Should Euthanasia be legalized? Discuss

Should Euthanasia be legalized? Discuss

Everyone knows life is treasure that money can not buy, but sadly nowadays people spend money to buy death which is euthanasia with or without conscious. "Euthanasia Acts means that psychosocial factor, rather than strictly terminal illness, are being used to open the door to assisted suicide" (The Ottawa citizen, 2012) Euthanasia is also called as "mercy killing" . Mercy killing is morally incorrect , because when voluntary turns to involuntary, euthanasia may become a "slippery slope" to murder. Many proponent and opponent of euthanasia, but there are only few countries have legalized euthanasia such as Switzerland, the Netherlands , Belgium and so on. People always human have right to die , what if people is not willing to undertake euthanasia, but also do not have the strength to against? It no longer about right to die, it may involve right to live.  Finally, it will turn to murder but without other people notice. This would affect the vulnerable society in a passive way. Therefore, if euthanasia has been legalized, it , a lot of issues will pop up such as potential abuse, as well as the pain past their family member. 

Firstly, legalized euthanasia would cause potential abuse by mislead patients go through euthanasia with or without consult patients.The advance medical technology is able to enhance human life and quality of life by Palliative and rehabilitation centers which really help patient to release their pain or give them a better life. (Dr. Maisie M)Proponent o f euthanasia always stand for "people have the right to die" because they have the "right to refuse medical treatment". While "The professionals recognize that if pain is controlled, as it can be in virtually all cases, very few terminally ill people ask to be put to death."(Lewistown, NY.) Therefore, euthanasia will from voluntary turns to involuntary which become potential abuse which Holland is a example. Holland is regard as a civilized country worldwidely which euthanasia is active legalized here. Unfortunately, A disturbing findings of a investigation of euthanasia have published by Dutch government in 1991 "In 1990, 1,030 Dutch patients were killed WITHOUT THEIR CONSENT. And of 22,500 deaths due to withdrawal of life support, 63% (14,175 patients) were denied medical treatment WITHOUT THEIR CONSENT. Twelve percent(1,701 patients) were mentally competent but were NOT CONSULTED. " The figure above is pathetic,If the medical technology can help patient feel better, as if the pain can be relieve, most patients would like to continue live. How doctors or family members will rather choose not to use it but by misconvince them to undertake euthanasia? No matter is the family financial problem or doctor his or her self lack of responsibility or the hospital want to save resource in order to give to other more "more hopful"patient, these are can not be the excuses of taking other people's life. This is absolutely morally wrong, nobody has the right to do so. This is also against the doctors or hospital's principle of saving people's life. Doctor suppose to be angers to save people in their best way, while they become evils to cut down people's live and take them away. Sadly say that if the euthanasia has been legalized, the "right to die" will turn into "right to kill".

Secondly, family member need to carry more emotional pain when their beloved one undertake euthanasia. Patient usually has rather low ability to anti pressure during treatment period. Especially terminal ill patient are often suffer a great pain come with medical treatment, and most people can not endure it, at the time, people are seeking for a way to relief the pain, which rather than taking medicine to relief the pain temporary, first ting come to their mind is death. While for their family , they would willing to pay anything to enhance their beloved one's life, even they usually respect patient's decisions. A documentary of "The Suicide Tourist", a retired teacher American Craig Ewert, 59, choose to end his life after five months suffering with neurological disease. Other than the man is suffering with the great pain during treatment time. Do you notice his wife is happy during the time he was alive, she never showed her impatient to his husband even he totally lost the ability to take care of himself. No matter how hard it is , his wife still willing to do anything without any grievance. She always has a light smile on her face. However, there are two shots, firstly, when doctor confirmed he is died after took the medicine, she was crying out. Secondly, when she recorded the memory with her husband she was again crying and crying. No one would really understand how much pain in her heart. Her husband will never know how much pain he leave to his wife and sons. The emotional pain is far great than psychical pain, because "Pain caused by emotional distress is more deeply felt and longer lasting than that caused by physical injuries, according to a new study. "(Irvine , 2008)Since the family is the traditional place where life begins and is nurtured, euthanasia would cause great emotional pain to the family who lost their beloved one in this way. 

The last but not the least, euthanasia not the only way to relief pain, and it is against the nature of death. Many people out there are suffering with disease as well, such as Stephen Hawking who is a greatest physiologist suffered with Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis in his whole life. Can you say that he is not painful ? But he dedicate his whole life to physics world, and he achieved it. He did not give up until now. It's possible to fight with pain with disease. When other people have not given you up but yourself, it's pathetic. Lost ability to take care of self is not shame,but go through euthanasia is not the way to show a person's dignity as well.

Should Capital Punishment be abolished? Discuss

 Should Capital Punishment be abolished? Discuss

What is Capital punishment? Capital punishment is also know as "death penalty" which is a kind of deterrent to punish and execute criminal when they committed "capital crime" such as murder. It is the highest punishment for the wrongdoer. There are 58 countries still maintain the death penalty in both law and practice.(Wikipedia, 2011) The aim to carry out death penalty is believed to protect the society by shorting the dangerous criminal's life, but it is not the only way to protect the society , "The only way to destroy a criminal is by reforming the man who is a criminal. To destroy his bodily life is nothing but a stupid blunder. " (Sunrise magazine,1998)  According to website Brainz, there are 13 brutal and inhumane judicial punishments used today include beheading, judicial caning, hanging and so on. "It is incongruous and incompatible with our present standard of civilization and humanity."(Sunrise magazine, 1998) Therefore, Death penalty should be abolished as it is failed as a deterrent and is not reliable.


Firstly, Death penalty is failed as a deterrent as it does not prevent future murders.The purpose of punished criminal to death is because people think it is the only way to stop crime is to root out the origin of the murder or other serious offenses, "but this is of very small account in view of the fact that murder is seldom a career of repeated acts, but consists of single acts perpetrated by different individuals."(Sunrise magazine, 1998) According to Michigan State University and Death Penalty information Center in 2000, by comparing U.S., with the death penalty, has a higher murder rate than the countries of Europe or Canada, which do not use the death penalty. Moreover, "There is no credible evidence that the death penalty deters crime more effectively than long terms of imprisonment" (The American Civil Liberties Union, 2007)." Besides, the death penalty may have opposite effect. Some criminologist claim they have statistically proven that when an execution is publicized, more murders occur in the day and weeks that follow. A good example is in the Linberg kidnapping. A number of states adopted the death penalty for crime like this, but figures showed kidnapping increased. Publicity may encourage crime instead of preventing it (McClellan, G., 1961). Therefore, death penalty is not necessary to have as it does not deter the crime rate.


Secondly, the death penalty is not reliable as it risk kill innocent people. "Death is one penalty which makes error irreversible and the chance of error is inescapable when based on human judgment." (http://www.prodeathpenalty.com/ornellaspaper.htm) We can not do anything once the the death sentence undertake, because the death penalty alone imposes an irrevocable sentence." (Kogan, 1999) Example one, according to Gerald Kogan who are a Former Florida Supreme Court Chief Justice in 1999, since 1973, over 650 people have been executed. Thus, for every seven people executed, they have found for every seven people have been execute, there at least has one person was innocent. Example two, According to The New Yorker in 2007, Cameron Todd Willingham was executed in Texas in 2004 for starting the fire that killed his children, he insist his innocent and refuse an offer to plead guilty in return for a life sentence. At the end, "The Texas Forensic Science Commission has determined that the arson testimony that led to his conviction was based on flawed science."(yahoo answer, 2011) The case study above shows death penalty has high chance for risking kill wrong person.Dramatically, the law or people that have pushed the person to death is usually not punished as they have the authority power. Is this indicate the capital punishment is not reliable and conscientious? The answer is absolutely yes, a study carried by Columbia University Law school found two thirds of capital trials contained serous errors. (Kogan, 1999) When the death sentence is not equal and reliable, but cause tragic mistakes. Why should we support?


Last but not least, The death penalty is not necessary to have as it is not reliable and it has not been proven to prevent future murders. Thus, instead of executing criminal which may cause the publicity chaos and as well as tragic mistakes, rather than prison them. Once they are serving the life sentence, is highly decrease the danger and chance that they would back to wrong way and bring bad effect to our society, an it is also give them a chance to reformation which is enhance the humanitarianism in the modern society .

How can stress affect people in the modern society?

Loi has gratuated from university five monthes before, he is seeking for a job, but he is not satisfied with any offered jobs. As most of his friends have started their working life, but he still has nothing to do. He started to worry about his furture. He becomed depressed, started smocking, and he loss weight as he lost his appetite. All of these were caused by stress, which is the “emotional and physical way ” in which our bodies respond to pressure.(Guy Slowik MD FRCS, 2011) Modern life is more stressful than the past time as it has more hasses, deadlines, frustrations and demands. Stress will affect people positivly such as providing a motivation of working hard, or it will affect people negatively, such as loss of appetite and unhealthy behavoir and so on. “Unlike a physical complaint such as a broken leg that is easy to spot and identify, stress can have a multitude of symptoms and affects different people in different ways.”(How does stress affect people people at work, by kate pullen)  In general, stress affects people’s physical health most by affecting people’s internal system and causing irregular behavior.

Firstly, stress would affect people’s physical health by damaging people internal system such as Immune system. Immune system is designed to protecct us by agasinsting the viruses or bacteria from outside of the bodies. However, it consumes a lot of engery to fight those “ousiders”. Moreover, “evidence from both human and animal study shows that, when the  body under chronic stress, it will weaken a person’s immune system”(National Cancer Institue). As the Immune system getting weaker and weaker, there does not have extral energy to fight with virus. Thus, the body is unable to protect us from againsting with the virus or other bacteria. Therefor, when the body is under stress such as before or after big events, people is more easily got sick than normal days. On the way, some studies also indicated the stress afftects growth of certain kinds of virus-related tumors indirectly. Such as Kaposi sarcoma. Thus, when people’s immune system is affected, people easy got sick. Therefore, stress influence our physical health a lot. However, the recent research with animal models (animals with a disease that is similar to or the same as a disease in humans) also suggests that “the body’s neuroendocrine response can directly alter important process in cells that help protect against the formation of cancer, such as DNA repair.” (National Cancer Institute) Thus, stress influence people's immune system will affect people's physical health in both good and bad ways.

Secondly, human’s physical health would also be affectted by unhealthy behavior caused by unpropriately deal with stress, such as over drinking alcohol. From past to present, alcohol believed as “stress reliever”. Shakespeare referred to alcohol's stress-reducing properties in his play Julius Caesar (Act IV, Scene III): "Speak no more of her. Give me a bowl of wine. In this I bury all unkindness...." The concept that alcohol can "calm the nerves" is, therefore, more and more people choose to use alcohol to relieve their stress. In fact, it does not help much. Even alcohol make them feel better temporarily, but over a long time, people will choose to believe in alcohol rather than deal with stress when they feel bad or stressful. When people too much depend on alcohol, and drink too much alcohol will experience some extreme negative effects. These include unconsciousness, coma, and even death. As alcohol cause loss of brain cells, heart failure and stomach ulcers. (Gabriel J. Adams the negative of drinking too much alcohol)Research also shows, every year up to 22,000 premature deaths are associated in some way with drinking too much alcohol. (www.nhs.uk) Moreover, too much stress will also lead people to commit suicide. Singapore as one of high stress country average every day has one people commit sucide. Samaritans of Singapore in 2010 released that there are 401 commit suicide during year 2009. Therefor, stress is tighted with people’s behavior and is very much related to our lives.

Lastly, Stress is everywhere, it’s apart of life. No one can completely avoid it. As stress is very much related to human’s health and lives, people need to stand to fight with stress in a right way but not to show white flag to it. Even most of the time stress brings bad and negative impacts, sometimes little stress may helpful on the way of working or studying. Therefore, we need to face stress positively, and relieve stress appropriately such as listening to music, have a nice walk and so on.

Explain how people's differences in their definitions of success influence the way they lead their lives.

Success is a abstract and limitless term which can not be easily measure. However, many people go crazy with the word success, because success is like the carrot at the end of the stick that keeps the donkey moving forward. What’s your definition of success? A big house? to be famous? or have a powerful job? However, not every one consider success in the same way. To a large majority of people , success is combination of financial prosperity, fame and power. According to Daniel Midson, there are six types' view of success which is puritan, materialistic, power, spiritual, contributor and escapist. I will be focus on the puritan,power and spiritual.

People who believe in puritan keep enhancing themselves to a new and higher level in the way to be successful. They always update their new goals and try the best to achieve each one in order to prove their value and to achieve a high level standard. However, their goals are all related to self, the meaning for them to achieve those goals is to prove themselves’ value but not power or money. During the process of achieving a goal, they are not only gain experience but also knowledges, self-esteem as well as world view. Puritan help them to be more efficient and rigorous. There some people who are completely believe in puritan,also there are some people perform a part as puritan. For example. For the people who has a "to do list" or "bucket list" can be considered as Puritan in this way, as they try to complete or achieve their goels on the list to prove themselves are good at certain things. Also, one of my friends in middle school who can considered as almost purely puritan. She never compare anything with others but herself. She setted goal for every single thing and tried to achieve each one. For instance, she set different goals for every subjects and tests. For example, for math test one she might set goal is to achieve 85marks, if she get it, she will set her goal for math text two slightly higher than the text one; if she does not achieve the goal this time, she would remain the goal until she get what she expected. She was using this way to move forward. As a result, She was the best student in my class. In fact, Her self value is increasing with the goals being completed each time. Moreover, Puritan will always follow their mindset and keep living up themselves to a higher level. For puritan, improving self-value is the core value for them. The doctrine of success lead them to success.

Power is another term of success. For people who pursuit power as the only symbolization to success, they believe everything in the world is controlled by people who have a certain power. Adolf Hitler is one of the example. He has had great power to casue world war two during 1940s. He has had great power lead Germany to be the most powerful nation during 1940s. In his life, the only thing he has pursuitted was power which strengthen him and widen his ambition, on the way to explore his empire and occupy others’. In some senses, he was a successful leader with great power in the world even he did not used his power in a right way. However, power does lead people who have it to a different life-----for people who pursuit power are called successful life.

Spirtual is another term of success which people choose to reverse the material or power view of the world and go for a more pious view of life. They refuse temptations and desires of material, instead choosing to be connected to rewards in the spiritual realm. For example Mother Teresa is one of spiritual leader. According to Wikipedia, “she was a catholic who founded the Missionaries of Charity in Calcutta, India, in 1950. For over 45 years, she ministered to the poor, sick, orphaned, and dying, while guiding the Missionaries of Charity's expansion, first throughout India and then in other countries” Moreover, In the 1970s, she became well-known internationally for her humanitarian work and advocacy for the rights of the poor and helpless. All she did is not because of fame, wealth or power. She never thought about personal desires, all she wantted to do is to help needed people without any reward. Even she is not the most powerful or the richest people in the world, but she is one of the most successful people around all over the world, because she had spiritual wealth.

In practial, people hold various of believes about success. We can not determine which typs of success is more effective, because the definition of success is very depend on individuals. But, success can be simply understand as what can make you happier and what can make you better through your life.