A note on defending the very tiny risk of deliberate unconsensual killing in assisted dying

Freedom must not be undermined in the name of maximum safety from injustice

The fact a certain number of innocent people will be deliberately unconsensually killed, i.e., murdered, under assisted dying against their actual will is taken as decisive reason to be against it for many supporters of the bill. Yet in other areas of life these same people, or, at least, many of them, are willing to see the innocent killed against their actual will, or, risk thereof. Consider these three examples.

1. Suicide

Where suicide is legal this gives malicious agents the opportunity to blackmail innocent people into it. Where illegal, and, where attempted cases are severely punished, blackmail would be far less successful because no one would wish to face the legal penalty for a failed suicide attempt, instead, they’d be willing to undergo the threat of the blackmailer. Yet we do think suicide is a freedom each person should have, meaning, we accept freedom warrants a tiny number of people being blackmailed into killing themselves.