Physician Assisted Suicide

[DFIB]

"Then he begged me, ‘Come over here and put me out of my misery, for I am in terrible pain and want to die.’ “So I killed him,” the Amalekite told David, “for I knew he couldn’t live." Samuel 1:9-10

Basically, what I am trying to get at is that if you take one single line out of context you can come up with an argument for or against just about anything. What we really need to do is look at the work as a whole, and see what the core ethics the book is trying to instill -- love, compassion, forgiveness.

I reviewed the passage From II Samuel 1 and found that your reference to "out of context" scripture is correct and would like to expand a little. I hope you don't mind. I am writing from memory as there is a considerable amount of reading to be done in this account. I hope I don't miss the relevant details.

I will provide a little background so we can understand what is happening.

The story of King Saul is a story of constant failure. He was a king that was given to the Israelites to satisfy their own pride. God considered their request for a king as a rejection of Himself as supreme leader of Israel. Saul's first offense was to take on sacerdotal responsibilities Saul was a prideful man and ill prepared to be royalty. He disobeyed God's command in battle to fuel his own pride by sparing the King of his enemy and his possessions which he paraded before the people of Israel. God had instructed him to destroy his enemy. Because of this offense God pronounced sentence over Saul that his Kingdom would be stripped from him. Latter Saul consulted with a which to invoke the spirit of the dead. The purpose of the invocation was to seek advice as to how to proceed in battle. Because Saul sought the advice of the dead and not the advice of God he was condemned to loose the battle and even his life.

This brings us to 1 Samuel chapter 31. Here we find that Saul was not killed by the man who claimed to have killed him in 2 Samuel 1. Saul was in fact shot by archers and in fear that he would be tortured he asked his page to kill him. His armor bearer would not so Saul fell on his own sword a and killed himself. The armor bearer being a loyal servant that loved his king fell on his own sword and died as well.

So the man referenced in 1 Samuel chapter one was an impostor who thought he could gain favor with David because Saul was David's declared enemy only David did not hate Saul and in fact loved his son Johnathan. This is evidenced because David once had the opportunity to kill Saul while he was sleeping but did not. The penalty for what would seem to be euthanasia was death even though no euthanasia occurred. Saul's death was indeed suicide as he was wounded but died by his own hand.

[DFIB]

See! I knew this was going to be awesome!!

You just love to see the pot stirred just to smell the porridge my friend. Thanks for keeping us in the discussion.

[CytochromeP450]

CH - I agree. Religion is great if mixed with other areas of understanding such as philosophy and science. An individual should use it to guide their own personal ethics, but we should not be in a theocratic society. In fact, all the more conserative yet educated Chritians I know would aggree. They don't think law should be based on religion. They would argue very astutely from their end that the forced or cajoled Christian does not the good Christian make.

DFIB - I think you and I are much on the same wavelength in terms of the fundemental message of Christianity. I will say you are much better versed than I would ever pretend to be. I admittedly coppied that quote blindly.

The class was great. It was actually taught by professor who was also in the clergy. It was not at all like, "This is what the Church believes and you must beleive it too." Very rational discussion of the ethics behind it. In fact, my entire college was like that. Logic and reason where the primary focus, and religion was used to compliment it. I am not deeply religious, but I honestly beleive my education would not have been as complete without the understanding of a concept of spirituality beyond the constrains of space and time that my school offered. I feel much more rounded because of it.

[Quakefire]

Having read through most of the posts, most if not all provided a decent argument for or against, and this has remained civil. Thank you all for that. Dwayne thanks for stirring the pot

[DFIB]

This is an excerpt from a newspaper in Texas. I don’t know if it will add anything to the discussion. It just so very sad.

“C.W. and Patricia Guiles, who were both in their 80s, were found by their children late Wednesday afternoon at their home”…. “According to investigators, C.W. shot and killed his wife before shooting himself”…. “Evidently there were medical problems, and they both appeared as though they were tired of living, Leon County Sheriff Jerry Wakefield said. It looked like he shot her, and then shot himself” The Buffalo Express Vol 13 NO 8, Mitchell Pate.

What a world we live in that elderly people, that led productive lives, raised children, lived and loved would feel that this is the only solution for their life. Could a Dr. helped them go easier? I am sure. Would it be right? I don't know.

Makes me sad.

[Happiness]

That is a sad state of affairs when our elderly feel they have no other options. Sometime we forget that these are the people that fought for our countries so we are free. Now with that being said are we truely free, apperently not when you have some government agency deciding your end of life options, because of their beliefs not your own.

You could almost consider this a sort of Racism in my opinion.

Now in thinking of a young friend of mine who died of ovarian cancer 2 years ago, I have to say taking her own life was not an option for her. She fought until the day she passed. I think of her wasting away and turning various different colors, she always had the hope that something would work. She never was angry at the world, she accepted her condition, and she may have wished she made different choices in her treatment. She never lost her sense of humor. She truely had the support of her family and friends,(and not eveyone has that). We took turns near the end spending the night with her, holding hands while we slept so that if she needed anything she just gave us a squeeze. Her only pain Meds were pot and we came up with creative ways for her to smoke it (by the she never did drugs untill the end). A few days before she died she was taken to the hospital as we convinced her it was the best place for her incase she wanted other drugs. Her room was decorated with stars and moons and it was a big camp out.

The last two days of her life, all she wanted to do was pass on and finally (here is the sense of humor) she said to her family "I want dead silence tonight and I mean Dead silence!!!!!!!" Those were her last words...............................

This whole issue is a personal choice.

[monkadelic]

It's legally a patients right to terminate their own life with a DNR; physician assisted IMO is no different. It's a legal binding document. And also I for one would not want to be hooked up to a respirator and all other kinds of shit that I mentally cannot have a say so once started, and neither would my loved ones. I have seen way too many patients being kept alive by their family just to seep in the money to keep them alive rather than to have them check out with dignity; When you are an inpatient transporter, you basically have to watch these ppl slowly die on a period of time-day to day, especially on dialysis. actually had one woman a few weeks ago with terminal pancreatic cancer... 70 ish- went to the room she was already blue in the face with agonal respirations... the RT taking care of her said we weren't going down because she was sat'in at 83% with full NRB@15lpm the doctor overridded her call and sent that woman for a CT of the head. Not 1 minute after we put her on the table in CT she coded; but we couldnt call it becuase she was a DNR. there is alot of unneccessary stuff done to these ppl and instead of sending them to a Hospice they are just trying to milk the medicaid/medicare while they still can- and thats not right. Now I'm not a Dr or anything, but why in the hell would you send someone you know is going to die in the next 5-10 minutes for a test that has nothing to do with their ailment? Sorry just got to rant for a moment, because I care about these ppl and I would never have my own mother subjected to this.

[Just Plain Ruff]

Wow milk the medicaid. Those are pretty strong accusatory words. Got anything to back that up other than just your in hospital transport experience?

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[DFIB]

Medicaid fraud is a serious accusation and a terrible one to have levied against you. The FBI does not need nor want proof to come into your clinic, dismiss all your patients and take your records, computers, files, everything. All the while they harass your employees.

The worst thing is that the accusations can be anonymous and unsubstantiated.

[Just Plain Ruff]

Thats the problem. All he has to do is level the accusation and a previously reputable non fraudulent provider may be ruined.

Dont level accusations unless you have proof.

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