Dilbert's Scott Adams writes an entirely serious (and angrily raw) post about an important topic, doctor-assisted suicide. Excerpts:
I hope my father dies soon.
And while I'm at it, I might want you to die a painful death too.
I'm entirely serious on both counts.
My father, age 86, is on the final approach to the long dirt nap (to use his own phrase). His mind is 98% gone, and all he has left is hours or possibly months of hideous unpleasantness in a hospital bed. I'll spare you the details, but it's as close to a living Hell as you can get.
If my dad were a cat, we would have put him to sleep long ago. And not once would we have looked back and thought too soon.
. . .
I'm okay with any citizen who opposes doctor-assisted suicide on moral or practical grounds. But if you have acted on that thought, such as basing a vote on it, I would like you to die a slow, horrible death too. You and the government are accomplices in the torturing of my father, and there's a good chance you'll someday be accomplices in torturing me to death too.
. . .
[Update: My father passed a few hours after I wrote this.]
I hope my father dies soon.
And while I'm at it, I might want you to die a painful death too.
I'm entirely serious on both counts.
My father, age 86, is on the final approach to the long dirt nap (to use his own phrase). His mind is 98% gone, and all he has left is hours or possibly months of hideous unpleasantness in a hospital bed. I'll spare you the details, but it's as close to a living Hell as you can get.
If my dad were a cat, we would have put him to sleep long ago. And not once would we have looked back and thought too soon.
. . .
I'm okay with any citizen who opposes doctor-assisted suicide on moral or practical grounds. But if you have acted on that thought, such as basing a vote on it, I would like you to die a slow, horrible death too. You and the government are accomplices in the torturing of my father, and there's a good chance you'll someday be accomplices in torturing me to death too.
. . .
[Update: My father passed a few hours after I wrote this.]
4 comments:
Anyone who has had a loved one die badly knows exactly what he is talking about, and agrees with him 100%. It is a dishonor to the loved one and a lifelong horrifying memory for those left behind.
nonlocal
I've watched a generation of my wife's family die. For many of them, their death was the first time they were in hospital - and it was a nightmare for them, and the family.
There were many reasons, but, we have to come to grips with the reality of death, and allow ourselves to die with dignity and grace, vs. making our bodies a battleground for someone else to fight their Pyrrhic battles against the inevitable.
Completely agree. Many people get their idea of end-stage disease from soap operas. Living it or seeling a loved one live it is a horryfying experience (of which severe physical pain is not even the worst part, by far). I will never forget my mother's last three weeks. It's been three years now and that memory is still overshadowing all of my other memories of my mother making me cringe every time I think of her.
My father said to me in the 95th, and final, year of his life: "I didn't know it would be this hard to die." I have a feeling, with no data to back it up, that us baby-boomers won't be going down that road and that assisted suicide will become widely available within 15 years.
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