Y
O
U
DE
CI
DE
Livi
ng
life,
dyi
ng
on
you
r
ter
ms.
Wh
DEATH WITH DIGNITY 1
Death with Dignity
People walk down sidewalks, drive down roads, thinking and even dreaming of the lives that
others live every day. Adventuring to the movie because of a famous actor or actress and wishing
that they could gain the financial freedom or stardom of others and to do the things that
accompanies those freedoms. Watching in awe on the way these people live their own lives their
own way without anyone stopping them or interfering in any way. Even children in schools who
accomplish so much in athletics, the arts, grades are look up to with admirers who wish to be
them and watch from afar just enjoying and dreaming to be them. Because these are all positive
things and people imagine them in their own life, interfering usually is not an option and rarely
even questioned. Now imagine these same people whom everyone has let them live life their
own way decide that their time has come, because of something fatal that will eventually take
their life, and want to take their own life. Those same people who let you live your own life your
own way without interference now want to stop you from dying with dignity because it isn’t
what they want. Let’s decide now whether “Death with Dignity” is the right of one’s self or
dying painful, long term, and even unmemorable existence is the rights of others to decide for
you.
Decisions of Life or Death
The decisions to live life or to die on your own terms is a topic that causes many to ask who
has the rights to determine the life of others. Recently in the news was the story of Brittany
Maynard. Brittany Maynard was a 29 year old woman that was suffering months of debilitating
headaches (Maynard, B. (2015)). After going to the doctors she found out that she had brain
cancer at such a young age. Being so young, yet fighting a fatal cancer, the decision to live or die
DEATH WITH DIGNITY 2
because the center of her life. If she was alone, the decision might have been easier but she had
been married for a year. Brittany went through many doctors’ visits, procedures, and research to
no avail as the tumor grew and became more aggressive. Final diagnosis was a prognosis of six
months to live. Dealing with the idea of what is to come, the remaining quality of life, the pain to
