Scotland Parliament Strongly Rejects Legislation to Legalize Assisted Suicide

Life News ^ | 12/8/08 | Steven Ertelt

[wagglebee]

Edinburgh, Scotland (LifeNews.com) -- The Scottish Parliament, the devolved national, unicameral legislature of Scotland, is not receptive to legislation to legalize assisted suicide in that portion of Great Britain. Margo MacDonald, the MSP behind the bill, failed to garner enough support to introduce the measure.

MacDonald is hoping to get a private member's bill introduced at Holyrood next year but only has the backing of four out of the 129 that comprise the legislative body.

That means she is 14 short of the number needed to get the bill introduced and well short of the level of support necessary to get an assisted suicide bill approved.

MacDonald's bill appears to be modeled after American laws in Oregon and Washington state that require a waiting period before a terminally ill patient can request a physician to provide a lethal drug prescription.

After realizing she didn't have enough support to get her measure introduced, she talked with the London Times about why she brought the bill.

"There are lots of people up and down Scotland who would like to make sure that they miss the last - and for them most intolerable - part of life, because of incapacity, loss of dignity, loss of control, insufferable pain perhaps," she said.

Pro-life advocates oppose assisted suicide and say that doctors should not be in the business of killing patients. They say patients should be given more help to cope with pain and depression and better hospice care.

Though a bill to legalize assisted suicide doesn't appear to be advancing in Scotland, pro-life advocates in England are more concerned.

A new piece of legislation, the Coroners and Justice Bill, which British Parliament officials announced at the start of the parliamentary year, will deal with assisted suicide. The measure, would reportedly modernize the law "to increase public understanding."

What that means, however, is another question.

The bill could make it more clear when people would be charged under the law for aiding in an assisted suicide, as in the case of Debbie Purdy.

John Smeaton, the director of the pro-life group Society for the Protection of Unborn Children, explained some of the concerns on Thursday.

"We are concerned that radical, so-called right-to-die MPs or peers - urged on by media coverage for assertions that some elderly people have a so-called duty to die - might seek to use the bill to weaken the legal protection of the right to life," Smeaton says.

[little jeremiah]

You are dead to right and wrong because you are arguing on this thread for the right for people who want to commit suicide, but who don't have the guts to do it themselves, to involve the medical profession to legitimize their desire to die. So it's two wrongs - giving the stamp of state approval to suicide, one; and involving the medical profession who should be saving and helping life, not death; two.

You can't think it wrong because you said up the thread that people should be able to “help friends die” as though it is a worthy act.

You are jumping all over the place, no solid position, you don't even understand that your own “arguments” nullify each other.

You liber(al)tarians are pretty funny - you are all for “individual rights” but you want huge government enforcement and bureaucracy to be engineered Just For You!And one more thing - Psst! - right and wrong are the foundation of laws; they aren't irrelevant, but quite the reverse.

[little jeremiah]

A lot of really strange people on FR lately. Of course, I’ve been gone for a while so maybe it’s just SOP...!

Nothing like people making statements that X out their other statements. Interal contradictions galore. Maybe smoking too much of the weed that should be legal even though they personally don’t smoke it.

[BykrBayb]

This batch of trolls is strange. They support killing off the most vulnerable among our population, but they can’t decide why they support it, nor even admit they support it. They demand that we all support it through legislation, extrajudicial rulings, a complete overhaul of our legal system, and the undermining of millenniums of medical ethics. The people they target for extermination, based some arbitrary measure of brain capacity, have more brain capacity than the trolls.

[BykrBayb]

Maybe the cause of their limited brain capacity is the stuff they won’t admit they smoke. That would explain a lot.

Þ

[abigailsmybaby]

Sure it does. Why do you have to have somebody else help you commit suicide?

[little jeremiah]

And at the same time their plea is that they only want a smaller, less intrusive government...?!?!?

[BykrBayb]

A smaller, less intrusive government, whose function is to administer death to the majority of the population, to eliminate natural death.

[BykrBayb]

Why do you have to have somebody else help you commit suicide?

Do not assume. Arderkrag talks about killing "them" and "you," but never "arderkrag."

The proponents of euthanasia rarely ask for the right to be the target of the killing. On the rare occasions when they do claim they want to be the target of the killing, they're usually just saying that as cover, while protecting themselves from actually being targeted.

You won't see the Schiavos, Kevorkians, or arderkrags volunteering for their utopian blood baths. They only support that euphoria for those they consider inferior to themselves.

[abigailsmybaby]

I get it now. Thank you.

Sick bastard.

[BykrBayb]

You’re welcome. It does become more clear once you realize that.

I fully agree with your assessment. It takes one sick bastard to say just what’s in post 84, much less the rest of that bile.

[wagglebee]

What was the result of Terri’s autopsy related to her brain?

I see you are new and given your name my guess is that you are a Darwinist retread, so be sure to go back and tell them that conservatives still believe in God and reject your Darwinian agenda to exterminate "undesirables." Why does that even matter?

Terri was not on a ventilator or any similar device, so obviously her brain was able to keep her blood flowing and heart beating.

If, as I'm sure YOU believe, Terri was "brain dead," then HOW EXACTLY did she experience "euphoria" from being dehydrated and starved? You and your ilk have NEVER been able to answer this question because as soon as you consider the it that you can't have it both ways.

Do YOU believe that YOU should be allowed to determine which lives are "worth living" and which are not?

“This person suffering from hereditary defects

costs the people 60,000 Reichmarks during his lifetime.

People, that is your money. Read ‘New People’.”

[arderkrag]

You can't think it wrong because you said up the thread that people should be able to “help friends die” as though it is a worthy act.

Actually, I do think it's wrong.

[arderkrag]

Do not assume. Arderkrag talks about killing "them" and "you," but never "arderkrag."

That's because I think suicide and euthanasia are morally wrong. Accept that, and maybe you'll understand my position better.

[Stonewall Jackson]

Not everyone is insane (just most of us). ;-)

[bamahead]

Libertarian ping! Click here to get added or here to be removed or post a message here!

[bamahead]

While I don’t personally agree with many of the pretexts of assisted suicide...I find it quite hypocritical that very often- the same moral busybodies who would deny a sick person in pain medicine that would ease their suffering, would also prohibit ones ability to make a personal choice to end their own suffering.

All in the name of enforcing their own moral code upon others. Using the power of Government, of course.

[floriduh voter]

Terri Schindler Schiavo with a life expectancy of 75 YEARS, was a victim of state sponsored homocide. Our current governor Crist is getting married later this week. I wonder if his little bride knows that he was part of the killing of an innocent life of a wife. Keyword: Charlie Crist Terri Schiavo

[floriduh voter]

How killing people thru the state is done and there's MONEY TO BURN too.

www.judgegeorgegreer.com

[floriduh voter]

IMO, name sounds a little sci-cruisey to me imo.

[BykrBayb]

Morally wrong for you, but desirable for others. How convenient.