up with rules that are still problematic, but make it easier to kill the elderly, the dying, and other vulnerable people, which is a bad sign.

[hadagribble]

For what its worth, I think we're approaching this question from opposite ends of the spectrum. Rather than asking when it is permissible to kill, I look at it as "when is overriding free will (on victimless actions) for societal good permissible"? Forcing terminally ill patients to live through the misery doesn't meet my bar on that front.

I realise that you're drawing a distinction between taking your life and having someone else take it for you, but to me, in this case the difference is largely academic since the agency remains with the patient at all times.

The objections to dueling were, as I understand, more around the social pressures which required one to participate making the idea of consent much more fuzzy.

[throwaway324324]

Interestingly, family pressure to euthanize is a major practical concern for countries with euthanasia.

The point is actually that there is no distinction between taking your life own or someone else's. If consent is our metric, dueling is permissible (with societal pressure safeguards, if you'd like). Consent is irrelevant, the issue is that intentional killing should be a relic of a more barbaric past. The cure (resolving psychological distress over having a painful death by being willingly poisoned, often in front of your family) is worse than the disease.

Ultimately, you're saying that it's permissible to kill when a terminally ill patient would "live through misery", where someone who is not the patient defines what constitutes "misery". Am I understanding that correctly? On what grounds would that not apply to, for example, a severely depressed homeless person suffering from substance abuse, who a doctor might judge has much more suffering in store for them than a cancer patient with access to painkillers?

[SpikeDad]

>Because I would be participating in killing a living human. It's our duty to avoid intentionally doing that, even if it really hurts.

Says who? You? When did you get elected my keeper? Stay alive all you want but keep your morality to yourself.

[throwaway324324]

My answer actually didn't mention anything about watching over you to ensure that you don't inject lethal poison. I was talking about why I personally would not kill myself or ask anyone else to.

But yes, if I think it's wrong to intentionally kill a human, it follows that I neither want my government supporting it, nor for others to mistakenly think it's fine. Morality isn't something to "keep to yourself".

Presumably you think it's fine to intentionally kill, in certain special cases? Could you do the opposite of keeping your morality to yourself, and tell me what your exceptions are? (I'm wondering, for example, if it is just consent? If so, can someone buy that consent?)

[mbrutsch]

Choking to death on your own vomit is what you consider a painless death? I hope you have a painless death.

> A DNR is not an order to cease basic life-support post-resuscitation.

And no one said it was; no one even hinted at it.

> For which of these does he deserve to suffer for, more than he has already?

The first, the violation of her express written wishes that led to her "painless death".

Sadly, he's dead, which means his suffering has ended. The rest of us get to continue remembering until we too pass.

[throwaway324324]

Suffocating while "semi-vegetative" is assumed to be painless, much like we assume euthanasia to be painless.

In any case, I'm sorry about your mother. There's not much I can say about your stepfather, except that you probably shouldn't hate him for trying to hold on to someone he loved.