Humane (adjective): having or showing compassion or benevolence.

Having just had recent experience with this (and perhaps I’m just working my way through the stages of grief), I have to say that our end-of-life treatment of people is hardly humane. We treat our dogs and cats more kindly than we are permitted to treat the people we love when they are beyond the ability of medical science to recover. Instead of ending their lives painlessly and quickly, we are forced by legalities to submit them to a slow, lingering passage, hopefully eased by painkillers (though we can’t know that). This strikes me as cruelty, not humane treatment.

Do we treat people less humanely than we do our pets? Feel free to discuss (but keep it civil, please!)

From: [identity profile] supergee.livejournal.com


The moralistic insistence that it would be Wrong to let someone die with a habit has curtailed the supply of painkillers to the dying.

From: [identity profile] cakmpls.livejournal.com


Yes, we do.

P.S. I have seen it with my parents. I'm sorry you went through it, too.
Edited Date: 2013-10-21 10:30 pm (UTC)

From: [identity profile] kateelliott.livejournal.com


Having just gone through hospice with my father, I have to agree with you.
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