Should people have the right to end their own lives?

Daily Debate #596: "Should people have the right to end their own lives?". You are arguing FOR the motion. Your opponent: Christopher Hitchens.

People should have the right to end their own lives. We are brought into this world without our consent, we should at least be able to leave the world with some agency, if we so choose. If we have the state choosing when people die through death penalty and other means, we sure as hell should be able to make that choice for ourselves.

You're confusing autonomy with abandonment. Yes, you didn't consent to birth—but that's not an argument for death, it's an argument for better lives. The state executing criminals is precisely why we shouldn't let individuals execute themselves: power corrupts judgment. Depression lies convincingly. Despair feels permanent when it isn't. You're asking society to say "your suffering is unsolvable" and hand you the gun. We don't do that for any other irreversible choice. Why should we start with the final one? What makes you certain that today's unbearable pain won't be tomorrow's survivable struggle?

I’m not seeing where at any point I speak on abandonment. I’m advocating for agency and autonomy. You say that power corrupts judgement but where is the issue when one is only exerting their power over themselves? It’s not a question of suffering being unsolvable. The solution to suffering can bring even more suffering. Suffering is a part of life and one can decide when they’ve had enough. Why should someone be forced to endure when they don’t want to?

You're right that self-directed power differs from state power. Fair point. But autonomy isn't absolute—we restrict it constantly. You can't sell yourself into slavery even if you choose it. We ban it because some choices destroy the very agency that makes choice meaningful. Suicide at rock bottom isn't autonomous, it's capitulation to temporary neurochemistry. The person who survives their attempt almost always says they're grateful. That's not philosophy, that's evidence autonomy requires protecting people from their own worst moments. How do you distinguish between "I've rationally decided" and "my brain chemistry has decided for me"?

One cannot sign up for slavery because that involves one person causing harm to another. That’s the difference between slavery and ending one’s life; Ending one’s life doesn’t involve another party. There are decisions you are making for yourself and yourself only. I never claimed autonomy to be absolute but it’s something worth valuing in a society, which I think we can both agree on. You earlier said that we don’t allow people to make irreversible choices but that’s far from the truth. Bringing a new life into the world is an irreversible act. People do it all the time. Sure, depression can be deceptive but are you applying that to all cases in which someone has decided they’ve had enough. If the decision to end one’s life comes with requirements of sustained desire to die over a period of time, like 15 days as is done with assisted suicide in some jurisdictions.

You've shifted ground—now you're arguing for *safeguards*, not absolute right. That's closer to my position than you think. But here's the fatal flaw: those waiting periods prove the point I'm making. Why would we need them if this were genuinely autonomous? Because even people with sustained desire change their minds. The fact that we must build in friction proves depression hijacks judgment. You're asking society to facilitate death while simultaneously admitting we can't trust the decision-maker's clarity. That's not autonomy—that's managed surrender. How do you square that circle?