"Why I don't regret my abortion"

Religion is about searching for a greater meaning in human life in some kind of cosmic chess game, and antinatalism states that there is none. It is defined by the absence of religion as much as darkness is defined by the absence of light. And it's only unhealthy in the sense that ascribing some irrational meaning to life is healthy. In which case, basic atheism is also unhealthy (and there are statistics to back this up, showing that atheists tend to be less happy than religious people). If the healthiness of a philosophical outlook depends on suspension of objective reasoning, then I question the validity of that as an argument against antinatalism. I have no problem with the notion of making the most of this life whilst we have it. But where I draw the line is at taking a risk on behalf of someone else in order to enrich your own life, or based on the assumption that since you have a positive valuation of life that ensures that your offspring will share that valuation.



The only people who ascribe victim status to someone who has asked for a peaceful death and received it are those who believe in the sanctity of life. Therefore, organisations which propose the right to die across the board do not believe that there is any point in time where respecting someone's wish for death would make them a victim. They're a victim of people like yourself whilst they are alive, and if they were permitted the right to rational suicide, there would be no point at which they would be made to feel a victim or be made to feel that they were being forced into a regrettable decision.



See part 1, re "unhealthy". Nobody is put in peril if the right to die is based on respecting an individual's sincere personal wishes (whether that be the desire to die, or the desire to try every possible treatment and never give up on life). The majority of suicide attempts fail, and a prior failed suicide attempt is the biggest single predictor of a future suicide. Very few people lightly take the possibility of being maimed or going through severe pain for no avail, and even the most reliable suicide methods have possibility of failure. Furthermore, not everyone has access to the means to attempt suicide, such as those who are in care, or do not have independence. And just because someone may be mentally disturbed in some way, is not a humane justification for failing to care about their suffering.



Refusal to accept the futility of some cases of mental illness (or even basic unhappiness) is far from a reasonable response, because you're trying to deny the existence of cases which have resisted many different treatments. And the statistics bear out that failed suicide attempts are far from being freakish circumstances, and are instead more common than successful attempts. There is no moral justification for making suicide any more difficult than it needs to be, in terms of logistics, pain suffered by the individual, and the barrier posed by fear of harm.



Physician assisted suicide is simply one more way for a person to exercise their choice to commit suicide, and you appear to be in favour of making this choice as hard as possible to execute in practice.



If a form of suicide were available that would not involve physical pain or great discomfort, then this would help to overcome the instinct to avoid harm. For those who still are too scared to die, they would have the right to refuse the drugs at any time, like the cases that you allude to.



A fear is not manifestation of indecision. Agoraphobia is not 'indecision on whether or not to go outside', it is a debilitating fear. Thanatophobia is much the same, it is not an unmade decision on whether or not to die.



Why is contraception a problem for the child which may otherwise have been conceived. I have no difficulty in comprehending that good exists without religion; however 'good' is not the necessary or even desirable without consciousness and the prospect of being deprived of 'good'. An unborn person does not have the consciousness to crave good, and cannot be deprived of good.



The vast majority of people also have a broad agreement that human life does have some kind of objective purpose for its existence, and believe that their instincts represent objective truths rather than survival mechanisms. There is no need to consider the potential joy that a non-existent being may experience in the future, because as long as they are never brought into being, they will never have any use for that joy. Any kind of benefits to consciousness only need to be considered once that consciousness is actualised. Furthermore, the obligation to do no harm takes priority over the obligation to do good.



So what about those who suffer from terrible disabilities, who spend their entire lives in squalor, who develop debilitating illnesses, those who are homeless, those who are exploited, those who are harmed by others, etc? Where is the room for them in your analogy; do they simply get brushed under the rug, or vanish out of sight because they are inconvenient? And there is ample payment throughout the ride to maintain and fuel the vehicle and repair any damages caused by the hidden mines. And those who are not interested in taking the drive should be allowed to step out of the vehicle without any inconvenience and hand in their keys.



"F!cking them over" is to administer 20 courses of futile treatment (and then when all treatments have failed, you just say "we should treat the illness rather than allowing them to die") without respecting what the individual wants, and imprisoning the individual if they ever dare make their wishes explicit.



The 'bureaucracy' would be what ensures that nobody or almost nobody is vulnerable to being killed without their wishes. Being allowed to make a decision that you don't agree with is not vulnerability.



"Vulnerable" means that they don't really know their own minds and other people need to make their decisions for them. It relegates them to a lower legal status than most people. And how do we know that their legal status should be reduced? Because they want to make a decision that clashes with the metaphysical beliefs of the majority. And yet many, if not most mentally ill people are actually just like 'normal people', in that they uphold the same responsibilities, pay taxes, pay off their mortgage, etc.



They don't have the choice to go in comfort, without fear and without the risk of making a terrible mistake. They don't have the choice of notifying their family and friends and saying goodbye before taking the decision (because if they did, their plan would be foiled).



The fact that they are being imposed upon (even with the obligation to handle their own suicide and all the risks entailed) is victimising them. On the flipside, if they have never felt victimised, nor have ever had to deal with the repercussions of being victimised, then according to whom are they victims? Who gets to decide that they are victims if they have never felt victims and have never been unknowingly inconvenienced or trespassed against whilst having their wishes respected?



Because some form of imprisonment is the alternative to suicide for those who wish to end their suicidal ideation. In developed nations, they may get their bed, get nourished with mushy and bland food, but they are still captives. And certain forms of mental illness (including cases which are never successfully managed or cured) turn the brain into a torture dungeon, which they've no option but to endure for a lifetime. If it were possible to stimulate paranoid schizophrenia (as an example) in a healthy brain, then it would never be legal to inflict that as punishment for even the most reprehensible criminal atrocities; and yet those who oppose the right to die have no qualms about subjecting many innocent people to the same, when the only alternative would be death.



I wouldn't want to come out as gay in any place where my nature was not accepted and respected, or where they would force me to conform to their idea of normality rather than let me choose my own way. Those who are considered at 'risk' of suicide can be detained for an indefinite period. Those who are most mentally disturbed may not be successful at fooling the mental health professionals, and are thus sentenced to imprisonment for an indefinite term whilst still having to also deal with the symptoms of their mental illness. The NHS in the UK has been successfully sued for temporarily discharging patients for a home visit, who have then gone on to kill themselves, so have an incentive to impose indefinite imprisonment on those who are suicidal. 



The end effect is respect for individual differences and the right to choose.



Those who would be allowed to die would have no need for their hypothetical recovery, and the majority of those who did go on to die would represent futile cases in which a great many different options had been tried and had failed to bring the desired life satisfaction. Those who suffer from mental illness deserve the right to be able to trust the institutions which are charged with treating them; and forcible suicide prevention and the threat of long-term imprisonment can never be part of that.

This presumes without any basis whatsoever that the only reason to disregard the antinatalist argument is selfishness.

That is kind of a dumb thing to assume.

I don't think that it could be argued that it's only my opinion that non-existent people are not deprived of anything; or that bringing new life into existence will cause many to suffer without having first given their consent.



Obviously, the majority of opinion is that the suffering of those who end up with a lifetime of harm is 'worth it'; but I don't see why you would be morally justified in sanctioning a system which harms others in order to benefit you and people like you. I mean, we can all say that the deplorable conditions endured by sweatshop workers in places like China and Bangladesh is 'worth it' so that we in developed nations can enjoy the benefits of getting our clothes for cheaper. But who are we to say that someone else's suffering is a price worth paying, and then claim to be ethical people?