You can give people autonomy over the timing and manner of their death. Or you can reduce the suffering which attends some deaths, but you can’t really do both.
There's a principle among opponents of the death penalty, better 10 innocent go free than 1 innocent dies. (I think that might be from a court case, but it isn't actually derived from law?)
It doesn't seem to be logic in play by proponents of euthanasia. But I haven't looked into it too closely, maybe there's more reticence than portrayed in conservative media.
There's another irony, though, that this is a liberal issue even as liberal have been becoming less liberal in other directions (or one could say the left is becoming less liberal). Why would bodily autonomy really be presented as some fundamental right at the same time we see ie, England arresting people for social media posts?
I suppose a nuanced argument could be made to thread that needle, but it doesn't seem like it is.
I think the ideological orientation is coming from the other direction. They're so worried about people suffering unnecessarily that they're okay with one person who may not have been suffering being "put to sleep" accidentally in order that ten people not suffer. And besides that one person was quite possibly unhappy anyway...
Doctors have handled the intolerable suffering argument for decades with the "we'll give him enough morphine to make sure he doesn't hurt" euphemism.
The legalization crowd was always focused on personal autonomy, and that's not surprising, since our entire society (since Mill) deifies individual autonomy. The "prevent suffering" argument was always a red herring to drum up sympathy for what they really wanted: a universal right to die.
Maximal individual autonomy is a cultural and evolutionary dead end. A society whose only shared belief is "do as thou wilt" (even if your will is to kill yourself) can not remain cohesive.
There's a principle among opponents of the death penalty, better 10 innocent go free than 1 innocent dies. (I think that might be from a court case, but it isn't actually derived from law?)
It doesn't seem to be logic in play by proponents of euthanasia. But I haven't looked into it too closely, maybe there's more reticence than portrayed in conservative media.
There's another irony, though, that this is a liberal issue even as liberal have been becoming less liberal in other directions (or one could say the left is becoming less liberal). Why would bodily autonomy really be presented as some fundamental right at the same time we see ie, England arresting people for social media posts?
I suppose a nuanced argument could be made to thread that needle, but it doesn't seem like it is.
I think the ideological orientation is coming from the other direction. They're so worried about people suffering unnecessarily that they're okay with one person who may not have been suffering being "put to sleep" accidentally in order that ten people not suffer. And besides that one person was quite possibly unhappy anyway...
Thats a reasonable and charitable take.
Doctors have handled the intolerable suffering argument for decades with the "we'll give him enough morphine to make sure he doesn't hurt" euphemism.
The legalization crowd was always focused on personal autonomy, and that's not surprising, since our entire society (since Mill) deifies individual autonomy. The "prevent suffering" argument was always a red herring to drum up sympathy for what they really wanted: a universal right to die.
Maximal individual autonomy is a cultural and evolutionary dead end. A society whose only shared belief is "do as thou wilt" (even if your will is to kill yourself) can not remain cohesive.
It does seem to be trending in that direction.