[Heineken]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('crow', 'A')nd where is the error in teaching to fight rather than give up? Have you ever looked at the reasoning and principals that lead Judeo-Christians to the conclusion that life is worth fighting for?

Please give an example of how suicide can be brave?

If I figth my illness to the end, based on a conscious choice, and my kin who suffers the same illness commits suicide; who is truly braver?


That 'going to hell' over suicide is a childish notion at best and one that is seldomly taught these days. Catholic cemetaries for example, will allow a suicide victim to be burried in 'communion with their church'.

[Heineken]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('crow', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('threadbear', '
')
[snip]

Respecting the dignity of the individual, beats turning the beauty and meaning of life into a twisted form of fetish worship.

[crow]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Heineken', '
')
[snip]

You seem to be replying to my posts without reading them, since I already gave you an example of how suicide can IMO be brave---and, vastly more important, rational. If you don't agree with it, so be it.

[snip]

[crow]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Heineken', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('crow', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('threadbear', '
')
[snip]

Respecting the dignity of the individual, beats turning the beauty and meaning of life into a twisted form of fetish worship.

[Heineken]

I worked in a hospital for years. A slightly different perspective than hearing a dad's stories.

Read "How We Die," by Sherman Nuland, a famous surgeon. Although he's hardly a big proponent of suicide, his whole thesis is that very few of us ever die with "dignity." No, instead you're usually out of your mind and crapping in your pants and as dependent as a newborn. Maybe that's for you, but it's not for me. I choose to go as the ancient Greeks, a far better breed than we, went.

It is and should be a personal decision. What I decry is society's hypocrisy on the matter. A lot of people don't even have health insurance and therefore may not be able to afford the pain-easing drugs docs give to the dying; this problem will intensify as this nation becomes increasingly bankrupt. What are those people supposed to do? Spend five months screaming from the pain of terminal bone cancer?

[AmericanEmpire]

The problem of offing myself is that I'm actually afraid of what comes after death, even more than I am afraid of facing civilization collapse or terminal illness.

I have no idea if there is an afterlife or not. I don't absolutely belive that a God created everything in the universe but I don't discount it either. The unknown scares me. Same as the unknown of what will happen to me post oil scares me.

I was raised by Southern Baptist parents. You know the old if you commit suicide you are going to hell thing. If that hell is true it would be worse than facing hell on Earth.

However if its not true. Then lots of people go through unnecessary pain and suffering in this life because they won't off themselves to get the pain over with because of religious beliefs.

[Heineken]

Hell is a place that was created by the Catholic Church in its early history to frighten people into donating more money to the Church, AE. The idea was a clever one. But that's all the classical Hell is---a human creation like all the rest of the religious mumbo-jumbo.

Do you really believe in a God who would send to eternal fire and torture a kind old woman who killed herself to escape her last weeks of agony from liver cancer? As far as I'm concerned, such a "God" belongs in hell himself.

[crapattack]

Crow said:
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')Suicide removes a person dignity far more than any cancer ever will.

[Heineken]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('crapattack', '.') My God is a forgiving god.

[smallpoxgirl]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Heineken', 'T')hanks, crapattack. Suicide can certainly be a brave act when it is done to spare loved ones from financial ruin and years of terrible emotional attrition, as in the case of Alzheimer's or AIDS.

[AmericanEmpire]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'D')oes it remove more than being raped 12 times and then hacked to death one joint at a time? More than watching your child get gutted then having your balls cut off an shoved in your eye sockets and your dick stuck in your mouth while you're strung up from the nearest tree? Because that it what people in Rwanda faced, and others have faced.

[crapattack]

Heineken wrote:
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'A')nd an understanding one. Amen. The Fundie God, on the other hand, is a God tailored to advance the hard-beaked political beliefs of the Fundies.

[crow]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Heineken', 'H')ell is a place that was created by the Catholic Church in its early history to frighten people into donating more money to the Church, AE. The idea was a clever one. But that's all the classical Hell is---a human creation like all the rest of the religious mumbo-jumbo.

Do you really believe in a God who would send to eternal fire and torture a kind old woman who killed herself to escape her last weeks of agony from liver cancer? As far as I'm concerned, such a "God" belongs in hell himself.

[crow]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('crapattack', 'C')row said:
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')Suicide removes a person dignity far more than any cancer ever will.

[crapattack]

crow:
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I')f I choose to commit a crime, then I hurt my dignity, but I might be more prideful since I might be able to buy a bigger car (if my crime was theft for example).

[crapattack]

AE,
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'U')gggh. I think I'm gonna be sick.

[Heineken]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('smallpoxgirl', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Heineken', 'T')hanks, crapattack. Suicide can certainly be a brave act when it is done to spare loved ones from financial ruin and years of terrible emotional attrition, as in the case of Alzheimer's or AIDS.

[Graeme]

I suppose assisted suicide in the presence of witnesses for those in acute pain near the end of life is permissible. Those who object to euthanasia might consider assisted suicide murder if performed with only two present. Does anyone have comments about this?

[Heineken]

An estimated 40 million to 60 million Americans lack health insurance. Most Americans' health insurance is dependent on having an employer who provides such coverage; even for those workers, insurance premiums are rising much faster than inflation, and some are opting out of company insurance plans because they can't afford the premiums. Sooner or later the US will experience an economic recession that will throw millions out of work and dramatically swell the ranks of the uninsured. The resources of hospitals that attempt to provide charity care are already stretched to the limit, and waits for such care are getting longer and longer.

It is likely that, during the next major recession, uninsured terminally sick patients will simply not be able to obtain any medical care or relief for their severe pain. What then will be society's obligation toward dying people in terrible pain who want to end that pain? If society cannot care for them, will it not then be obligated to help them die painlessly and humanely, such as by distributing barbiturates to those patients who request them and who meet certain strict criteria?

In such a scenario, does not the anti-suicide position become as bankrupt as the health care system itself?

[gego]

It has always struck me as absurd that government would attempt to prevent one from disposing of his own life as he sees fit. First of all, it is just about impossible to prevent a determined person. Secondly, it is immoral to attempt to deny a person the rights of self ownership (freedom) and to force them to suffer an agonizing life. I think it is just more of the bleed over of religious dogma into law anyway. I think the biggest hypocracy is that politicians attempt to look pious by creating laws against things like suicide, while at the same time carrying out muderous atrocities like Viet Nam and Iraq.