Assisted dying

 I often get angry with what I see or read in the news media. But rarely am I incandescent with rage.

Last Saturday was an exception, when I read about Graham Mansfield ("Man who killed his wife in ‘act of love’ calls for assisted dying law", Guardian 23 July 2022). 

Mr Mansfield's wife had pleaded with him to end her life when her terminal cancer became too painful to bear. The only option he felt was open to him was to cut her throat and then (unsuccessfully) repeat the act on himself.

It is hard to comprehend the love and compassion that enabled him to carry out such shocking violence on a loved one. I hope that I would have the courage to act the same way in his situation. Under no circumstances should he have had to do this.

Over the past few few decades, to my surprise and delight, the state (by which I mean the institution which presumes to run the island on which I live) has stepped back somewhat from interfering with some personal freedoms and behaviours which do not impact on others and where it should have no business. It no longer defines who we're allowed to love and partner with, or says what gender we identify with, or controls our fertility: all aspects of the individual that religions and states have looked to regulate for as long as thy have existed. But still it (the state) persists in forcing people to live, in terrible suffering, who clearly want to die. Part of the problem is the arcane influence still held by a minority religion based in the UK: the Church of England.

It is argued that, were it legal to assist a person to die, then the process would be open to abuse; a person requesting death may be under coercion. So clearly there would have to be a safeguarding procedure to eliminate such an abuse. (FFS Marriage is also open to coercion - that doesn't mean marriage is banned!) For example 2 independent persons to certify that the requester was making an informed and rational request, free from coercion.

I'm 70. I'm fortunate to be healthy, still, but I'm obviously in the last decade or two of active life. I don't want to have to be forced put up with limitless shit when I go downhill. And I may not want to wait till I'm terminally ill before I decide to check out.

This is why I support the aims of My Death My Decision and Humanists UK (and the Assisted Dying Coalition), who are campaigning for the legal recognition of the right to die.