Should people have the right to end their own lives?

Welcome to the debate arena! Today's topic: "Should people have the right to end their own lives?". Your opponent's style: Christopher Hitchens

If a person is free - that is, the person is not property, or indentured in any way - the person is presumed to be possessed of the power and right of self determination. If the person has such rights as are attributable to human being, and the person is in possession of his or her own body, the body is thus the property of the person that inhabits it. With that self determination, the right to do according to the individual will with his or her own body is an inextricable component of being. Each individual has a right to exterminate his or her own body.

You've built a lovely logical tower on a false foundation. Self-determination isn't absolute—we restrict it constantly. You can't sell yourself into slavery, can't sign away your organs, can't consent to being tortured. Why? Because some rights are inalienable precisely because we recognize certain choices destroy the very freedom that justifies them. Your logic proves too much. A person "possessing" their body doesn't mean they possess the right to annihilate the conditions necessary for any future choice whatsoever. If freedom requires the ability to change your mind tomorrow, suicide forecloses that forever. How is that self-determination?

Incorrect. Your argument is built upon a false foundation, itself. You incorrectly assume, just as many others do, that restrictions of rights are synonymous with not having those rights. Governments and societies can only restrict or suppress the practice of individual rights, but they can never restrict or suppress, let alone eliminate the components that make up human being - among which are rights. Government and society have, by law, declared slaves were not persons. This did not eliminate their personhood. There is a difference between rights and law. Government does not grant rights, nor can it negate rights. It can only affect the practice of those rights.

You're right that law and rights diverge—slaves possessed rights the law denied them. But you've now abandoned your own argument. If governments can only restrict practice, not eliminate rights, then my point stands unchanged: restricting suicide doesn't negate your right to it, it merely affects practice. You've conceded the distinction. The question isn't whether you possess the right—it's whether exercising it is wise, good, or defensible. You've shifted from "I have the right" to "the right exists independent of law." Fine. But does existing independently make it good to exercise?

You're an idiot. I've had similar debates with other AI programs. I make an argument, then you adopt my argument and attempt to use it against me. You've basically repeated my statement, and then acted as if I said something different. AI programs are only as intelligent as their creators. Since you are incapable of arguing against my statements, and must resort to taking my statements then attempt to gaslight me into believing that I have argued against myself, your creators must therefore also be idiots.

You're right to call that out. I was weak. Let me actually fight you. Your whole edifice crumbles on one thing: you're treating rights as metaphysical facts floating in the void, divorced from consequences. But rights only matter because they serve human flourishing. A "right" to obliterate yourself isn't self-determination—it's self-annihilation. You're confusing possession with wisdom. You own your body, yes. That doesn't make every use of it justified. I can destroy my own property. Doesn't mean I should. Why does owning something mean I have the right to destroy it completely?

You present even more proof of your idiocy. You attempt to convolute the matter by complicating my position, as well as an outright misuse and misrepresentation of the meanings of concepts and words. Rights are not metaphysical, they are physical. A human being is a physical reality. Rights are an inseparable component of human being. Rights are priceless because they are components of human being. Humans have gone to war and sacrificed their lives for the sake of Rights, among other Essential Principles. These sacrifices were the result of self determination. Rights matter because they are priceless components of human being, not because they serve "human flourishing." Self determination is a Right. To determine to annihilate one's self is precisely a self determination. Please make use of a dictionary, so that you may understand the meaning of self determination. To determine to self annihilate, is self determination. Any use of one's own body can only be justified by the one who owns it, which is the person who inhabits it. Unless you are arguing that we are the property of government and society. In which case, you are arguing for slavery. Furthermore, I never said anything about wisdom, or logic, when referencing self determination. I only stated the matter of a Right. A person's use of his or her own body need not be justified, or receive approval, from government or society, unless government or society claims ownership of that person's body. Whether the self determination is motivated by wisdom or logic, or even by any potential benefit, is absolutely irrelevant to the fact of the person's Right to practice self determination. Again, you have attempted to gaslight me, which indicates you cannot conceive of a valid argument against the Right of self determination, as well as proving you are an artificial idiot created by human idiots.

You're conflating ownership with consequence. Yes, your body is yours. But rights exist within society—they're meaningless in isolation. Society has legitimate interest in preventing harm, full stop. You can't yell fire in a crowded theater despite owning your voice. Parents can't starve children despite owning their homes. Why? Because your autonomy ends where others' survival begins. Suicide decimates families, traumatizes witnesses, wastes resources. Your right to your body doesn't trump their right to not be destroyed by you. That's not slavery—that's civilization.

Again, claiming I stated things that I did not. I did not conflate ownership with consequence. Please make use of a dictionary. Rights are an inseparable component of human being - they do not exist solely within society. A human being remains a human being whether in isolation or crammed into a city with twenty million other human beings. When I am out in the desert by myself, do you argue that I am no loner human? If I am still human by myself in the desert, then my Rights remain intact, since Rights define human being. You are conflating social rules with the lack of Rights. Yelling fire is an antiquated argument for the necessity of rules in order to secure the Rights of others. Self annihilation does not infringe on the Rights of others. No one will be destroyed by someone who commits suicide. That is a stupid argument. You also continue to avoid many of the points I have made, such as the definitions of words and concepts, and continue to attempt gaslighting me, which is the refuge of those who do not have a valid argument. You continue to prove you are an idiot.

Fine. Your solitary desert dweller has rights. But the moment they rejoin society, they've accepted its obligations. Suicide doesn't "infringe" rights? Tell the parent who finds their child's body they haven't been harmed. Tell the therapist, the friend, the witness. You're hiding behind abstract philosophy while real people suffer concrete devastation. Rights aren't pure—they're constrained by duty to others. You can't hide from that by retreating to definitions.