Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide are Morally Correct

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Euthanasia is Morally Correct

"The third night that I roomed with Jack in our tiny double room, in

the solid-tumor ward of the cancer clinic of the National Institute of

Health in Maryland, a terrible thought occurred to me. Jack had a melanoma

in his belly, a malignant solid tumor that the doctors guessed was the size

of a softball. The doctors planned to remove the tumor, but they knew Jack

would soon die. The cancer had now spread out of control. Jack, about 28,

was in constant pain, and his doctor had prescribed an intravenous shot, a

pain killer, and this would control the pain for perhaps two hours or a bit

more. Then he would begin to moan, or whimper, very low, as though he

didn't want to wake me. Then he would begin to howl, like a dog. When

this happened, he would ring for a nurse, and ask for the pain-killer. The

third night of his routine, a terrible thought occurred to me. 'If Jack

were a dog, I thought, what would be done to him?' The answer was obvious:

the pound, and the chloroform. No human being with a spark of pity could

let a living thing suffer so, to no good end." (James Rachel's The

Morality of Euthanasia)

The experience of Stewart Alsop, a respected journalist, who died in

1975 of a rare form of cancer gave an example on the morality of euthanasia.

Before he died, he wrote movingly of his experiences with another terminal

patient. Although he had not thought much about euthanasia before, he came

to approve of it after sharing a room with Jack. While growing up, each of

us learns a large number of rules of conduct. Which rules we learn will

depend on the kind of society we live in and the parents and the friends we

have. We may learn to be honest, to be loyal, and to work hard. Sometimes

we learn a rule without understanding its point. In most cases this may

work out, for the rule may be designed to cover ordinary circumstances, but

when faced with unusual situations, we may be in trouble. This situation

is the same with moral rules. Without understanding the rules, we may come

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