Terry Pratchett on Assisted Suicide.

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http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...Pratchett-law-allow-assisted-suicides-UK.html

Heres the skinny for your tl;dr folks ..

Sir Terry, who was knighted in the 2009 New Year Honours, said in an article in the Mail on Sunday: 'I intend, before the endgame looms, to die sitting in a chair in my own garden with a glass of brandy in my hand and Thomas Tallis on the iPod.

'Oh, and since this is England, I had better add, "If wet, in the library". Who could say that this is bad?'

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...allow-assisted-suicides-UK.html#ixzz0NtdEwHHs
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Terry Pratchett was knighted? Blimey. Good. He really does look like one of his own wizards these days.
 
When Terry Pratchett dies, he will only come back as a stronger wizard.
 
I was going to suggest that someone dress up as Death and say Hello. But that would probably be bad taste.
 
Daily Mail? I don't believe it, find a better source.




But really, the law is just pathetic in this regard. It's no surprise assisted suicide is allowed in Switzerland given the general public's approval of the idea and how much more democratic the Swiss method of government is.
 
One should always be allowed to leave on one's own terms. Good for him. Sounds like a ridiculously pleasant passage.
 
VictimOfScience said:
a ridiculously pleasant passage.
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[sexual reference]


Good on him. That's the way to go. I'm not sure it'll be that convenient, though. Not really plausible if you're dying from stroke-induced seizures and vomiting up your own internal organs. OH WELL.
 
This man is awesome. I wish I could be arsed to read more of his books, but I'm too much of a computer fanatic sometimes.
 
Just started reading men at arms, i found a load at my uncles house and i intend to read all of them.
 
Assisted suicide is like having a team of writers for an auto-biography. Not to say that I think it's always wrong, but the rhetoric used in this case is misleading. It goes along the same lines as intelligent design and do-it-yourself books.
 
I've known about his stance for a while - one of my favorite authors.

However - that article was bloody horridly written...
 
mindless_moder said:
Could you elaborate on that ? . I didn't catch the analogy there .
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People use confusing lingo to distract from what something really is. Creationism started to be called intelligent design...and do-it-yourself books are just funny because if you buy a book that tells you how to do something, you're not doing it yourself. That was a George Carlin reference actually.

He used a good example. PTSD used to be called shell shock but went through many changes over the years to make it sound better.

George Carlin said:
I don't like words that hide the truth. I don't words that conceal reality. I don't like euphemisms, or euphemistic language. And American English is loaded with euphemisms. Cause Americans have a lot of trouble dealing with reality. Americans have trouble facing the truth, so they invent the kind of a soft language to protest themselves from it, and it gets worse with every generation. For some reason, it just keeps getting worse. I'll give you an example of that. There's a condition in combat. Most people know about it. It's when a fighting person's nervous system has been stressed to it's absolute peak and maximum. Can't take anymore input. The nervous system has either (click) snapped or is about to snap. In the first world war, that condition was called shell shock. Simple, honest, direct language. Two syllables, shell shock. Almost sounds like the guns themselves. That was seventy years ago. Then a whole generation went by and the second world war came along and very same combat condition was called battle fatigue. Four syllables now. Takes a little longer to say. Doesn't seem to hurt as much. Fatigue is a nicer word than shock. Shell shock! Battle fatigue. Then we had the war in Korea, 1950. Madison avenue was riding high by that time, and the very same combat condition was called operational exhaustion. Hey, were up to eight syllables now! And the humanity has been squeezed completely out of the phrase. It's totally sterile now. Operational exhaustion. Sounds like something that might happen to your car. Then of course, came the war in Viet Nam, which has only been over for about sixteen or seventeen years, and thanks to the lies and deceits surrounding that war, I guess it's no surprise that the very same condition was called post-traumatic stress disorder. Still eight syllables, but we've added a hyphen! And the pain is completely buried under jargon. Post-traumatic stress disorder. I'll bet you if we'd of still been calling it shell shock, some of those Viet Nam veterans might have gotten the attention they needed at the time. I'll betcha. I'll betcha.
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Good for him. There should be nothing stopping him if he wants to down a bottle of sleeping pills and take a calm journey through, but yes I agree with Ty in that he should do it alone, and not get someone else to help him.
 
Except sometimes they can't do it themselves, that's the point.
 
dekstar said:
I know but I was talking morally they shouldn't get help.
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So it's morally ok for them to kill themselves as long as they're capable but morally wrong for them to have someone willing to help assist in their suicide if they are incapable of doing it themselves?
So if your chronic illness is disabling I guess you're shit out of luck compared to someone who's suffering as much but is still mobile? How is that morally right?

And tyguy "do-it-with-our-help" is the same thing as "assisted suicide" but less elegant.
 
Tyguy said:
People use confusing lingo to distract from what something really is. Creationism started to be called intelligent design...and do-it-yourself books are just funny because if you buy a book that tells you how to do something, you're not doing it yourself. That was a George Carlin reference actually.

He used a good example. PTSD used to be called shell shock but went through many changes over the years to make it sound better.

Click to expand...

The evolution of the terminology makes sense to me. They didn't understand the condition when it was first recognised, hence the rather simplistic name "shell shock". Battle Fatigue and Operational Exhaustion show that they realised it could be caused by more than LOUD NOISES and explosions.

Finally, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, we know, can come after any highly distressing situation. In fact, calling it Shell Shock would itself be a misleading euphemism.

That thing about do-it-yourself books doesn't make sense. The book gives you the knowledge, it doesn't actually do everything for you. You're still doing it yourself, you're just using the bank of human knowledge to help you. And that's what everyone does all the time. So if you want to get picky, then you have to say that nobody has ever done anything for himself, because he's always used at least some of the know-how passed on from other people.


Anyway, none of this really gives a good reason to as to why people shouldn't be helped with dying.
 
facepalm.jpg
 
Golly, you sure showed me.
I guess you aren't against assisted suicide. But even so, I don't agree with the rest of what you said.
 
Tyguy said:
People use confusing lingo to distract from what something really is. Creationism started to be called intelligent design...and do-it-yourself books are just funny because if you buy a book that tells you how to do something, you're not doing it yourself. That was a George Carlin reference actually.

He used a good example. PTSD used to be called shell shock but went through many changes over the years to make it sound better.
Click to expand...

So what you're trying to say that suicide is suicide and theres no reason to make it sound better by calling it "Assisted" . I guess you're right on that front , Except the term primarily refers to people with terminal illnesses whereas suicide is much broader.
 
Eejit said:
So it's morally ok for them to kill themselves as long as they're capable but morally wrong for them to have someone willing to help assist in their suicide if they are incapable of doing it themselves?
So if your chronic illness is disabling I guess you're shit out of luck compared to someone who's suffering as much but is still mobile? How is that morally right?
Click to expand...
Well no, what I said was that it's morally wrong for someone to help someone commit suicide, because it can be classed as murder. I didn't say I was against it, however.
 
It brings peaceful thoughts, does it not? ... Excellent man, he loves Half-Life, btw.
 
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