Talk:Assisted suicide

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 14 August 2019 and 21 December 2019. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Nadiasayed2525.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 14:52, 16 January 2022 (UTC)

Netherlands is the first country in the world formally to legalise euthanasia.

In Wikipedia, it didn’t mention Netherlands is the first country in the world formally to legalise euthanasia. I think it should be added since there is a sentence in Wikipedia that voluntary euthanasia was legalized in Colombia (in 1997), the Netherlansa (in 2002). It’s not correct. Colombia is not the first country to legalize the euthanasia. It will mislead reader. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Xxchen1999 (talk • contribs) 20:56, 2 October 2018 (UTC)

This has since been added to the article. -- Beland (talk) 02:09, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

Also known as killing

"If a person is unable to provide consent it is referred to as non-voluntary euthanasia. Killing a person who does not want to die, or who is capable of giving consent and whose consent has not been solicited, is the crime of involuntary euthanasia, and is regarded as murder."

While it seems in that some people have confused the issue, the above statement is clear. Given this, should not the article be balanced and avoid the danger of being seen to be pushing a pro-euthanasia point of view? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.151.2.22 (talk) 07:25, 3 May 2023 (UTC)

Yes, that's what the article says and the article does aim to be neutral. The intent of your comment is somewhat unclear; is there a specific change to that wording you would like to propose? -- Beland (talk) 02:06, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

While it is less one correction that is required to be made in the interests of balance, does not the general tone of the article need to be changed? 91.110.75.1 (talk) 08:14, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

What specific passages do you find contribute to an unbalanced tone? -- Beland (talk) 18:48, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

Decent End of Life Care

Could this article highlight that the debate on 'Assisted Suicide' did not just appear from nowhere, but is part of long-running campaign? Then again, if the article is to fully report concerns about quality of life and death, then might it not highlight calls for better funding of first-rate end of life care? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.149.166.137 (talk) 09:14, 21 July 2023 (UTC)

Various advocacy organizations and dates of various advocacy documents are already mentioned in the article. It's unclear what you mean by "long-running"; do you have specific facts you want to see included or reliable sources that could be cited? -- Beland (talk) 02:04, 23 June 2024 (UTC)

Requested move 30 November 2024

Assisted suicide → Assisted dying – I propose moving the content from "Assisted suicide" to "Assisted dying", which is currently a disambiguation page, based on the following Wikipedia policies and rationales:

• WP:NPOV considerations: The term "suicide" carries a meaning and connotations that do not accurately represent the legal medical procedure as practiced in many of the jurisdictions where it is permitted, particularly outside the United States. "Assisted dying" is a significantly more neutral terminology, encompassing the more American terminology of "Physician-Assisted Suicide", which is typically said to entail the patient themselves initiating the process of death at their life's end, as well as euthanasia, which is typically differentiated as the doctor taking the active means to end the patient's life. Medical Aid in Dying (MAiD) is also certainly becoming quite common, but after performing a review of the topic, it still does not seem to be the term in primary use outside of Canada. My initial inclination was to rename this article "Medical Aid in Dying", but that does not appear to comply with WP:COMMONNAME.

• International usage in Anglophone newspapers of record: A review of the terminology in major English-language newspapers of record worldwide shows a mix of terminology, but a reasonably clear preference for "assisted dying" that only seems to be increasing as the procedure gains more worldwide acceptance:
  • United Kingdom: Financial Times, BBC, The Guardian
  • North America: The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Globe and Mail
  • Australia/NZ: The Sydney Morning Herald,The New Zealand Herald
  • Ireland: The Irish Times
  • Africa: Mail & Guardian (South Africa), Daily Nation (Kenya)
  • Asia: South China Morning Post, The Hindu, The Times of India, New Straits Times, Bangkok Post, Philippine Daily Inquirer
  • Caribbean: Jamaica Gleaner

• Search trends and public usage: Google Trends data demonstrates the increasing prominence of "assisted dying" over "assisted suicide": https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=today%203-m&q=assisted%20dying,assisted%20suicide&hl=en

I propose this move to reflect current terminology while acknowledging both terms' usage. The proposed change would:

• Move the current content to "Assisted dying"
• Create a redirect from "Assisted suicide"
• Maintain searchability for both terms

References

Sincerely, AndAllForWhat? (talk) 03:58, 30 November 2024 (UTC)

Oppose In following some of the links provided, and in conducting searches, it seems that there are two senses in which assisted dying is employed. One, per this article in the BBC, is as a term to cover a subset of assisted suicide (https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-47158287) and the other is as a broader term than assisted suicide which includes euthanasia (https://www.maxim.org.nz/article/faq1-euthanasia-and-assisted-suicide/). Even Dignity in Dying UK, who advocate for this, distinguish between the two terms (https://www.dignityindying.org.uk/blog-post/assisted-dying-not-assisted-suicide/) and use assisted dying as a subset of assisted suicide. Thus I do not see the two terms as interchangable because there is too much ambiguity in the term assisted dying, while there seems to be none with assisted suicide as used in this article, and what seems to be the most common use of the term only coverss a subset of the topic discussed here. We discuss this issue in the article under terminology.- 04:53, 30 November 2024 (UTC) Bilby (talk) 04:53, 30 November 2024 (UTC)

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TL;DR of my Response to Bilby: Given the pre-existing usage on Wikipedia and (most importantly) WP:NPOV concerns, as well as what I perceive to be primary usage of the term "Assisted dying" to cover all of the practices covered in the article, I think "Assisted dying" would be the best term until the English terminology used worldwide stabilizes.

Full Response, with justifications and citations:

The Maxim Institute article you cited says, "Assisted dying can take two forms: euthanasia or assisted suicide." Since the article Assisted suicide deals extensively with both, mentioning euthanasia 99 times, wouldn't that mean Assisted dying is the most appropriate name for the article?

It seems like a lot of the problem here is that several outlets describe the definitions as being in flux, and they do appear to be in flux.

The BBC says in the cited article above that "[t]here is some debate over exactly what the various terms mean." The BMJ says, "Proponents and opponents of assisted dying do not all agree on the terminology used to describe the process." - https://www.bmj.com/assisted-dying

If the name is currently in flux, I think we should, at a minimum, at least defer to how it's currently used on Wikipedia.

The first paragraph of Assisted suicide says, "It has been formerly referred to as physician-assisted suicide (PAS) or assisted suicide, but is now more commonly referred to as assisted dying or medical aid in dying."

Per WP:COMMONNAME, how can we defend the article itself saying it is more commonly referred to as "assisted dying" or "medical aid in dying"?

In the terminology section of Assisted suicide#Terminology, the article notes, "the term 'assisted dying' is also used to refer to other practices like voluntary euthanasia and terminal sedation," citing some academic resources. The article mentions the words "euthanasia" 99 times, indicating the appropriate name of the article is "assisted dying."

Additionally, the current Assisted dying page already groups them all together.

From a colloquial grammatical basis, it does also seem to me that since "euthanasia", "assisted suicide", "medical aid in dying", "physician-assisted suicide" all involve dying, if we want an article that encompasses all of them (which we currently have), assisted dying would be the best title to encompass all of them?

I think, more holistically, using the phrase "Assisted Suicide" to describe all of the practices in the article comes off as a WP:NPOV. For instance, in regards to the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill passed by MPs today, the mainstream British press has used "Assisted dying" to describe the bill. Examples from The Times, the BBC, and ITV: https://www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/article/assisted-dying-mps-vote-for-legalisation-bill-in-england-and-wales-d6w3760pt, https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/crmzgmz1meno, and https://www.itv.com/news/2024-11-25/itv-news-assisted-dying-vote-tracker-how-do-mps-intend-to-vote-on-the-bill.

However, opponents have used the phrase "Assisted suicide". Examples: Vatican News, the official news portal of the Vatican and the Holy See, and Care Not Killing: https://www.vaticannews.va/en/church/news/2024-11/faith-leaders-in-the-uk-sign-letter-against-assisted-suicide.html and https://www.carenotkilling.org.uk/press-releases/poll-62-say-assisted-dying-too-complex-to-rush/.

So, given the pre-existing usage on Wikipedia and (most importantly) WP:NPOV concerns, as well as what I perceive to be primary usage of the term "Assisted dying" to cover all of the practices covered in the article, I think "Assisted dying" would be the best term until the English terminology used worldwide stabilizes. - AndAllForWhat? (talk) 06:55, 30 November 2024 (UTC)

I think you may be mistaken in how you describe this article. It is not about both assisted suicide and euthanasia. Euthanasia is covered in euthanasia. Therefore the use of assisted dying to refer to both terms does not help us here, and this is why we currently have [assisted dying]] point to assisted suicide (here), euthanasia and palliative sedation. If you wish for an article that covers all three I suppose you could expand the existing assisted dying page. But I can't see how renaming one of the three, and ignoring the other two, helps.

Perhaps expanding the existing assisted dying article to better explain the different topics it covers would be a better idea? - Bilby (talk) 07:43, 30 November 2024 (UTC)