"No law can give or take away the choice to commit suicide"
- Maggie Gallagher
About this Quote
This quote by Maggie Gallagher speaks with the idea of individual autonomy and the right to make choices about one's own life. It recommends that no matter what laws are in place, people have the right to make their own choices, even if those options are challenging or unpopular. The quote implies that suicide is an individual choice which no law can take away a person's right to make that choice. It likewise implies that no law can require somebody to dedicate suicide, as it is eventually a personal choice. This quote talks to the importance of respecting private autonomy and the right to make choices about one's own life, even if those decisions are not popular or widely accepted.
"I think suicide is sort of like cancer was 50 years ago. People don't want to talk about it, they don't want to know about it. People are frightened of it, and they don't understand, when actually these issues are medically treatable"
"I think about death a lot, like I think we all do. I don't think of suicide as an option, but as fun. It's an interesting idea that you can control how you go. It's this thing that's looming, and you can control it"
"As history since Hiroshima shows, the best, perhaps the only, way to curb war is to deter it with such overwhelming force as to turn it from a struggle into suicide"
