Ok, I want to talk about a new subject because I think it's important :
Medical assistance in dying (MAID) and why the current politics around this issues are HIGHLY problematic.
Quickly, you should start to see appear to type of people:
- Those who are against
- Those who are in favor of
Now.. Those who are against are usually using morality and religious beliefs to make their point. For them, helping people to end their life is immoral. This is a rather conservative and reactionnary point of view.
On the other side, you should see more progressive people (from leftists to liberals) in complete favor of such project.
Indeed, when you look at the testimonies, you will often see people in very hard conditions and non currable diseases who only have one wish : to die.
So when you are on the progressive side, you will tend to say that.. yes.. we should open those MAID to people everywhere.
PROBLEM:
When you look more closely to all the testimonies AND the testimonies of heath professionnals like doctors. They will tell you another story:
"I don't have another choice but to die"
Those are people who want to live, but in certain condition they will have no other solutions but to die.
In reality, this happens for a few reasons:
- Sometimes the prices of medication is too high or is not not refunded by social security
- Good palliative care are simply not possible because of a lack of equiments, ressources or personnal
- Reason (X)
I will keep the reason "X" for my conclusion.
For now, you need to understand that some people who will choose MAID actually want to live. But they will have no choice. This is because the system and most gov do not care to actually create the conditions for those people to live a happy life. Most health care are inexistant and when they are, some medication are simply not refunded. Pauverty and the lack of access to palliative care by the system is also the problem.
So you guessed it, the solution right now - even if it can help a minority - is NOT to allow MAID as it is, the solution is to create a system where people can LIVE before they choose to die and propose MAID as a LAST resort.
Sadly, this is not a solution that is prioritized by gov and the system. Health care are in a all time low, gov are privatizing more and more the medical sectors thus creating big problems such as a race for benefits... creating a lack of personnal, a lack of ressources and a lack of equiments.. the aid toward the military and security is prioritized over the aids toward social services and health care... Hospital and health professionnal in those institutions are crying for help etc.
And this is where I want to give you the last reason why people are pushed toward MAID:
- Because people are pushed to think themselve as a weight for their relative and for society
Yes, you heard that right some people are pushed to think of themselves as a weight for their relative and society... and you should start understanding where I'm going with this :
This is an example of structural violence
due to capitalism. (structural violence is grossly when the organization of a society creates thousands and thousands of death)
A society where people are pushed to believe that they must be productive in society, will inevitably push people who are not productive and incapable of creating productivity toward suicide.
So who does this targets ?
Well, first poor people, those who will likely not have the ressources to finance a medical assistance by themselves, then its will be old and sick... and then yeah... disabled people.
Imagine that :
In our societies today, some people will be literally pushed with a smile and with comments such as "you are so courageous", toward suicide.. simply because they have no others options or because they feel like a BURDEN for everyone else.
In other words, society is currently organizing itself (through the politics of capitalists) toward a system where people who are non productive will be pushed by law and society.. toward the solution of death simply because others refuse to create the conditions for their happyness.
And if you think that it will stop to disabled people.. you are missing the point.
What I'm talking about here ... is Eugenism.
A society organized toward a form of Eugenism through capitalism and democracy.
Soo .. what is the take away of this ?
Well:
- First, we all have a voice in society and we can all create the condition for change if we mobilize enough forces. So we, collectively NEED TO REJECT the world vision that is pushing us to see us and other people as tools of production for society. We are human beings, we are not machines created to produce. This also means that we must question beliefs system that pushes those vision (meritocracy is the biggest example)
- Second, we must reject the creation of those MAID if they are not created on a foundation of good paliative care and good social services for people in difficulty or handicap. We can NOT allow society to become an eugenist system where some will be pushed toward death because they can't afford to live.
