Euthanasia

Contention 1: Unreported Euthanasia and Euthanasia without consent. Now I know that my opponent is against some of these, but this plays a key factor in my slippery slope argument that I will get into next. In 2003, Terri Schiavo recovered from a vegetative state that she had been in for 13 years. She had been dubbed dying, but she began to recover and eventually woke up to be on the O’Rielily Show. (http://www.rense.com...) They had removed her feeding tube and she had been without food and water for a few days even when she began to show signs of recovery. This is an event that occurred in the United States and we can see how this can easily go wrong when we try to give someone a peaceful end. In New York, Dr. Dimancescu's program has increased the ability for patients to get out of comas by a total of 91% compared to regular machines which have only 11%. (http://www.nysrighttolife.org...) For this next part I will argue that of self determination. The reason I say that only those who are faced with death should be able to decide weather or not euthanasia is justifiable for them, but only when they are in the correct state of mind. Those who chose willingly can either be suffering from depression or from that of sickness and that sickness can impair the way they think by forcing an unbearable pain upon them. Under Self-Determination one must first mentally defeat the sickness and then when they are in the correct state of mind then they should be able to make any judgemental decision and it is likely under this case that they would choose life over death. (http://www.vatican.va...) My opponent brings up that the Netherlands case is irrelevant, but the study is still a study. Though they may not have the same culture or morals they are more like US than Africans. (not trying to be racist, but it’s a simple fact) If my opponent still does not choose to accept my Neatherlands graph then I shall present one from Oregon and it shows the exact same trend My opponent brings up that since we euthanize animals then why don't we euthanize humans. The answer to this question is simple when looking at this from a moral standpoint. She is also right to say that you cannot put a price on a life. When religion is applied God gave humans dominion over the Earth and all animals upon it. Thus it is justifiable for humans to kill animals. When it comes to humans it is immoral to play God and kill a human being and determine the day which he meets his/her maker. Hence why one of the 10 Commandments is "Thou shall not kill" and we all know that euthanasia is a "mercy" killing. We also do tons of crazy things to animals that we do not do to ourselves like testing new pesticides on and desease treatments/testings. Also when you see the new technology coming out everyday to wake people from comas it really makes it irrelivant and irresponsable to kill someone like Terri Schiavo where you only had to wait a while and then she woke up after the doctor had pulled the plug. Contention 2: Slippery Slope Argument My opponent misinterprets my argument by saying that all doctors are to go on a killing spree and that we will have a society like in the Giver where we euthanize all of the senior citizens, because they cannot contribute to society anymore. No this is incorrect. I'm simply showing how legalizing this will lead to more as society gets to accept it as a norm. Like how the process of "Unwinding" is gloabally accepted though we would view it as apalling! (Unwind by Neil Shusterman). It's social acceptable, because society has accepted it as a norm and has been used to it for so long. Just like in Belgium now, people are able to euthanize children, which I had brought up last round. You can see how this is becoming socially acceptable as the numbers and the rates of euthanasias are increasing and in some cases doubling. The cases of Euthanasia in both Belgium and Neatherlands have doubled and skyrocketed since they had been able to legalize it and this is proof of this becoming a norm. There is plenty of information on euthanasia avaliable as several European nations have been doing this for years. Now once again, I understand that Pro is against involuntary euthanasia, but the fact is that I have show that by supporting this will lead to the fact of it getting legalized as it has led to the ability for children to be euthanized by the word of their parents in Belgium in 2009. Contention 3: Giving the healing doctor a killing role. My opponent states that my fear of the doctor is irreliant, but pounder this; why are children afraid of clowns? Many actually point to two prominate and well known clowns, Pennywise from It by Stephen King and Bozo the Clown. Bozo the clown who turned out to be a prominate serial killer and Pennywise is a self explanitory one, but these two caused a major fear of clowns and the same can be done to demonize doctors. (http://zidbits.com...) My opponent likes to give statistics here so I'l use her very source to give you some of these facts. Physician-Assisted Suicide [euthanasia]: 42% Had both a "religious and nonreligious objection" to physician-assisted suicide 31% Had "no objection" to physician-assisted suicide 21% Had a "nonreligious objection" to physician-assisted suicide 5% Had a "religious objection" to physician-assisted suicide Physician Characteristics: 79% of Asian doctors in the US object to physician-assisted suicide 71% of Hispanic doctors in the US object to physician-assisted suicide 67% of White doctors in the US object to physician-assisted suicide 65% of Black doctors in the US object to physician-assisted suicide 79% of Catholic doctors object to physician-assisted suicide 79% of Muslim doctors object to physician-assisted suicide 75% of Protestant doctors object to physician-assisted suicide 74% of Hindu doctors object to physician-assisted suicide 54% of Jewish doctors object to physician-assisted suicide 39% of doctors with no religious affiliation object to physician-assisted suicide Physicians from the US Midwest are more likely to object to physician-assisted suicide than those from the US South So it appears from Pro's own source that the numbers appear to show that the numbers are actually saying the opposite of what she is trying to say. (http://euthanasia.procon.org...)