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Mercy Killing

            Modern medical technology has made it possible to extend the lives of many people far beyond when they would have died in the past. The prelude of death for some people ensures a long and painful fall where one loses control both physically and emotionally. Various forms of modern technology such as respirators, oxygen tanks, and a variety of medications can be used to prolong life. Some individuals embrace the time that modern technology buys them. Others find the loss of control overwhelming and frightening. They may want their loved ones to remember them as they were; they do not want to be remembered as they have become. To the terminally ill, death is the last hope of maintaining any remnants of dignity left to them in a life where there is no longer any control and is the only escape from a life where pain rules their existence. Some people feel since there is no help for these types of people; that a physician should be able to perform a mercy killing. Yet mercy killing is not allowed in the United States and should be legalized. .
             Mercy killing is the practice of killing or permitting the death of a hopelessly sick or injured individual (person or animal) in a relatively painless way. Mercy killings raise many issues, legal and ethical. These issues include things such as its similarities to suicide, whether it would be an easy way out for doctors or whether life is a "gift from God".
             Mercy killing is far different from suicide. Suicide can be committed by any random person in society. Unlike mercy killing, suicide is not based on a person's physical state of health. According to sociologist Emile Durkheim, a person who commits suicide often times because of anomie. Anomie has to do with how well a person is accepted in society. Suicide reflects a non-acceptance of change and an unwillingness to face life. Unlike mercy killings, it is an act based on hopelessness and despondency towards life.


Essays Related to Mercy Killing

1. Euthanasia

The term euthanasia is fairly broad in scope, which is why it has been divided into "allowing someone to die", "mercy killing", and "mercy death" (Thiroux, 214). The practices of "allowing someone to die", "mercy killing", and "mercy death" (all forms of euthanasia) are acceptable and good in cases where either the party involved has requested such services or evidence has been presented to support the belief that the party involved would request such services if able. While most people may approve of "allowing someone to die" or "mercy death" in which the patient in question has taken active ...

  • Word Count: 3302
  • Approx Pages: 13
  • Has Bibliography
  • Grade Level: High School

2. Mercy Killings

Peter Singer tells his view on euthanasia (mercy killings) and why they should take place in some cases. ... Killing him, or letting him live? ... One one hand, killing him will end his pain, but on the other hand, it cut off the chance for him to get better. ... That usually leads to adoption, but we discussed in another entry whether it really is, indeed, killing someone if you have an abortion. ... In Of Mice and Men, by John Steinbeck, one of the characters kills a mentally crippled character in an act of mercy, but was it really right to do so? ...

  • Word Count: 416
  • Approx Pages: 2
  • Grade Level: High School

3. Euthanasia

Euthanasia or better known as mercy killing, is a practice of ending a life so as to release an individual life from an incurable disease or intolerable suffering. ... Sometimes fully disabled people are felt sorry for and someone takes for granted that the disabled person is "suffering" thus killing them. ... Euthanasia may be "mercy" killing but it is still murder no matter what the circumstances. ... But killing is never the right thing to do, and society must never approve Euthanasia. ...

  • Word Count: 797
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  • Grade Level: High School

4. The Holocaust: Inside Concentration Camps

Hitler even called them "mercy killings." ... Brandt are charged with responsibility for expanding the authority of physicians to be designated by name, to the end that patients considered incurable according to the best available human judgment of their state of health, can be granted a mercy killing" (Berenbaum 104). This decree opened the door to the killings of anyone seen as being different and incurable. ...

  • Word Count: 1042
  • Approx Pages: 4
  • Has Bibliography
  • Grade Level: High School

5. Suffering or Mercy

What we first must understand in order to answer that question is what euthanasia or "mercy killing" is. ... Are there more healthcare professionals assisting in mercy killings than we know? It is astounding the number of healthcare professionals that do assist in mercy killings. ... It seems that psychiatrists are more supportive of mercy killings, than cancer specialists (Stone para 71). ... Female doctors were more supportive of mercy killings than the male doctors (Stone para71). ...

  • Word Count: 1281
  • Approx Pages: 5
  • Has Bibliography
  • Grade Level: High School

6. Immorality of Euthanasia and Physician Assisted Suicide

Active euthanasia, also called mercy killings, is said to have occurred when the physician has actively done something to bring about the death of the patient. ... By allowing active euthanasia, we are in fact stating that killing an innocent human being is acceptable as long as there are sufficient circumstances to warrant such a killing. ... Killing an innocent human being is immoral therefore active euthanasia is immoral. ... Suicide is defined as the act of intentionally killing oneself. ...

  • Word Count: 1511
  • Approx Pages: 6

7. Mercy Killing

It come from the Greek words for 'good' and 'death', and is commonly called mercy killing. ... The pro-euthanasia movement cheerfully hands the dirty work of the actual killing to the doctors who by and large, neither seek nor welcome the responsibility. ...

  • Word Count: 3200
  • Approx Pages: 13
  • Grade Level: High School

8. Mercy and the Misfit

Mercy for the Merciful Mercy is a strange thing. ... The Misfit seems like a nearly merciful soul, one who could perhaps be swayed to lean towards mercy in a given situation. ... With this conclusion, he doesn't see the wrong in killing those who get in his way, regardless of the polite man he seems to be otherwise. ... To those who can see their own faults, accept them and the mercy granted to them by God and man, then mercy is a reasonable and wonderful thing. To those who are confused with their own faults and refuse mercy from God and man, then mercy is a thing that does not ex...

  • Word Count: 1572
  • Approx Pages: 6
  • Grade Level: High School

9. God's Mercy Revealed in the Book of Genesis

God then appears at the last moment before Isaac was given up and stops Abraham from killing Isaac. ... He demonstrated forgiveness by giving them another chance to live their lives and showed mercy by not killing them. ... He did this by showing mercy and forgave them for the sins that they had committed. God's mercy had been demonstrated over and over again. ... God acts as he does out of mercy and forgiveness, not insecurity. ...

  • Word Count: 1630
  • Approx Pages: 7
  • Grade Level: High School

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