SynapsesAny suicide that isn’t preceded by careful deliberation, in full knowledge of its consequences, is undoubtedly a sad thing. Other suicides would often be tragic also, as much as I respect the freedom to make that choice, outside of the moralistic prescriptions of societal norms.
Teen suicide would often not be preceded by that deliberation. We’re more vulnerable then, and might be inclined to overestimate our misery, and underestimate our prospects for the future.
Allowing physician-assisted euthanasia (or suicide) is the morally correct thing to do, as I’ve argued many times in the past. This doesn’t however mean that any given attempt to make it legally permissible is sufficiently persuasive.
A court has to decide on the merits of the case before it, and the Supreme Court of Appeal’s decision to uphold an appeal by the Ministers of Justice and Health (among others), against the Pretoria High Court’s 2015 ruling permitting Stransham-Ford’s assisted suicide, seems to have been the correct one.
