For probably a quarter of a million years, the natural response to teenagers being moody, weird and uncomfortable in their bodies has been “Get over it, kid, it’s just a normal part of growing up.” Today, of course, we are now being informed in no uncertain terms that the proper response includes pharmaceuticals, hormones, massive life-altering surgeries including amputations and removals of evolutionarily vital organs and the celebration of contra-factual positions.
Canada is doing one better: making it not just legal, not just socially acceptable, but *praiseworthy* for teenagers who are depressed to seek out medical professionals to END THEM. The “MAID” (Medical Assistance In Dying) program is apparently advancing by leaps and bounds; it’s not just people with horrifying terminals illnesses that promise nothing but agony and degradation, but things as tenuous and potentially *temporary* as depression and PTSD. Something like 7.5% of the deaths on Vancouver Island are the result of doctors helping people off themselves.
Let Me Be Obama-Clear: if you want to off yourself, that’s your decision. If you are an adult of sound-ish mind and you don;t want to live on this planet anymore… it’s your life to do with as you please. Getting the government to help you out with that, though, gets a little weird. If you have a terminal case of explosive xenopolycythemic ass cancer eating you alive causing chunks of your flesh to drop off and detonate, then, sure, I can even get behind your decision. But if you’re just *sad?* If you are not yet an actual adult? Naw. There ain’t no role for the government helping out here, and a pretty big argument for the government trying to prevent that sort of thing.
The Canadian government getting involved here makes sense from a purely ledger-based point of view: make it acceptable and in fact praiseworthy for an increasing fraction of the populace to be euthanized, then you can go after the people you as a government *really* don’t want hanging around: those who consume but do not contribute. Elderly retirees living off pensions and social welfare. People in loony bins. The homeless. Criminals. Imagine a Canada where such people were peacefully marched into Carousel, never to be heard from or paid for again. From a bureaucrats point of view, it’s a spectacular system. (One wonder what happens when they realize what an economic drag “migrants” are.) From the point of view of a conscientious religious person, it’s demonic. From the point of view of a pragmatic skeptic, it’s equally horrifying.
Even Canadian clothing retailers are getting in on the action, producing public service spots extolling the virtues of ending oneself, with no actual valid reason given:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UxdzzYGvBMU
There are times when bringing on death is the proper course of action. But it is never a good thing; at best, it is merely the least bad option.