People have the right to be euthanized.

Con begins by challenging the notion that one's life belongs to one's own person. Thomas Bowden explains, "The Declaration of Independence proclaimed, for the first time in the history of nations, that each person exists as an end in himself. This basic truth -- which finds political expression in the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness -- means, in practical terms, that you need no one's permission to live, and that no one may forcibly obstruct your efforts to achieve your own personal happiness" [1]. "I would argue that the right to die is a corollary of the right to life. A free person does not belong to God, to the State, to the medical establishment or to anyone else. If a rational, competent person decides that life is not worth living because of illness, suffering, loss of a loved one, untreatable hopelessness, or whatever reason, then that person has the right to end his or her life. Just as one should be left free to pursue rational values that do not violate others' rights, one should be free to terminate their life on their terms" [1]. Con then claims that rights come from God. This is problematic for two reasons. First, not everyone believes in God, let alone the Christian God that Con refers to. Even Christians cannot agree with each other, which is why there are thousands of denominations of Christianity alone. If Christians cannot even agree amongst themselves, we have no reason to believe the entire human race's rights are dictated by the "Christian" God. Indeed billions of people (and millions of Americans) do not believe in or accept this version of God that Con describes. And secondly, the United States government does not base its concept of rights on religion. Ergo, this religious argument is useless at establishing the basis for legal rights. If this argument were to prevail legally, it would be a horrific violation of the separation of church and state. The First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States reads, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion," meaning the tenants of Christianity nor any other religion is to be established as the basis of our law [2]. Con quotes the founding father's supposition that rights are established by a "Creator," which by the way is not necessarily the Christian God. The founding father's also believed that black people and women had little to no rights -- should their moral standards be the basis of rights for now and always? Con would have to defend this fallacious appeal to tradition and appeal to authority. The founding father's ideas were not always just or relevant. The Supreme Court has ruled that euthanasia is not necessarily a Constitutional right; however, it should be left up to the states to decide. That does not mean that it is not a right - it simply means the federal government has chosen to regulate something that IS a fundamental right. This is not uncommon. For example some states seek to ban gun rights, sex for money, gay marriage, marijuana consumption, or they exercise eminent domain over property rights, etc. My opponent goes on to suggest that the right to life is protected by the Constitution which is patently false. Indeed the right to choose is the federal law of the land; the right to abortion (choose) was valued by the Supreme Court over the right to life in 1963's Supreme Court decision of Roe v. Wade [3]. Therefore we can see that the government basis the right to life on a level of sentience and not the value of being alive in and of itself. Moreover, the Supreme Court decided in Cruzan v. Director that the due process clause protects a patient's liberty to refuse medical treatment, even if that refusal would ultimately lead to the patient's death [4]. As such, SCOTUS has ruled the Constitution recognizes one's right to bodily autonomy - to act in a way that kills one's self by not taking the medicine or treatment. Sentience is the capacity to feel, perceive, or experience subjectively. It can also refer to the ability of any entity to have subjective perceptual experiences [5]. We use this as the basis to distinguish rights among living beings, which is why animals do not have the right to life and humans do -- humans are more sentient. Con falsely accuses me of a hypocritical double standard, but indeed there is none. Neither fetuses nor people in comas, vegetative states, etc. have a level of sentience where they can consent or they are conscious, and therefore, they are not given the inherent right to life above their previous choice (or possibly another person's choice) for the aforementioned reasons. As such Con is incorrect in accusing me of a double standard here. Con writes, "A person could be brain dead and people would still treat the person as a person... I don't see how a person very ill would be considered a non-human." First, let's recognize Con's straw man as I have never said that a very ill person was non-human. I said they were non-sentient which is entirely different. Second, how other people feel is irrelevant to one's personal freedom and right to their own body. If my mother does not want me to get a tattoo, that is too bad, I can get one. If my mother does not want me to have a child, too bad, I can have one and that is true whether I am 12 or 42. We do, in fact, have the right to bodily autonomy and to control what happens to our own bodies. So if I choose to die, I have that right the way I have the right to control what medicines I take, how I eat, and how I live my life whether it makes me sick or not. If I have diabetes, I can choose to eat sugar until I die. My opponent then fallaciously accuses me of equating a human being's life with an animal's life. This is another blatant straw man. First of all I've explained why humans should have more rights than animals based on their level of sentience. Next, I asked why we should show greater compassion to animals - meaning we show greater empathy for animals not suffering than we do regarding human suffering. If we do not want animals to suffer and therefore "put them down" to ease their unnecessary pain, we should extend the same care and consideration to humans who are more sentient than animals - especially because they can voluntarily choose to end their own lives, whereas animals cannot communicate that choice to you (if they are in fact sentient enough to choose that). Con keeps equating euthanasia with murder which is false. Murder is the killing of another human being without justification or valid excuse, and it is especially the unlawful killing of another human being with malice aforethought [6]. Euthanasia is the practice of intentionally ending a life in order to relieve pain and suffering [7]. My opponent compares euthanasia to rape which is absurd. The reason euthanasia should be legal and doesn't count as aggression is because 1) euthanasia may be entirely voluntary, 2) people may give their loved ones the right to choose euthanasia for them, 3) euthanasia is done on those who are not conscious and have little to no chance of surviving for long without great pain and needless suffering. Rape, murder, and all of Con's other dramatic analogies are not comparable. In conclusion, please note that Con has dropped my points regarding this statistic: In 86% of cases, euthanasia shortened life by a maximum of a week - usually only a few hours. Con must prove that the exorbitant costs (which he does not deny exist) outweigh keeping this unconscious, barely living (or ever to be able to functionally or consciously ever live again) person alive on a cost/benefit analysis. Thus far, he has only repeated "you cannot put a price on a life" and yet I have argued in the last round why some people would prefer to not waste a lot of money suffering needlessly, while withering away in pain for a few more hours. SOURCES: http://www.debate.org...