Self Determination, right to die.

So as seems to be fairly common at the moment, as I ready myself to talk about a subject, a media frenzy kicks up about the same subject. Today it was the death of Tony Scott, the film director who grew up within miles of where I live, who ended his own life apparently as the result of receiving a grim medical diagnosis.

The main sticking point when discussing suicide seems to be an innate need to justify and understand the act in an objective fashion. To lay out a one size fits all set of circumstances under which we as the mass conscious can accept the act, without attaching to it a prerequisite of an indefinable intention based almost deontological value judgement.

Cases like Mr. Scott's are the border on which Assisted Suicide advocates rally, they argue that the circumstances of soon to be diminishing mental capacity, physical capability and immanent pain mandate a stance of allowing the individual the right to make autonomous decisions while still possible, and aiding in the facilitation of such acts if the agent is no longer capable.

This is a stance I just can't see as being fully realised. If you assign a value on life, and you state that that value can be removed/ negated by adding in a set amount of future pain and debilitation it's ultimately arbitrary to overly define those required negatives. Although the need to stringently define suicide is felt even in it's title, and the way it is commonly used only for those deaths in which some morally acceptable condition is absent, voluntary euthanasia, martyrdom. Thus attaching a negative connotation to any perceived suicide attempt, whenever the word is used, the decision to end the life of the agent by the agent themselves already judged as flawed and unworthy of full understanding.

If the intention of an act is to cause ones own death, knowingly and with full capacity to make said decision, I see no reason at all to relegate that decision into a subcategory of suicide, Voluntary Euthanasia is merely acceptable suicide, understandable by the masses, and Martyrdom merely self annihilation for a "greater cause". Arguing the merits of intention, be they to escape future pain or lack of capacity, or dying for the greater good I believe skips the main point. The autonomy of the one making the choice.

I see no reason to deny the rational choices of any individual with the capacity to make them. Who else can define the value subjectively speaking of their own life apart from the agent themselves.

I would grant anyone with the capacity to make their own decision the right to self autonomy.

Anon Anon

Depression ..being repressed by hopelessness.

So after yesterdays post there was something I actively wanted to address, but again I think I need to put my thoughts in order before I attempt it at a later date. The surest way I can see of doing such, is to lay out my history with depression. It's something I've written about in the past, but time as always provides perspective, and often the things we wish could be left behind are the things we need to revisit.

When I think about my life, in general broad sweeps of time, I remember having a happy childhood. Yet when I actively think about my childhood, I don't remember being carefree and full of the joys of being a kid after being about 8. I began to notice a distance between myself and my peer group, I was already the youngest kid in my class, but emotionally I seemed to always be immature. I also remember being very self conscious, I was constantly being dragged into things I was neither interested in nor ready for. Constantly in fights, but normally because I was in the wrong place at the wrong time, or someone else manipulated me into defending them.

I was inept at social politics.

By the time I was 16, I was all but an outcast, and actively began to despise school. Even now I feel very little but pure hatred when I think of my high-school and my treatment within, not only by the students, but by several members of staff as well. Academically I was expected to do well, from being 13 the teachers had told my parents that I was Oxbridge bound, and so the encouragement stopped and the expectation began.

This, I think, was the first real bout of depression, and social anxiety that I suffered through. My attendance trickled down to below the bare minimum required. I can still remember a sunny afternoon sat in my bedroom, staring into a large mirror contemplating serious self harm for the very first time. Then it all got worse, rapidly. I dropped out of school completely, my parents separated and divorced, and I was officially diagnosed with clinical depression, all by the time I was 17.

At 19 I returned to a College, still depressed, feeling worthless because of my failure to keep my life moving, feeling the crushing weight of the lost moments, years of my life. Regrets continued to destroy me, all I could feel was what I had lost. I tried to kill myself in the November, I was hospitalised after taking a massive overdose of pretty much every medication I could lay my hands on, which was needless to say ... substantial. I left a suicide note, I left a video file on my computer explaining everything I felt I had left unsaid, and I went to bed. I woke up about 18 hours later in an agony that I'd never experienced before, and never wish to again.

I kept trying to go back to sleep, to ignore the burning pain, but eventually I went seeking help. I never wanted to HURT myself, I never wanted to cause myself pain. My suicide attempt was the very antithesis of such an act, it was an attempt to stop the pain, because to me my very existence was pain. It was a mercy. I fucked up. My Mom found me, made me explain what was wrong, and this is where things get fuzzy. I remember being in an ambulance, being questioned as to what I'd taken and when. I remember being in a Hospital bed, my Dad was now there, I don't know where my Mom went. I remember my Dad sitting with me while a Doctor hooked me up to an I.V. with some form of antidote to the crap shutting down my organs in my system, I remember telling him I could feel ice flowing up my arm, past my elbow, my shoulder. Then it started to burn. It felt like I was on fire, internally .. and I started to scream. From there on out I hallucinated throughout the night, the next morning I was told I'd had a reaction, but that it was that or live without kidneys, so .. horrific visions of blood and gore it was.

I won't go through my hospital stay, how I heard whispers of pity and condescension, how I scared one of the younger doctors with my emotionless analytical and logical breakdown of why I attempted to end my own life. How a Consultant Psych mentioned schizophrenia after reading and watching what I'd left behind, or being withheld clothing and being watched in the bathroom. The crying of my younger siblings. Or how when it came to being assessed for the "funny farm" I just out-talked the young guy I was left with and told him everything he wanted to hear so I could go home. I was rational, and I'd have passed any capacity test I was put in front of.

Anyways, I returned to College finished and excelled in my education, took all the anti-depressants I was told to, attended every therapy session I was scheduled and ultimately was eventually also diagnosed with agoraphobia.I then went on to have a foreign adventure, fall in love, have my heart broken and go to University.

My next major bout with depression came in my second year of University, one of my best friends died, my girlfriend went on study abroad to Australia, and I felt alone. But I quickly found a GP, started medication and worked through it eventually getting a solid 2:1 and my shit together.

When the Undergrad, Postgrad and love-life all fell away however depression was waiting for me. I'm aware things can get better, I'm aware life can change in an instant, that amazing things can happen. Now however the question I've been left with is, can the hope of something better truly offset the pain of a currently empty and unfulfilled life? I don't know, but I'm still searching daily for enough small moments of joy to make it all worth while.

So what is my depression to me, it's a cold analytical weighing of the good in my life versus the bad. It's an anxiety which freezes me, and locks me into my house, into a room in my house at times. The sure knowledge that acting will lead to pain, and the fear that the pain will tear me apart. It's the cast iron belief that I've already had every golden moment in my life and the rest of it is shit. That my potential was a lie, that what I've become is all I was ever worth. It's waking up crying, and so sad that you can't imagine ever smiling again. It's insomnia, it's going days without sleep, and knowing the longer it lasts the more unhinged you'll become. 

It's the clarity that only comes from sitting in a pitch black room with your eyes closed and focusing on the worst aspects of life, it's suffocating. It's not having the energy or desire to move, to eat, to bath, to continue at all. It is not apathy I care very strongly about it all, I'm just left listless and lacking any drive to do anything but avoid more pain.

It's withdrawing, it's literally not speaking to anyone who doesn't force their company on me for weeks, months. Depression is needing to spend every moment alone. It's a crushing weight of guilt.

It's suicidal ideation, it's scouring for every piece of information on ways to end it all. It is knowing, that ending the pain is preferable to living within it.

Anon Anon.

Self-Determination .. real Freedom.

Ok, so I'm going to get the auto-biographical and personal side of this out of the way with first. I fully intended to keep posting here without any real breaks to my writing, honestly I need the release and platform on which to vent.

My latest post was on the 19th of July, on the 21st my Step-Grandmother died at home. Hence the break. But back to Isabella, she was 91 and six weeks before her death she had been in respite care while my Parents went on a holiday. Her eyesight was deteriorating and her mobility was becoming increasingly more limited, but at 91 the biggest health crises of her life was having her appendix removed at 14.

When she came out of care however, a stay which lasted only 3 weeks, it was with massive haematoma's on both legs due to falls while in care, and more tellingly a diagnosis of Vascular Dementia. Gone was the self reliant ex Nurse, and here was a frail, confused, frightened and very ill woman. She suddenly needed full-time care, and it took 3 of us to provide it.

When she died it was sudden, and she was with her son (my step-dad) with me in the next room over. Meaningless platitudes about having a good innings, and a decent run followed from all, and brought comfort to none. Death itself was quick and I believe painless, but those final six weeks were hell. It was one degradation after another, and there was nothing intrinsically valuable left in life at that point.

She was lacking all in capacity, autonomy and ability for self-determination by the end. She was also lacking in all quality of life, and this was merely a severe 6 week decline. I cannot imagine the assault on the life not only of the sufferer but also on the family that  a long term battle with dementia must be, it has left us all shaken, and questioning.

I cannot myself imagine an end more horrifying, and if I could leave legally binding future directives right now setting out a self determined plan for a death with dignity in the event of such a devastating loss of capacity I would have already done so.

The High-Court has thrown the ball to Parliament however via the Tony Nicklinson case, and christ I hope they get their skates on. I don't often praise the current Tory regime, but thank whatever deity you wish that they're not a bunch of religious fundamentalists like their American counterparts. The GOP would proudly proclaim the sanctity of life and let all in it's wake be fucked. I have higher hopes for Europe, and the U.K. in particular. Belgium, Holland, Luxembourg and Switzerland leading the way to dignity and a progressive stance on end of life determination.

I'll leave it at that, I don't want to get bottled down tonight ...

Anon Anon

Prose - I love you

I hate you; you’ve poisoned this world for me. Every moment since, has been a moment filled with agony, with loss.


Every single fucking second of my existence is now a chasm, void of light, laughter and hope.


Before you, my life was bleak; it was in fact a dreary monotonous drudge of an existence. It was grey, and lacked flavour, it was in fact what at the time I would have described as lacking anything vital. I existed but I did not live.


Then you arrived, and you brought laughter, and hope, you brought a magnificent pulsating edge of vibrant life, and you gifted it to me. I spent hours, mindlessly and inexplicably happy. Your smile could make my day, your laugh lift my spirits, hearing you snore make me feel secure. My life was filled from your exuberance with whimsy and joy.


It burned then, with passion, with need with desire. I longed for you, and I allowed myself to need. With my need came hope. It was a small and fragile thing, tempered with my own misgivings, flawed with my own insecurities. But it grew, and you dashed it and re-forged it stronger and brighter and sharper.


You made me hope, you allowed me to hope. You owned me, and I was consumed in us. I could abandon loneliness and exist beyond myself, exist within us, our life. You made me want to be more; I wanted to be a better man for you. I saw myself growing, I saw myself being someone worthy of having this love.


Then you died. My life was no longer vivid, and it could never again be greyscale. It was and is now only the absence. A void, what’s missing is you, what’s missing is hope.


I hate you because you left me. You left me and you took all the colour, and all the hope, you took the future with you. I’ll never forgive you for being the best thing that ever happened to me. I’ll never forgive you for being the woman who I dream about every night. I’ll never forgive you, because I love you.


I hate you.

More Penis than I really want ...

Ok for some reason, I'm talking about Penis again..

I was reading Nathan Emmerich (@BioethicsUK) piece he just linked too and immediately felt the need to vent.

He starts out by stating:
One aspect of the German court’s ruling is that circumcision is, somehow, tantamount to allowing individuals other than the child to determine his religion and, therefore, denies the child the right to choose their own religion.
Which is a notion that causes me to desire a 3rd hand so I could triple facepalm. I follow the point that yes children/infants lack the autonomy and possibly the capacity to make these decisions for themselves, and even as an atheist I can see the value in being raised within a strong cultural surrounding and the feeling of belonging which that can bring. But there's a difference between raising a child with a set of beliefs that they can later challenge through vigorous thought and debate, raising a child with more material cultural traits forms of dress or grooming for example which again as a free agent later in life those raised in these cultures can cast away, and raising a child in a culture which mutilates the genitalia of it's infants.


He continues:
What we can, I think, say is that male circumcision causes very little harm and certainly causes nothing like the harm that female genital mutilation causes.


Fuck that, fuck that right there, the fictitious FLAMING TREVOR religion of Africa plucks out both eyes of all females, however the global religion of the WETNWILD WILFREDS only plucks out one eye of all males while infant ... should we excuse the WILFREDS? Is it not quite as bad so should we be content to just let shit be? Underselling the deaths, the complications, and even in the perfect procedure the FORCED removal of nerve endings in the genetalia of infants for any reason because others have it worse is beyond inane.

He wraps it all up with:
in the spirit of mutual respect we should embrace the contemporary moral diversity and the traditions that constitute it. If that means tolerating circumcision or, rather, not being intolerant of those whose traditional cultural and religious practices include circumcision - a relatively harmless practice - 


We don't espouse freedom of religion and moral relativism when it's backing up something ethically repugnant such as cannibalism. Fuck respect when it ends in the condoning of any abuse. Parents signing their children up for elective surgery to amputate any part of their anatomy for any reason non-medical is abuse, and religious loop-holes need to be sealed shut. I applaud Germany, for taking a progressive stance on a practice all too easily brushed under the rug, we must stop condoning this shit just because it's common, or for fear of being labelled anti-Semitic.

As I stated yesterday figures show 117 male infants died last year in the United States due to complications with this easy and quick unnecessary procedure. FUCK that .. and fuck anyone refusing to be objective when looking at this.

Merkel fears Foreskin backlash from Jewish community.

“I do not want Germany to be the only country in the world in which Jews cannot practise their rites,” Merkel is quoted as saying “Otherwise we would make ourselves a laughing stock among nations.”

Obviously, historically speaking the German nation has reason to be touchy about being attacked for showing anti-Semitism, but in this case the German people can be proud of their human rights stance. Backing down now over fears of blatantly false accusations shows nothing but a lack of resolve and metal when actively pushing forward a progressive and much needed stance on Human rights.

Following is a post I wrote on male circumcision over a year ago, yet as with all ethical subjects, the base argument holds throughout the test of time to still remain valid.

Posted   Saturday, 7 May 2011 at 12:37

So I’m going to preface this with a disclaimer that nothing I say below is directed to anyone that I know, so if I upset anyone it’s completely unintentionally. But I would ask that if something I say raises your hackles, please examine your beliefs, examine why you believe them; ultimately if you’re still pissed talk to me about it.

So what’s pissing me off, basically it’s something close to my heart ... my penis; or at least the penis as a whole, and the routine unnecessary mutilation of the male genetalia. Male genital mutilation is generally known as circumcision, and this is where I lose all my support with most of the world.  Because it’s simply accepted, in fact not only is it an accepted societal norm in America (suggested figures of 70% are not at the high end of the estimates) and at around 30% worldwide. I’m discussing the generally accepted means of male circumcision here, not some weird out there crazy remove the entire penis thing, I’m pissed about the removal of foreskin.

I try to keep informed on matters of Medical Ethics, I’m into it ... so when this cropped up "Now a Dead Link" (The death of a 2yr old boy Jamaal Coleson Jr in the U.S. who died during complications arising through circumcision), I obviously jumped all over it. Especially in the current climate where there is a motion in California to ban all circumcision without consent of the individual being circumcised. Effectively banning all infant circumcision, the outcry from parents pissed about infringements on their right to choose has been ridiculous.

I flat out reject ANY religious reasoning, the idea that a divine mandate exists to get men to offer up their foreskins to god is archaic nonsense. In what civilized country would any Medical professional allow a parent to make the decision to AMPUTATE a part of their child for religious reasons. Well pretty much everywhere. It’s a disgusting loophole within our system that needs closing immediately.

So what about the basic reasoning as to why we should permit this to continue, well the arguments are generally as follows.

1. The foreskin is redundant it serves no purpose. –Bullshit, total and utter bullshit. The foreskin contains over 20,000 sexually receptive nerve endings, to remove it removes a distinct part of the male sexual experience, it is the MOST sensitive part of the penis and it holds virtually ALL of the fine-touch nerve receptors within the penis. The foreskin also provides a protective covering for the glans and the glide mechanism.
2.  Aesthetics. It looks better, females find it more attractive.-- FUCK THAT, men find big boobs attractive that doesn't mean all infant females should have implants. If the societal norm called for females to only have 2 fingers on their left hands because it was pretty how many would be signing their kids up for digit removal.
3. Cleanliness. Good parents DO NOT CUT OFF BITS because you can’t teach your children how to use SOAP.

Within the US there are NO other non-medically necessary infant amputative surgeries allowed purely on the say so of the parent. You can’t elect to have your child’s tonsils removed, nor their appendix.

So what makes circumcision so medically compelling to allow.

One of the major grounds put forth is the idea that it cuts down on the risk of penile cancer, .. well obviously if you REMOVE something you can’t get cancer in it. Penile cancer is less common than male breast cancer, but infant males aren’t subjected to double mastectomies.

The next medical reason often cited specifically in the States is that it helps cut down on HIV/Aids infection, but there is no clear correlation of this when comparing the US to Europe, Europe having about 1/5 of the number of circumcisions and about a 10 times lower rate of HIV infection. Within Africa where this is being argued hard as a means of dealing with the tragic infection numbers, results are even more confusing, Cameroon, Rwanda, Lesotho, Malawi, Tanzania, Ghana and Swaziland all show higher HIV rates in the circumcised, while Ethiopia, Cote d’Ivoire, Uganda, Burkina Faso and Kenya show the exact opposite. Leading me to generally dismiss the entire notion until some definitive correlation is drawn.

My medical facts. Complications can happen IN EVERY medical procedure, the rates of these complications are widely speculated about. But figures show 117 male infants died last year in the United States due to complications with this easy and quick unnecessary procedure.

So if you’re a female and you like dick nice and circumcised, well done you’re perpetuating a disgusting abuse and mutilation of the male gender. If you’re having kids and want your son to look like his daddy, PLEASE reconsider. Abusing further generations because it’s been done in previous generations is at best lazy, at worst the willing perpetuation of a cycle of abuse for nothing more than the shallowest of reasons. If you’re a male and you’ve been circumcised and you think this is all out of proportion because you “work fine” I’m sorry that you never got to experience what it was meant to be like for you, but don’t let your vanity and pride take that opportunity away from your sons. If they want a circumcision when they’re old enough to know what it means, and old enough to know what they’d be losing AND risking then that’s their choice, please don’t make it for them.

An Initial Inane Ramble.

So life is odd.




I’m rapidly approaching my thirty-first (31) birthday and my life is not what I expected it to be, by a long shot. I’m not even talking about it not living up to the hype, or the youthful dreams of glory and wealth. Instead I’m talking about still having absolutely no idea of what direction it is taking, what shape it is forming into.


Sure I can say my life is disappointing, but considering I tried and clearly failed to commit suicide at 19, I have achieved things since then. I’ve lived in a foreign country, been engaged twice, I was in a 5 year long relationship with a woman I adored, returned to school, received praised and media attention for my A-Level results, went to university and didn’t leave until I had bachelors in Law and Philosophy (2:1), completing a Masters in Law and the Post Graduate Diploma (Commendations) needed to practice law in the U.K. I made a ton of friends. I loved and I lost.


But on the other end of this fantastic journey that I had no hope of having when I was still
mired in my teens, I’m living at home, with little prospects, little social life and staring down the barrel of hopelessness again. I’ve lived my entire adult life with depression and agoraphobia. At my worst I find it hard to step outside my home, sometimes my bedroom because of the panic and anxiety coming into contact even with my own family can cause. At my best I have stood in front of a lecture theatre filled with 500 people, given speeches and won student body elections based on my performance.


Despite being tipped for big things, and achieving academically all along my student years, the law career simply never happened. I applied, and applied, and applied for every job that even looked like an in into a legal career and despite interviews going well and C.V’s being well received, no one took the chance. I still apply, they still don’t jump. On a more personal note the love of my University days, craved freedom rather than the constraints of a relationship and the friends I made, went out into the world and scattered forging their own paths.


I’m crippled with indecision, with the financial burdens of Post-Graduate education, and with the encircling certainty that somewhere along the road I’ve just plain fucked up through that indecision way too often to drag it all back.
I’m the oldest of 3 siblings, and my Dad was 21 when I was born. Ten years further along a journey I know ends only one way, I feel a million miles away from that existence.


So why am I writing, I’m hoping that as I ramble I become entrenched in an idea, a notion, a plan of action. Whether it be of my own devising or someone else’s I don’t care. But the last time my life was so listless, I wrote. I wrote constantly. It lead me to education. The last time I was happy, at University, I was writing constantly.


The more I delve into my own mindset, the more I explore my thoughts and feelings on the world, the more I care about what is happening around me, the more I engage. I need to engage again.


Aristotle famously said that all paid work absorbs and degrades the mind. Well my mind is pretty much unsullied, I wish someone would let me get dirty every now and again. The next time I’m told I’m overqualified for an entry level position I might crawl into a foetal position there and then and cry myself into a coma. The job I want wants me to have more experience, the job I can get that experience in thinks I’m overqualified. The idea of returning to and hiding in academia for all eternity via a Ph.D. etc. scares the hell out of me, because I know how negatively the Masters and the P.G.Dip have harmed my employability.


Where’s Picard to tell me to just “Make It So” when I need him.


If anyone made it through this, I apologise for it’s lack of flow and overarching plot, it was indeed a rather inane ramble. I’m going to be posting thoughts on ethical and political topics as I see fit generally, but also Nerd centric social topics and of course the disasters I face personally.


 anon, anon