Assisted Suicide

Assisted suicide is not a topic that your average person is even aware of let alone passionate about. The reason I decided to do my project on this subject is because of a movie. As I explained in the discussion question, I recently watched You don't know jack, a movie about Dr. Kevorkian or as he later became known "Dr. Death". As I watched the movie I found myself going from not even caring about the subject to kind of getting outraged at the treatment of Dr. Kevorkian, who in my estimation (at least as he was portrayed in the movie), was just trying to help people who were in the most desperate of circumstances. As such, when this project came up, I thought what a great opportunity to research my newfound opinion on this controversial topic.

Assisted suicide as defined by Wikipedia is, "the common term for actions by which an individual helps another person voluntarily bring about his or her own death. "Assistance" may mean providing one with the means (drugs or equipment) to end one's own life, but may extend to other actions." For example, Dr. Kevorkian actually invented a machine that he would use to help his patients commit suicide. Assisted suicide is usually the last option of the terminally ill and people with degenerative diseases, who don't want to end their life in suffering and would rather have the dignity of choosing their own death. Currently, 43 states still consider assisted suicide a criminal act. 5 states have no clear laws and only Oregon and Washington have laws permitting assisted suicide ("Assisted suicide laws,"). It is my belief that assisted suicide should be legalized so that people don't have to suffer needlessly.

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There are many objections to legalizing assisted suicide but most of them are pretty flimsy at best. The following according to Procon.org are some of the more popular objections.

1. "It's against the Hippocratic oath". The first promise in the Hippocratic Oath is the prohibition against killing patients, how can doctors break their oath?

2. "It's a slippery slope to legalized murder". If terminating life can be perceived as a benefit why limit it to only those who can give consent?

3. "Certain social groups will be put at risk". If assisted suicide is legalized, the poor, minorities, and those who are least educated and least empowered will be at risk because of prejudice against them.

4. It's against most religions to commit suicide, particularly Christianity.

These objections can be easily answered as shown on Procon.org.

1. In regards to the Hippocratic Oath, it has been changed numerous times already. It used to contain passages that said women shouldn't practice medicine and that doctors shouldn't break the skin. Now