The right-to-die means the power to choose death.
There are three basic divisions of this right:
1. Voluntary death chosen by the patient.
2. Merciful death chosen by proxies for the patient.
3. Life-ending decisions
chosen by the physician.
This portal does not support
any of the harmful or criminal variation of these rights:
1. Coerced or manipulated death or any form of irrational suicide.
2. Mercy-killing or any form of choosing death for others without
authorization.
3. Unreasonable ending of medical treatment or any other means of
causing premature death.
Organizations supporting the right-to-die:
Instead
of listing individual organizations,
of which there are many world-wide,
here is the umbrella organization,
which will lead you to whatever groups seem most interesting to you:
The World Federation of Right
to Die Societies
Safeguards for
Life-Ending Decisions
This website explores the
creation of new and better safeguards
to prevent premature death,
irrational suicide,
and other abuses of the
right-to-die.
How to Die:
Safeguards for the Life-Ending Decisions
A free 400-page book which can be read by anyone with Internet access:
PART ONE: Permitting Chosen Death: Worries, Problems, Abuses, &
Mistakes
PART TWO: Defining Terms for the Right-to-Die
PART THREE: 26 Recommended Safeguards Life-Ending Decisions
PART FOUR: Planning Our Own Deaths
PART FIVE: Deciding Death for Others
PART SIX: Changing Laws Concerning the Right-to-Die
Bibliographies:
Preparing for Death
Advance Directives for Medical Care
Personhood
Helping Patients to Die
Supporting the Right-to-Die
Opposing the Right-to-Die
Causing
Premature Death
Draft legislation to replace all state or national laws against
assisting
suicide
and to approve chosen deaths under appropriate
safeguards.
Section V presents 26 safeguards (A-Z)
to separate premature deaths
(harmful crimes)
from life-ending decisions that are not premature (helpful,
non-crimes).
Several advantages of this form of legislation
in contrast to the more conventional gentle-poison laws are discussed
here:
Advantages
of the Premature-Death Approach to the Right-to-Die
Voluntary
Death by Dehydration: Questions & Answers
This portal raises and
answers common questions
about this method of choosing a voluntary death or a merciful death.
Assisted Suicide
This portal gathers information about repealing laws against 'assisting
suicide'.
The Hospice
Cooperation Project
This website seeks better
cooperation between
the hospice movement and
the right-to-die movement.
Discussing Degrees of Mental
Decline
When
patients are experiencing problems like senility and dementia at the
end of their lives,
their proxies must make their medical decisions for them.
Right-to-Die
Minnesota
This is a website, Facebook Page, & e-mailing list
for people who want to change Minnesota laws with respect to the
right-to-die.
Annotated
Bibliographies:
Best Books on
the Right-to-Die
These books explore every dimension of the right-to-die.
Books
Opposing the Right-to-Die
These books present several arguments against the
right-to-die.
Best Books on
Voluntary Death
Voluntary deaths are deaths definitely chosen by patient.
These books often detail the process of deciding when to die.
Books on
Helping Patients to Die
Professional health-care workers and others
who help people to end of their lives.
First Books
on Voluntary Death by Dehydration
A
simple, painless way to die.
Cyber-Sermons and other short pieces on the
right-to-die:
Will this Death
be an "Irrational Suicide" or a "Voluntary Death"?
Irrational suicide is: harmful, irrational, capricious, &
regrettable.
Voluntary death is: helpful, rational, well-planned, & admirable.
Will this Death be a
"Mercy-Killing" or a "Merciful Death"?
Mercy-killing is: harmful, irrational, capricious, &
regrettable.
Merciful death is: helpful, rational, well-planned, &
admirable.
Fifteen
Safeguards
for Life-Ending Decisions
The case for the right-to-die will be advanced
if advocates of the right-to-die create workable safeguards
that will be accepted even by some of the people
who originally opposed all forms of the right-to-die.
Four
Legal Methods of Choosing Death
We now have the following legal
methods to end our lives:
1. increasing pain medication; 2. terminal sedation;
3. withdrawing life-supports; 4. voluntary dehydration.
Choosing
Your Date of Death:
How to Achieve a Timely Death
—Not too
Soon, Not too Late
This cyber-sermon explores the possibility
of weighing all possible factors
to choose the ideal time to die.
Voluntary
Death by Dehydration
Giving up food and fluids might be the best way to choose death.
Working for the
Right-to-Die
This is a three-page chapter from
Becoming More
Authentic: The Positive Side
of Existentialism
.
Watch Your Language!
A continuing series on the expressions we use in the right-to-die
debate:
"physican-assisted
suicide"—"physician
aid-in-dying"
"euthanasia"—"gentle
death"
"medication"—"life-ending
chemicals"
"hastened
death"—"timely death"
Created February 1, 2004; revised
and expanded several times, including: 5-13-2010; 4-5-2012; 10-11-2012