An argument against euthanasia

1. (Premise) It is wrong to euthanize a patient who does not give valid consent for euthanasia.
2. (Premise) Valid consent is not the expression of a mental state that constitutes an abnormal mental condition.
3. (Premise) Suicidality is an abnormal mental condition.
4. (Premise) Consent is not valid when it comes from external threats.
5. (Premise) A resolve to die is an instance of suicidality, unless it comes from external threats.
6. (Premise) Consent for euthanasia is the expression of a non-threat-motivated resolve to die, unless it comes from external threats.
7. A patient either consents or does not consent to euthanasia. (Tautology)
8. If a patient consents to euthanasia, the consent is not valid. (2-6)
9. Therefore, no one gives valid consent for euthanasia. (7 and 8)
10. Therefore, it is always wrong to euthanize a patient. (1 and 9)

Presumably, defenders of euthanasia will deny at least one of 3 and 5, thereby denying that all non-threat-motivated resolves to die are abnormal mental conditions.

But now take a paradigmatic case of a suicide. Jones is a disgraced lawyer. She has gambled her clients' money and lost, driving some of her clients to suicide, and has done all sorts of other spectacularly bad things. She now thinks that because of facts about her psychological make-up, she will never again be able to hold up her head in society given how infamous her case is. And so she attempts suicide. We think we should stop her and that she is in an abnormal mental condition. But is Jones' case significantly different from that of Smith who is facing unremitting physical pain and the alleged indignity of medical treatment for the rest of her life? Suppose Jones is right that given her psychological make-up and her social environment, the rest of her life will be full of psychological pain and social indignity (including jail, which is surely more undignified than just about any medical procedure). It seems that that if we think, as we should, that Jones' resolve to die is an abnormal suicidality, we should think the same thing about Smith.

Now, we might say this. Jones is only facing unremitting psychological pain because of an underlying psychological abnormality. Normal people bounce back, and so Jones is not normal. Be that as may be, this abnormal condition of Jones stands to Jones' motivation to die in exactly the same way that Smith's abnormal physical condition stands to Smith's motivation to die. Both of them have a condition that will almost certainly render the rest of their lives miserable. That in the one case the condition is psychological and in the other case it is physical surely makes little difference. Besides, the line between the psychological and physical is hard to draw (though for some purposes a rough-and-ready distinction is helpful). A crucial part of Smith's misery will be pain, and pain is a psychological phenomenon. (And surely it makes no difference whether Smith's pain is normal or abnormal.)

Of course, there is the difference that Smith hadn't done terrible things in the past, while Jones had. But we don't stop Jones from suicide primarily because she had done wicked deeds. We stop her because that's the thing to do when someone is suicidal. And we should likewise stop Smith from killing herself, and a fortiori not help her to do so.