Transcript of Bax & Obrien Interview on Final Exit Network

This is the transcript of my appearance on the Bax & O’Brien radio show linked last Friday. This transcript would never have happened if I had been the one who had to do it.

To anyone who needs or prefers a written transcript over audio, you (and I) owe your thanks to Dawn Willis, an activist in the U.K.

Dawn has a great website and resource on the too-often ignored issue of bullying and it’s long-term effects on individuals. You can check it out at http://www.quinonostante.com/.

This transcript should be mostly accurate. Dawn left a few blanks where she wasn’t quite sure what was said. I filled it in as best I could. Any errors in this are undoubtedly mine – in failing to check carefully in filling in the blanks.

An additional note – the show had two hosts – but I couldn’t for the life of me tell them apart and still can’t. Dawn couldn’t either, so they are just identified in black type with my own responses in (I think) brown.

Without further introduction and explanation, here it is:

Intro: A little while ago now, I’m not sure how long ago Georgia Bureau of Investigation infiltrated a group called ‘The Final Exit Network’ and found out that this group would help people to facilitate their own suicides. Not only help them to put the plan together but would even be there when it happened and even hold down their hand, so hold down their arms so that the natural instinct to stop it wouldn’t take.

On the phones right now is Stephen Drake from notyetdead.org and they are opposed to assisted suicide, and he’s on the phones right now.

· Good Morning Stephen, how are you?

· “I’m fine thank you”

· Stephen let me understand your philosophy here, are you against to a person wanting to end their own life or are you against to the idea of other people assisting them with it”

· Yes, what we have a problem with is assistance, people commit suicide every day in this country , thousands of them every year, and people who are serious find ways to do this on their own. I think that one of the things you can look at here are the people who go to final exit network the fact they are unwilling to commit suicide unless they have people by them and comforting them means that that they already have some ambivalence . These aren’t terminally ill people, these were people with chronic disabilities and conditions.

· Well I don’t know if that matters, my personal opinion if you are a competent individual , whether you are terminally ill or not it’s your choice whether you want to end your life or not, but let me also ask you this, when you start talking about assisted suicide, are you opposed to the idea of somebody telling you how you can do it? Or are you opposed to the idea of somebody being there and actually participating in you doing it?

· Well I think there’s a real problem with spreading the information but we believe that there is very little you can do about that. The book Final Exit has been around for decades now with information on different ways to kill yourself, there’s internet groups devoted to that. The Assistance is the real problem and the Georgia case highlights that. As you said there are these allegations about holding people’s hands down, and y’know I don’t know how you distinguish that natural instinct to tear a bag off, and somebody who actually changed their mind, and the difference between working out whether somebody carried out what they wanted to and actually committing a murder.

· I thought I had a problem with your opinion but I guess don’t , I mean I certainly, like I said believe that a person should have the right to choose to end their own life but I certainly don’t think that anyone is entitled to be an active participant. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with telling somebody well ‘here’s how you do it and here’s what you need and this is where you get the stuff,’ but to actually be there and assist in it, I think that is a little bit different so,

· It’s very different, and if you believe in the first amendment, it’s very dangerous territory in terms of controlling information

· This is Stephen Drake from notdeadyet.org. As I understand it assisted suicide is illegal in all states except for Oregon and Washington, what is about their laws in those states that is different from anyone else

· Well they, theoretically limit eligibility for getting a prescription to enabling them to kill themselves with barbiturates, if they are expected to have six months or less to live, one thing which should be highlighted is that the people who go to Final Exit Network wouldn’t be eligible for assisted suicide in Oregon or Washington

· Yeah Oregon or Washington allows medical facilities and Doctors to help you to end your life but you have to be terminally ill

· Correct, expected to die within six months

· Right, now you, people should know Stephen that as you talk about this you are not only an advocate, but you yourself were born with a brain injury and your physician told your parents that you would be better off dead

· Correct, that’s correct the word he used was “vegetable” and when doctors use that word, and I hear stories like that with frequency whether its with an adult with a brain injury or a newborn what comes next is the discussion about warehousing and institutionalisation or disposal or neglect

· But I don’t know how that’s related to this because we’re not talking about taking someone else’s life we talking about taking your own life

· It’s interesting though because in the pro euthanasia movement they don’t separate them out real well and two the people right now who are acting as spokespersons for the Final Exit Network – people who haven’t been arrested – have both been active spokespersons in the past of decriminalising killing children with disabilities – killing without prosecution

· You see I’m not, the reason I brought it up, there is always going to be the moral question about the quality of life, the respect of life, and how that feeds into assisted suicide and I have a hard time reconciling y’know, what is right and what is wrong, I mean while much of my whole philosophy of life is that, life is important regardless of where it stands. If it were me and I were in constant pain and there was no medical way of improving I can see where you might thing well maybe I would be better off dead,………………

· And that should be fine if it’s your decision

· Clearly I think there’s a real moral implication in having an organisation come to your house and hold your hands down,

· But not if you solicit them, that’s the other problem I have here, these investigators infiltrated the Final Exit Network, they was an undercover investigator who went to them and said that he wanted to kill himself and they put forth together this whole plan, and then that’s how they made the arrests. That’s borderline entrapment.

· They didn’t go hunting for them, they did this at the request of the families of one of the people whose death is being investigated

· The family of a person who had originally used The Final Exit Network, the family members went to the investigators and asked them to investigate the organisation.

· That’s correct

· Because and it’s understandable but I don’t think its relevant because the surviving family members couldn’t come to grips with the idea that their loved one, for whatever reason, wanted to end his life so they are looking for somebody to blame

· Well the question is if he hadn’t found Final Exit Network, would he have committed suicide?

· Well he might or might not have but if he was a competent individual, a competent adult, that’s his business

· Sting operations are complex and inherently problematical. There are things we would never be able to get to the bottom of, including political bribery cases if we didn’t engage in them in some way.

· That’s true, sting operations

· Court cases , the courts sort out what is a fair sting operation and what’s not

· Ok, but as far as the one you’re talking about, the case you’re talking about I don’t care if you are married, if your parents are alive or you have adult children, there is nobody else who should be allowed to make the decision for a competent adult if they’ve decided they want to end their life. Their parents shouldn’t be able to step in and stop it, their spouse shouldn’t be able to, and their adult children shouldn’t be able to. It’s your choice.

· But then you have a problem deciding on who is and who is not a competent individual.

· No, not at all

· If they succeed in their bid how do you prove it?

· It’s not as simple as that due to existing statues – because the law already mandates law enforcement and healthcare providers to prevent a suicide, so this thing about anybody has the right, yeah they do, but there are also mental health protection laws, that aren’t criminal statutes but they require certain professionals to act in certain ways.

· Listen Stephen, just so you know where I’m coming from. I have a very close loved one who committed suicide, conversely I am also a certified suicide prevention person. But, and I understand that I would have a responsibility to try to prevent a suicide if I have to find myself in a place where one is about to take place, what I’m talking about is on a principalled level a person’s choice, this is not very different from abortion, a person’s choice to whether they themselves want to live or not, if they are a competent individual, and it’s not that hard to determine whether they are competent or not, if they had a job, if they had a household, if they had no signs of incompetence all the way up until the day they died then obviously they were competent to make that decision, and I don’t have a problem with that. Yes I would try to stop someone because I am supposed to but that doesn’t mean morally I’m objecting to it.

· Well the problem with drawing a line with abortion and you hear people say this, it’s like abortion is a right for all women. When people talk about not just prevention of suicide for some people but putting assistance into the mix they are not talking about all people who are serious about wanting to commit suicide, they are really just talking about old, ill, disabled people, people who are one of those or all three

· And I think that’s the bulk of people who commit suicide looking for assistance.

· Well no it’s not, there are a lot of people very serious, and in fact one of the cases under investigation is a woman who had no physical illnesses, but had long term emotional struggles

· And searched out Final Exit. OK but really you think the bulk of them, you see I think the majority of people who …….assistance are competent and not necessarily emotionally disturbed, addicted to substances or clinically depressed.

· You know neither of us has any information to go on, we have our opinions and beliefs, but the fact is we have no hard information. The only thing we can get on this is the word of the people from The Final Exit Network, who are going to colour everything, even if they are trying to be honest, it’s for their own self interest.

· What if The Final Exit Network people weren’t physically there holding the person’s hand down? Would you still have a problem with them?

· I think there’s still a problem determining how much assistance they are giving

· If they weren’t present at the suicide, I think that makes a difference, do you?

· Yes, if they are not present. That makes a big difference

· OK. Stephen Drake from notdeadyet.org, we appreciate the time, thank you

· Thank you

As I mentioned in my earlier post, this was a much better exchange than I am used to.

–Stephen Drake