With today’s resolution to Debbie Purdy’s court battle to have the law on assisted suicide clarified, there is now an inescapable feeling that matters are coming to a head regarding the issue in this country. A tide of opinion polls, news stories and incessant letters in newspapers show that this debate just won’t go away — and the pressure for a change in the law is growing.

The argument is simple enough. Some people with serious illnesses want to take their own lives, and they want their loved ones to be nearby when they do it. None of this harms anyone else, so why do we need a law against it? If one takes the view that the law should only prohibit what really needs to be prohibited, and otherwise should allow people as much freedom as possible, then it is hard to justify a law against assisted suicide.

I don’t have a problem with the argument. But it’s important to realize that, behind all this, there’s an issue that isn’t touched upon at all by the legal debate. Legal or not, is suicide ever the best option?

I am extremely uneasy with the attempts by those in favour of assisted suicide to recruit the terms “compassion” and “dignity” for their side. They risk implying that to carry on living with a debilitating condition somehow lacks dignity, or that killing someone can be more compassionate than caring for them.

Personally, I find those who carry on despite everything to be admirable, even heroic — not undignified. And I have infinite respect for those who dedicate their lives to care. If Dignitas were a hospice rather than a death clinic — if it cared rather than killed — it wouldn’t make any headlines, but it would provide a greater service to the desperate people who pass through its doors.

Filed under: humanrights, ideas, jonathanbirch, society on July 30th, 2009