On Mercy Killing(對「安樂死」的看法)
With advancement of modern medicine, more
cases of illness, such as cancer, or illnesses related with oncology, emerge.
Their emergence creates the necessity of physicians’ helping patients to keep
them alive as long as possible. However, medical treatment on the other hand,
prolongs the suffering of patients.
Patients’ pain and suffering might be extended in proportion to a period
(long or limited) in which they receive medical treatment. To ease or eliminate such suffering, Assisted
Suicide was thus devised and became legalized. Assisted by whom? Physicians or someone
else.
As an Asian myself, I’d like to talk about my
viewpoints regarding so –called “mercy killing” of course from the position of
an Oriental.
Influenced by ancient philosophy of life for
thousands of years, most of the Orientals view death as a matter of course in
life. They believe that there are four
stages, namely, birth (生) 、seniority (老) 、illness (病)and death (死), which are a natural course and cycle of life. Among them illness in is
naturally unavoidable. When faced with serious illnesses, such as those beyond
cure, ancient Asians either committed suicide or helplessly procrastinated their
suffering until death. They very seldom,
if ever, asked someone else to help them to kill them either kindly or
mercilessly. Because there existed a
traditional moral code, 『身體髮膚受之父母，不可毀傷』-literally meaning “Bequeathed and
inherited from parents, each part of our body, including hair, skin etc. should
not be destroyed or damaged.” This
emphasizes the importance of taking best care of our body as a gratitude to our
parents. Therefore, assisted suicide was never thought of in the Oriental culture
before, not to speak of putting it into practice.
Assisted Suicide was never mentioned also partly
because of a firmed concept of morality about life and death, and partly
because people were not intelligent or cruel enough to devise such statutes to
allow physicians or others to help ill persons to end their lives. They believe that life is controlled or predetermined
by Heaven or by fate. Physicians did not play a role of ending patients’
life. It is an Oriental concept about
life that they could do nothing but yield themselves to fate, which is the key
determiner. (聽天由命 or 恨命莫怨天) No one else, and nothing else.
As for physicians, they knew better than to
help their patients to terminate their lives by adding purposely some poisonous
or fatal drug to kill patients even if patients would have been very grateful
for physicians’ benevolence to help them end their life. This was against morality, rule of mortality
and social ethics, let alone that of physicians, whose responsibility was to
help people to get rid of illness. In the mean time, helping some patients to
die sooner than they would have been otherwise destined to be is an act of
murder rather than mercy. And murdering
someone is the last thing most people will do because it is a crime, an act of breaking
law. Some groups or organizations even in the West today are still in strong
opposition religiously, ethically, legally, theologically or morally, to mercy
killing, another name for Assisted Suicide.
Around two thousand years ago, there was a
dictator and emperor, named Tsao Tsao (曹操) in the Era of
three-country, who was always troubled by an illness, possibly suspected to be brain
tumor related, which caused severe pang from time to time. To treat his illness, one day he sent for a
very famous surgeon by the name of Hua Tou (華陀). Dr. Hua proposed to have a brain surgery for
Tsao Tsao by cutting open Tsao’s skull to remove the tumor. Upon hearing this, Tsao flared up, and put
Dr. Hua to death, mistakenly thinking that Dr. Hua had an ill attempt on his
life. This did not by any means constitute
a case of Assisted Suicide though Tsao Tsao was not humorous enough to think of
it as one. Because Tsao was lacking in any intention to have himself “get
killed”, too.
(Neurosurgery was invented
as long as 2,000 years ago? Had it been
the case, Chinese medicine would have been much more advanced than the Western
one! Unfortunately, all the people related to Dr. Hua were killed as accomplice
in the “murder”. And legend has it many
important and unique books of medicine written by Dr. Hua were also burned up.)
In my opinion, the Orientals do not accept
mercy killing so easily or readily as do some Western people because of deeply
rooted morality for centuries. In deciding to employ such a method to eliminate
patients’ suffering, I think the position of physicians must be less active or
initiative than that of patients or their family in the Orient. However, with the urgency or necessity of
employing ‘mercy killing’, physicians’ evaluation of illness must be seriously
taken into account. However, should a patient lose his power of expressing
his/her free will, then a physician, a power of attorney of patients’ family,
some other people concerned, and or justice should be responsible for the
adoption of such a drastic measure.
After all, not only is a patient’s suffering
crucial but his/her family people’s is. In
some people’s minds, “an act of euthanasia” (causing death painlessly so as to end
suffering) is one in which one person kills another person for the
benefit of the second person, who actually does benefit from being
killed. That is the key point that it is legalized in some countries in the
world.
Broadly defined, sometimes suffering
refers to more physical pain than a spiritual one, or may be both. Besides the cases in medicine, for those
wishing to terminate their own lives for a divine cause, they might sometimes seek
for assistance from someone else. For
instance, killing oneself by stabbing one’s belly in ancient or modern Japan,
the so-called “hara kiri- 切腹自殺 (腹切りin
Japanese). In this specific
kind of committing suicide, a person needs someone else to cut off his head by
standing at his side. Why is another person needed to serve as an assistant of the
killer? Because, the assistant will ease greatly the pain of the one who kills
oneself before one dies. And of course,
he helps speed the one to death otherwise a person’s dying very slowly is extremely
painful.
Both persons deem it an honor
to perform in collaboration such a noble deed- killing oneself and helping the
other to get killed. The above tradition in the Orient may be called Another-Assisted
Suicide. In medical cases, both assisting physicians and the
patient are not honored at all. The beneficiary is the patient himself or
herself, all right. But, can an
assisting physician be called “a benefactor of the suicide”? I doubt it. But to
some physicians, they rather think they are. Maybe is it out of a guilty
feeling? The physicians assert that they are innocent of the killing and their
act is absent of crime on any account. What a good and perplexing defense! How do you like it?!
As for the Oriental people who suffer, they of course
long to die sooner than be tortured to death.
Their pain and or suffering can be evidenced by some famous idioms
expressed, such as “痛不欲生” (so painful as to desire to be dead to end
suffering) or “生不如死” (ceasing to live is much preferable to going
on living). Of course, the above two phrases sometimes are referred more to
spiritual pain than to physical suffering. Indeed, suffering sometimes is indescribably
great for someone inflicted with incurable diseases and yet it is
subjective. Too bad! None but the one
who experienced or is experiencing such pang can tell if suicide is preferable
to suicide assisted by someone else.
Someone argues that there is a difference between euthanasia and
PAS. For me the former may include the
latter; and the latter did not come into existence as long as the former. The
word "euthanasia" was first used in a medical context by Francis Bacon in the 17th
century. “Euthanasia must be defined as
death that results from the intention of one person to kill another
person, using the most gentle and painless means
possible, that is motivated solely by the best interests of the persoen who
dies.” PAS (Physician-Assisted Suicide) involves the physicians who serve as
pain relievers at first, but finally as executioners. PAS, euphemistically called, is always at the request
and with the consent of the patient, since he or she self-administers the
means of death.
Whatever
the minor difference between Assisted Suicide and euthanasia might be, both are
concerned with one’s killing of the other, in a painlessly way of killing, and
with the consent of the other or his/her family. Both must incorporate
four elements: an agent, a subject; an intention; a causal proximity.
And a patient’s will to his/her life is the key factor to be considered. The
will includes voluntary and non-voluntary intention. And a physician’s roles
are inclusive of active or passive involvement. Either a patient’s will or a
physician’s role has to be under strict surveillance and regulation of a law. That is, a court’s
ruling comes first, and then a “suicide” happens later. It seems to be a
win-win plot, with a happy ending. Haha! These are the procedures the way they
are. However, they are hardly acceptable
as yet in Asia. But who knows when it will become as popular or prevalent as birth
control?
12/14/2015
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