๐ A Man like Me ๐

Narut Phongsathaporn

Nov 27, 2006

Advanced Writing

Prof. Sienicki

Essay 3

 

“Physician – assisted suicide should be legalized" 

            Have you ever considered people and doctors’ point of view on assisted suicide? Assisted suicide laws are still unclear in many countries around the world. There are only a few places in which assisted suicide is legal, such as Oregon, U.S.A., Switzerland, Belgium, Netherlands (Humphry). Since assisted suicide was legalized in Oregon in 1997, there are a lot of controversies among doctors, but there is little public debate because doctors who support this practice are reluctant to talk publicly. Nevertheless, a survey of Michigan doctors shows that 56 percent would support physician – assisted suicide, 35 percent said they might offer to help if it were legal (Rosenthal). That means if this practice were legalized, almost all doctors would support it. Although the survey did not ask the reasons why physicians would support assisting terminally ill patients to end their lives, I think that their reasons must be similar to my point of view. I believe people should have freedom to make their own decisions to get over their terminal illness, not the doctor, hospital or government, because no one else but the patient can know how much pain, both mental and physical, one wishes to endure.

            Patients who are terminally ill or in uncontrollable and unbearable pain, not coma patients who lack of awareness, should be allowed to ask for lethal prescriptions, and physicians should be allowed to help or assist them. In addition, they should not be forced to stay alive, just because you love them and don’t want to let them go. All beings, including human race, loves oneself, fears death and doesn’t want to be killed, but to some patients death is more desirable than living in a state of constant suffering with no quality of life. For example, my grandmother died when she was 87 years old. She fell down the stairs which caused blood vessels inside her head to hemorrhage. After a surgery, she was disabled and couldn’t move half side of her body. She couldn’t speak as well as she used to or do anything by herself. She sometimes had so much pain in her head. She had to stay with a nurse 24 hours a day, 7 days a week for one year. I saw her cry every time I visited her. She always told my mother that she wanted to die. Can you imagine how much pain she had? Not only she, but also her relations, I and my family had faced agonizing time. If you were her, would you want to stay alive?

            A recent survey from The Pew Research Center reports that public strongly support for right to die laws.

Strong Support for Right to Die...

 

              1990                           2005

Right to die laws*...                                               %                                %

Approve                                                                 79                              84

Disapprove                                                            13                               10

Depends/DK                                                            8                                6

                                                                           100                             100

Which comes closer to your view...

Patients should sometimes be allowed to die           73                               70

Doctors should always try to save a patient’s life      15                               22

Depends/DK                                                          12                                 8

                                                                           100                             100

*Laws that let patients decide about being kept alive through medical treatment

 

(More Americans Discussing…, p. 1)

According to this survey, an overwhelming majority of the public supports laws that give patients the right to decide whether they want to be kept alive through medical treatment. And fully 70% say there are circumstances when patients should be allowed to die, while just 22% believe that doctors and nurses should always do everything possible to save a patient. As a result, we see that majority of the public supports assisted suicide. Why don’t we make this practice be legal?

            By contrast, some people argued that if physicians paid more attention to pain control, there would be little need for suicide. Physicians may recommend suicide instead of treatment or care. I would say that assisting suicide is requested by patient, not physician’s offering or recommendation. Physician’s responsibility is to help the patient, which means lessening pain.

In a workable system, the option of physician-assisted suicide would arise only after all treatment options are exhausted, the best of hospice and palliative care has failed to relieve unbearable suffering, and if a mentally competent patient continues to request assistance in dying. Then, with outside opinion concurring, a physician would be permitted to prescribe medication that the patient could use to hasten death at a time of the patient's choice (qtd. in Should physician-assisted suicide be legalized?)

According to White’s statement, physician has to do everything possible to safe patient’s life. Physician can assist suicide only when all treatments are used and assistance is requested. Nine years of practice in Oregon, there is no evidence that physician paid less attention to the patient who asked, “Help me die”.

            It is clear that helping the patient to die is better than keeping patient alive with suffering, and most people support it. If someone who you really love is terminally ill and want to die, you should feel his pain with sympathy or compassion and let him go calmly. Don’t hold him to stay alive because that is your wish, but not his desire. Please remember that don’t judge people before you’re walking into their shoes. You would never know how much pain they have, if you were not them. 

 

 

References

Humphry, D. (2005, March 1). Assisted Suicide Laws Around the World. Assistedsuicide.org. < http://www.assistedsuicide.org/suicide_laws.html>

More Americans Discussing – and Planning – End-of-Life Treatment STRONG

PUBLIC SUPPORT FOR RIGHT TO DIE. (2006, January 5). The Pew Research Center For The People & The Press. < http://people-press.org/reports/display

.php3?ReportID=266>

Rosenthal, E. (1997, March 13). When a Healer Is Asked, “Help Me Die”. New York Times. <http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C05E4DC1139F930A2

5750C0A961958260&sec=health&pagewanted=all>

Should physician-assisted suicide be legalized? Thirteen Online. <http://www.thirteen

.org/bid/vp-assisted.html>

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                 Doey, a handsome boy from Thailand, which is the land of smiles, falls in love with a very beautiful Korean girl whose name is Jun Ji-Hyun, who is a movie star acting in a most famous Korean movie, My Sassy Girl, which is Doey’s most favorite movie; fortunately, she had a chance to meet Doey, who was a Public Relation of Jun Ji-Hyun Thailand Fanclub website at that time, give him her autograph and have an interview, which was at a Royal Méridien Plaza Athénée Bangkok Hotel, which was about her biography and new movie, Daisy, when she went to Thailand in 2006.

Education, this is a common practice in which we are all involved, and there are a lot of educational systems all over the world. But what is the best way to educate our children?

In Kie Ho’s essay “We Should Cherish Our Children’s Freedom to Think.” He supports the American educational system that children should have freedom to think, speak and write; moreover, they should be able to use their own creativity to learn. He states that the American schools provide opportunities to develop creativity of their children whereas other schools in many countries try to teach their children by memorizing or reciting knowledge like his experience when he was a student in Indonesia. He had to memorize the names of major cities in the world. I absolutely agree with him. I had a useless experience from a Thai school when I was a child. Teachers came to the classes to teach their students by the book. They sometimes wrote sentences which they called “knowledge” on a blackboard and told us to note them down our notebooks. I had to recite all of the sentences exactly in my head because the teachers might ask some questions the next day, and I would be punished if my answers were wrong. However, I never got a creative assignment at the school or for homework.

Back to Ho’s essay, he wonders why many people complain about the American educational system and compare it with others. “If American education is so tragically

inferior, why is it that this is still the country of innovation?” (Ho, p. 126) Ho is right. Why the first country can reach the moon is America? Why the computers’ processors – Intel and AMD are from American companies? And why we use Bill Gates’ Microsoft Windows or Apple’s Macintosh as operating systems of our computers? The simple answer is American education. Ho found this answer when he saw a waterfall with flying fish made from only colorful yarns, foil paper, felt pens and crayons by schoolchildren in exhibition of the Laguna Beach Museum of Art.

I realized how the American educational system works when I came to the U.S.A. to learn English. For example, in my reading class, my teacher always prepares articles for students to read. Then we discuss about them in small groups to share our opinion to each other. This activity helps me be able to see one thing in many different ways. I practice a lot, so my English skills were improved. In comparison, every student starts learning English since they are in an elementary school, and I was one of them. I have learned English for over 15 years by memorizing vocabularies and grammatical rules although I couldn’t use English well. I couldn’t understand anybody who talked to me in English. This is always a big problem in Thailand. Students can pass an English exam easily, but they can’t use English in their real lives.

            When I was in high school, it was a first time I meet the American education. Teachers used this system and called “Child Center”. It took me long time to adjust myself. Finally, I like this educational method because I could guess what questions should have been asked in the exams, and I tried to find the answers before; as a result, I got better scores in every subject.

However, the important thing of education is, “How can you memorize, use and apply your knowledge for your daily lives?” That means you have to learn how to find the best way to memorize in long term, think and create. I think that the best way to educate students is not only the American educational system. We should mix memorization and creativity together and put them like the three steps to develop education: memorize the knowledge that you have learned, practice more to have a proficiency in deep level of that knowledge and create new useful things for yourselves or the world. Just like the way that every scientist does, they must memorize old knowledge by reading or studying experiments of old scientists. Then they have to practice or try a lot of their knowledge. Eventually, they can invent new things or find new some knowledge. Think that if hundreds years ago, the scientists didn’t use these tree steps to develop their knowledge, we would not have electricity, cars, computers and airplanes. How we would be? How do we live? And how we will be in the next hundred years?

          Therefore, we should cooperate to find the balanced point of these educational systems and use them together proficiently. One day, your child may be a heroic person who saves this confusing world.

 

            I support that the older people should live with their adult children. Because human is a social animal, they can’t live or do everything alone. But the adult children who live with older people should be single or not married yet.

            There are some good reasons for older people to live with the adult children. The first reason is that adult children can take care the older people easily and closely. Adult children can keep their eyes on the older when they get sick. The second reason is that the older people can give any advice to their children when they have any problems. The last reason is that if father, mother and their children live together, the house will become home as everyone called “home sweet home.” Everybody in that home won’t feel lonely. The older will have very good health, and children won’t go out to meet bad things, such as drugs, alcohol, etc. In Thailand, most criminal problems come from children or adults who don’t live with their old people.

            However, if adult children have spouses or little children, they become a big family, and problem will be occurred. For example, I used to live with my mother, father, sister, grandfather, grandmother and my mother’s sister family. There were ten people a small house. I didn’t have freedom to do anything that I want. I had to ask my father and mother then my aunt and uncle, and finally I had to ask my grandparents before I do something or hang out with my friends Moreover, you can see a big problem when everyone has different ideas on something, such as if we want to have dinner out side or buy a new furniture, Sometimes we fight each other or we had to vote on everything.

            Even though you live with your adult children or may be you live with your older people, be kind to them. I’m sure that you all can get happiness in your life.

 

           When I was a child in Thailand, I used to ask myself why my friends and I have to stand in line in front of the flag pole and sing the national anthem every morning in school. Everyday at 8 a.m. and 6 p.m. all radio and television stations will play the national anthem and show the pictures of the King and royal family. Everyone stops their activities whether they are running, shopping or eating. They stand still until the song ends. Every car stops. The policemen stand steadily and touch their eyebrow with the right hand. It’s an incident I see everyday. Thai people do so in order to pay respect to the king and his family. In the movie theatres, before the movie starts, the Royal anthem will be played and again the pictures of the King will be shown. I always wonder who the king is and why Thai people have to see and know about the king so much. When I came home, I asked my mother about the king. She looked at me with her warm smile and told me, “The king is a man who reigns the country and the King had done many good things for the country and Thai people. That is why all the Thai people respect and love the King very much.” Then she gave me a little book about the king. That night, I was reading it until I slept.
           Since I heard about the King and royal family a lot, I started to be interested in them. I tried to find many books about them. I read and I found that his life was very interesting.
           The King, His Majesty King Bhumibol Adulyadej the Great, King Rama IX, the ninth King of Chakri Dynasty of Thailand, was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, the United States of America, on December 5, 1927. His Majesty came to the throne on June 9, 1946, when he was only 18 years of age, and was crowned as The King of Thailand on May 5, 1950. His ceremonial name, according to the ancient tradition is “Phrabat Somdej Phra Paramindra Maha Bhumibol Adulyadej Mahitaladhibet Ramadhibodi Chakrinarubodindara Sayamindaradhiraj Boromanatbophit”. That day, His Majesty pronounced the traditional oath of accession which stated, “We will reign with righteousness for the benefit and happiness of the Siamese people”. Since then, over 60 years after his coronation, everyday, His Majesty has been concerned about the uplifting of the general well-being of the Thai people. His Majesty has traveled throughout the kingdom visiting his people, though there was rain, sunshine, floods, or difficult ways to go through rural barren areas, to listen to his villagers’ problems. His Majesty tried to solve these problems with Royal projects, giving the villagers knowledge to improve themselves to have a better livelihood. There is a picture that impresses all of Thai people. It is a picture of The King. In that picture, His Majesty holds a map in his left hand, a pencil in right hand, and there is a sweat drop on the tip on his nose. I saw this picture everywhere, and every time I saw it there would be a smile on my face and deep in my heart.
          Nowadays, His Majesty the King is well recognized as the heart and soul of the Thai nation, as the longest-reigning monarch in the history of the world. But, how many people know why Thai people love their King so much? If you ask Thai people, “Who is the one you most love and esteem?” The answer surely is “Nai Luang” or my King.
          One of my favorite books has many stories to express the love of Thai people for their King. In the story “My stake”, Mom Rajawongse Cuckrit Pramoch, a member of the Royal family, asked His Majesty “Have you ever been discouraged?” His Majesty answered “Yes, I have. Sometimes troubles are discouraging. But I can't be disheartened, because my stakes are very high. My stakes are the country and happiness of all of the Thai people”. An another story I read, I learned that many years ago His Majesty visited people in poverty in the North East of Thailand because there was a drought for many years. When His Majesty arrived there, an old woman crept to him and asked for the water. His Majesty said, “Don’t worry. There will be water here. We will give you water”. Incredibly, it suddenly rained. That made people and the entourages surprised. I like this story very much. I told this story to my friends then they said, “He is a deity from heaven”.
           When I grew up, I went to the university which was established by one of the kings of Thailand. The university was named after the king’s name, Chulalongkorn University. I feel very proud of my university. Many times, when there was an important event such as a conference that had important people around the world come to Thailand, it took place at my university. I sometimes saw a king and the family passing by when they came to my university to attend an important occasion. The people would sit politely on the ground and wait to see the king. Thai people believe that if they have a chance to see the King in person, they will have good lives. I am very happy to have a chance to get a graduate diploma from a daughter of the king. It is not easy to have an opportunity to be close and get something hand to hand from the royal family. Not many universities in Thailand are honored to have such an opportunity. The King and his family will give the diploma to the graduated students who graduate from public universities only. On my commencement day, I heard a very impressive story about the king from my teacher. He told that over the past 40 years, His Majesty have given diplomas to more than 100,000 graduate students every year. The rector of the university asked His Majesty to give diplomas to master and doctoral degree only. But His Majesty said that he can’t because most students graduate with only a bachelor degree and they have only one chance to get diploma from his hand. One day; moreover, when His Majesty was giving diplomas, the electric light was broken down. One student lost his opportunity to have his picture taken with the king. After the last student got his diploma, His Majesty let that student took a picture again. I think if I were that student, I would be very happy because the king gave me special attention.
           This year, there was a very important event about the King of Thailand. On June 9, it was the 60th Anniversary Celebration of His Majesty the King’s accession to the Throne. Many important people, royal families and leaders of countries around the world came to Thailand and celebrated in this event. I now understand that the Thai King is loved and respected by many people, not only in Thailand.
So June 9, 2006 was pronounced a national holiday due to this celebration. It was 7 in the morning; I went to join the people to celebrate this important day. When I arrived at the location where the ceremony was to take place, I was very excited to see many people waiting to see the King. I think there were almost million of people in that place. Everyone wore a special designed yellow T-shirt and yellow wristband for this event. We all waved royal-yellow flags. It was very amazing that there were so many people doing the same thing. An old man standing next to me said that some people came to this place since 11 p.m. of yesterday to attend this ceremony. I said to myself that if I came here later than this, I might not find a space to stand. At 10:11 a.m. the King, Queen and other members of the royal family came to the throne hall. At 11:24 a.m., the King and the Queen appeared on the balcony in their Royal attire to greet the people. Everyone sang a Thai Royal anthem loudly. Everyone was happy, proud to be born in Thailand and have such a great king. After the spokesman officially began the ceremony, the King gave a brief speech to all the people. He and the Royal family thanked everyone for being there and wishing them the best. He wished for all Thai people to love each other and be in harmony. He wanted the Thai people to adhere to righteous thinking and act reasonably. When the speech was finished, the king waved his hand to the people. The crowd began to give a deafening cheer of “Long Live the King” “Long Live the King” “Long Live the King”…… until the king left there.
          After the ceremony, I took a taxi to a place called Impact Arena where there was an exhibition showing the life and all the activities that the King had done to improve the country. It took a long time to get to the place because there was heavy traffic. I was supposed to meet my mother there, but there were so many people and I thought for sure I could not find her. So I called my mother and told her that we should not meet. It took me three hours to see only one section because I could not walk freely. It was so crowded that people had to flow into the flood of people. The exhibition was nationally broadcast and at 7 p.m. every Thai person all over the country, including me, lit up candles and sang the song composed for the royal family together. I unconsciously cried with joy when I was singing. After the song ended, many fireworks were shot into the sky. They were the most beautiful fireworks I have experienced in my entire life. When I went back home, I saw my father watching the news showing the celebration that I attended in the morning. They showed the pictures from different angles. In one picture from the high angle, I saw the people wearing the yellow T-shirt everywhere. It looked like Chow Praya River, the main river of Thailand. I saw many people, actors, actresses, children, the old and the handicapped. They all cried with joy. I can say that I had the best sleep in my life that night. My heart was filled with joy. I am very proud to be Thailand born in a country that has the great king. “I love my King."