thedailywhat:

This Is All Kinds Of Wrong of the Day: The U.K.’s High Court has ruled that Tony Nicklinson, the 58-year-old with locked-in syndrome who says his life is ”dull, miserable, demeaning, undignified, and intolerable,” does not have the right to die. 

The court blatantly ignored Oregon’s Death with Dignity Act in its ruling, saying that there was no precedent for assisted dying anywhere in the world:

It is not for the court to decide whether the law on assisted dying should be changed and, if so, what safeguards should be put in place. Under our system of government these are matters for Parliament to decide… not for the court on the facts of an individual case or cases.

Nicklinson, “devastated,” likely will appeal to the Supreme Court:

I thought that if the court saw me as I am, utterly miserable with my life, powerless to do anything about it because of my disability then the judges would accept my reasoning that I do not want to carry on and should be able to have a dignified death. … 

Judges, like politicians, are happiest when they can avoid confronting the real issues and this judgment is not an exception to this rule… this means yet another period of physical discomfort, misery and mental anguish while we find out who controls my life — me or the state.

[theindependent]