Compulsory euthanasia is still a long way over the horizon, Jeni, but I suspect the voluntary sort will rise up the political agenda in the next 15-20 years, as the baby-boomers reach their 80’s & 90’s. At least I hope so - I want it as an option for myself when I get there a decade later.
Quick links: NewsBiscuit Home • Chat Room • Writers' Room • Top Ten
Quantitative easing etc.
(49 posts) (15 voices)
-
The All New Jeni B
offlineMemberAll points taken. I wasn't for one moment suggesting that we should kill off our elderly, far from it.
JFR, I couldn't agree more with regards to voluntary euthanasia though, having watched family members suffer and die slowly, if I were to be in their position I'd want the option to choose when to go.
But what is the solution? Ultimately, whatever course is taken, it will cause upset.Posted 1 year ago # -
beau-jolly
offlineMemberQuaz: "The road to Hell is paved with MBAs." I fully agree, despite having an MBA myself. I was a "mature" student of 39. I did it full-time over 12 months and paid for it myself. (I blew a redundancy package because I wanted a year off and some intellectual stimulation). The majority of other matures did it part-time while working. The full-timers were mainly kids in their 20s from all over the globe but with no work experience. They were shockingly naive, but had wealthy parents.
I remember one guy who came across from the USA. He turned up at the wrong university as he had got lost, but still enrolled. Throughout the year he couldn't find his arse with both hands behind his back and barely scraped though every module, re-sitting most. He was the sort of stupid which is too stupid to realise he was stupid. (Is that “hubris”?) He eventually headed off to London, clutching his MBA, intending to work in the City. I have no idea what happened to him but, if he managed to find London, I suspect he is now very wealthy.Posted 1 year ago # -
The All New Jeni B
offlineMemberIt's the same with the degree I'm doing beau. Three mature students who are there by choice and a bunch of kids many of whom are only there because it "Seemed like a good idea."
They consistently fail modules or barely scrape by as many of them have yet to grasp that a rudimentary knowledge of spelling, world affairs, politics and history is also necessary.
Many of them didn't know that you have to register to be eligible to vote, and even fewer understood that we have a two-tier Parliament!
Yet they will inevitably scrape a degree, the same with the Post-Grad diploma, and in just a few short years will be qualified to defend someone in Court.
I honestly believe that there should be a minimum age requirement for certain degrees.Posted 1 year ago # -
beau-jolly
offlineMemberQuite right Jeni. Also, there is no grading so 40.5% is the same degree as 69.5%. 70%+ meant "with distinction" so I was inspired to get a better degree than the f*ck-wits who were just there for the ride.
Mark Twain said, "All you need to succeed is ignorance and arrogance". I'm proud to say that's me stuffed on both counts!
Posted 1 year ago # -
beau-jolly
offlineMember...and it's not just the students. We had a 60yo professor teaching "The political context of management" who's first words were, "Has anyone ever worked for the private sector? - I haven't". FFS. How does that qualify you to teach business?
Posted 1 year ago # -
The All New Jeni B
offlineMemberIt's in part to prove a point to my eternally disagreeable Grandmother that I aim to graduate with distinction, and partly to show that hard work and determination can help achieve something.
Invariably, it is the mature students who attain the highest grades for modules, and who are put forward to represent the Uni in international debating competitions etc.
I don't for one minute consider myself to be clever enough to sail through without working at it, yet some of the younger students think that they can.
Posted 1 year ago # -
dvo4fun
offlineMemberOne student on my 'mature student' only Social Work course popped his notebook into his pocket and bid us cheerio upon learning that attendance at lectures was 'not a requirement of the course'.
So when the distinction came through (coughs modestly and looks at shoes) I did feel that I'd earned a better pass than the smug lazy sod. However, many years later I met him again in a lift somewhere - he was on his way to deliver training to students in the same specialist area we had both chosen.
Posted 1 year ago # -
beau-jolly
offlineMemberOne side knowing more than the other as a reason for market failure is always referred to as "hetrogenous expectation" (or HE) in MBA speak. This is not so much elitism as a way of ensuring the original author always gets the correct citation.
Irrelavant to the line of this thread, I know, but it is economics and opens the interesting vein of management-babble. It is also a reason for the resent original market failure as people were buying bundles of shite while the seller off-loading them wrapped them up in such a way that the pile of poo was not easily seen. If you don't know whether what you are buying is poo or not, you have to assume everything is poo.Posted 1 year ago # -
John Ffitch-Rucker
offlineMemberJeni,
I empathise; my mum died a horrible, lingering death from bowel cancer last year. Her oft expressed opinion was that it’s farcical that we can treat our cats, dogs and horses with greater compassion than our parents, for at least we can give our pets a serene and welcome end to suffering. If you’re human, tough; stay here and suffer, ‘cause that’s what the Christian ‘God’ and his imbecile followers wants.Posted 1 year ago # -
The All New Jeni B
offlineMemberAbsolutely John.
Sorry to hear about your Mum, I lost my Grandfather, slowly, as a series of Strokes shut down his circulation and he lost toes, lower leg, etc.
He eventually called time on any further amputations and was told by Doctors that he would be dead in months.
He believed that it was ultimately inhumane to make him suffer pain and indignity when he would never, and had never, allowed any of his animals to suffer needlessly.
Thankfully, for him, he lasted less than a week and I swore from then that I would support any family member in a similar position who wanted to choose when to die.Posted 1 year ago # -
dvo4fun
offlineMembermrs 4fun's father is in a shallower strokes-induced decline than your grandfather Jeni. Changed from one the kindest concerned-for-others men I've known to seriously depressed, wholly self - obssessed and with what is approaching zero 'quality of life' notwithstanding being in what seems to be a well run and caring care home.
M-in-law was explaining recently how she'd had discussions with care services about resusc. for him 'in the event'. Thought I'd take the opportunity to ask her views were she to be in similar circ's "Just shoot me." said with feeling. Not given to such comments in the 40+ years I've known her, but no doubt strongly influenced by observations of her lovely man's last two years
I'm one of Jfr's 'imbecile followers' (not of JFR himself you understand) but don't hold a strong view agin appropriate assistance as the end approaches. I see no nobility in screaming one's way out of this world and on a selfish basis would like a generous overlap of morphine as required and if that shuffles me over the edge of existence then that seems a fair arrangement.
Posted 1 year ago # -
Scroat
offlineMemberGetting back to the thread and Gerontius's earlier comment, India is an outstanding and extreme example of greedy pockets grabbing all the money. They have more millionaires in India than in the UK, but at the same time incredible levels of poverty. So greed is stopping the trickle-down process and people are dying of malnutrition.
And while I'm on, I was incensed with Digby Jones on Question Time when he queried the need for continuing UK aid going to India because there were so many rich people there.
And when bankers say they need to offer high wages to attract "the best people" greed is the driving fact here too. As someone above has said, let them all go abroad and get jobs there. There are equally well-qualified people who would do the same jobs for less - and probably better too because of better personality traits.
And finally, if you are going to put someone in charge of something, it should go without saying that they carry the can if the whole thing goes tits up. No more rewards for failure please.
Fascinating thread.
Posted 1 year ago # -
Ironduke
offlineMemberLittle point- my oath of registration stating that my constant endeavour will be the welfare of my patients means I CANNOT REFUSE to euthanase an animal which is in distress if that is the most appropriate course of action for relief of its sufferring, and I could be held professionally accountable (and very rightly so!) if I were to so refuse. An animal with spreading necrosis and a hopeless prognosis would certainly fall under that category.
Interesting contrast with doctors, no?
Posted 1 year ago # -
beau-jolly
offlineMemberIn an attempt to pull these two threads together:
As I understand it, Doctors have a Hypocratic oath to preserve life; even if it doesn't want preserving. This means that they are often forced to make immoral judgements. Presented with a dying person, most out-of-hours GPs will pass the problem to the local hospital where they can die expensively and uncomfortably with tubes sticking out of them if they don't die in the ambulance. (We avoided that at the end and Maddy died at home)
Similarily, CEOs of companies are legally bound to act to maximise the profits of their shareholders. This means they are not allowed to make morally correct decisions if an immoral one will make more profit. The only way around this would be if the shareholders voted to take smaller profits to allow the company to make decisions that benefitted non-shareholders in some way. The problem is that in many cases the shareholders are big institutions and pension funds whose existence is to maximise their returns.
For example, if a bank in America had sold, through 3rd parties, a load of mortgages to people who could never repay them and didn't have any equity, then they have a legal obligation to wrap the toxic loans in investment packages and off-load them as quick as they can to other, unsuspecting institutions rather than taking their cock-up on the chin and going bust.Go, as I believe they say in the US, figure.
Posted 1 year ago #
Reply
You must log in to post.