Leighton - Reconciliation watercolor.
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In late November, by a vote of 330 to 275, the British House of Commons supported a bill which will "allow" doctors to assist terminally ill patients, facing prognoses of death within six months, in ending their own lives.
Responses in the United Kingdom and elsewhere range from gratitude to outrage.
Oddly, much of the outrage comes from supporters of a "right to life" who oppose abortion and, when they're consistent, capital punishment.
Consistency would also dictate recognition of your personal rights of ownership over your life.
Decreeing that you may not be killed in the womb, or by another person, but that your rights end if you want to end it all, is a claim that you are property without inherent rights.
The "right to life" these advocates assert is, in this context, no different than a "right" to not have their cattle stolen or their slaves escape. It's not about the opinions of the cattle or the slaves. It's about exercising ownership rights over the cattle and the slaves.
The basis of any plausible "right to life" -- or any other right -- is self-ownership. It's your life. You own it. It's yours to do with as you wish, so long as you don't infringe the equal rights of others.
It's also yours to end, when and how you wish, so long as -- again -- you don't violate others' rights with the way you end it.
There are obvious areas of reasonable disagreement on when that's true or not, such as in cases of diminished mental capacity due to youth, dementia, etc. But there's no reasonable argument for conditioning your exercise of that right on the arbitrary whims of government.
Maybe you're terminally ill and don't want to face your final moments in pain.
Maybe you're IN pain that's incurable, intolerable, and unlikely to cease.
Maybe the love of your life died and you don't relish living out years or decades in your partner's absence.
Maybe your situation has you believing that your continued existence will impose undue hardships on people you love.
Those are all reasons. Maybe "good" reasons. But your reasons don't have to be "good" for the decision to remain, by right, yours and yours alone. Maybe you flipped a coin. Perhaps your religious beliefs say that you've reached your permissible lifespan. Your call.
If you don't possess the right to end your life, you possess no rights at all.
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