Jensen Caraballo: Assisted Suicide Laws Are Dangerous

According to a 2013 Pew Research Center study, 65% of the Latino community is against assisted suicide. That’s more than half of the Latino community. We understand how dangerous these practices are. But I would like to see the entire community against assisted suicide.

Have you heard of the Disability perspective? I am going to give it to you through this essay.

I was organizing with ADAPT when I first learned about the anti-assisted suicide movement. I was getting arrested for disability rights issues; in particular issues of forced institutionalization. I was once forced into an institution too, which is what drove me towards the Disability community. I learned about assisted suicide through my work in the field. I never learned about the anti-assisted suicide movement until after I started engaging in disability rights organizing. I did some advocacy with Not Dead Yet and nonviolent direct action in Chicago.

My name is Jensen Caraballo, I was born with a neuromuscular Disability called Spinal Muscular Atrophy, and I am originally from Puerto Rico. I am going to give you some hard facts about assisted suicide and why I am against it.

One problem is doctors’ attitudes towards people with disabilities. “In [a] survey of 714 practicing US physicians nationwide, 82.4 percent reported that people with significant disability have worse quality of life than nondisabled people. . . . [T]hese findings about physicians’ perceptions of this population raise questions about ensuring equitable care to people with disability. Potentially biased views among physicians could contribute to persistent health care disparities affecting people with disability.” (Lisa Iezzoni, et al., Physicians’ Perceptions Of People With Disability And Their Health Care,” Health Affairs, February 2021)

The main reasons people want assisted suicide have nothing to do with pain.

According to the Oregon data, where assisted suicide has been legal the longest, the reasons are: loss of autonomy, decreasing ability to participate in enjoyable activities, loss of dignity, feelings of being an emotional or financial burden on family and loved ones, and loss of control of bodily functions, such as incontinence and vomiting.

Terminally ill people are part of the Disability community. This means that Disabled people will be murdered by mistake, coercion or abuse. This is damaging to the Disability community. It is dangerous. Nondisabled people receive suicide prevention, while Disabled people get assisted suicide.

I am affirmatively against assisted suicide. It’s too easy. Disabled people experience torture and punishment for swearing in institutions. We experience immense violence. This is happening every single day.

As a Disabled Latino man, I feel assisted suicide laws are dangerous. A person can administer death medicine without the person’s consent. Doctors think disabled people have no quality of life.

We want community-based services and palliative care. It’s too easy for abusers to kill off Disabled people without their consent. Disabled people are often denied community supports while society is offering assistance with suicide.

Some people are locked away in nursing homes. They are trapped in nursing facilities. Institutionalized. Forgotten. Alone. Wondering about freedom and a life full of choices. Autonomy. Where people get to decide exactly how they want to exist. Assisted suicide is dangerous for the Disability community.

Assisted suicide negatively impacts disabled people. Many Disability organizations oppose assisted suicide like:

• ADAPT (American Disabled for Attendant Programs Today)

• ADAPT National

• American Association of People with Disabilities

• Assn of Programs for Rural Independent Living

• Autistic Self Advocacy Network

• Autistic Women & Nonbinary Network

• Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund

• National Council on Disability

• National Council on Independent Living

• National Organization of Nurses with Disabilities

• National Spinal Cord Injury Association

• Not Dead Yet

• TASH

• The Arc of the United States

• United Spinal Association

• World Institute on Disability

We want community based services for Disabled people and fair pay for home care for our homecare attendants and a bill of rights for domestic workers.

Our needs are normal. They are not special. I live in the community in my own apartment with 24/7, 168 hours per week of home care services. I have Consumer directed personal attendant services (CDPAS). I’ve traveled to Japan for culture exchange.

Assisted suicide is scary and dangerous to the disability community. We understand suffering. We suffer exceptional pain. But we do it together. We have to uplift each other and be in loving and caring community.

Show Love. Spread Love and Light upon this darkness. Give people support. Spread life. Spread joy. Be a light to darkness. Assisted suicide is darkness. It’s violent. It’s dangerous. It’s wrong. It should be illegal and stay illegal. Life is worth living. Life is bearable. Life is better when people feel supported and loved and important to the community. Change is needed. I will help make this change. You should make a decision to do the same. You have the power.