The modern European is trusted to make countless decisions about his life. They can pick and choose careers, become possessed by beliefs no matter how peculiar, or develop complex, and even at times destructive relationships.
He can slowly chip away at his health with alcoholic or tobacco toxins to consequently diminish his long survival probability and even refuse life-saving medical treatment.
Yet when it comes to one of the most personal decisions a person can ever make, how and when to end unbearable suffering, the state barges in to take that choice away.
It is that choice that is at the heart of the euthanasia debate, not medicine or end-of-life care. If our lives belong to us, then so must the final decision about whether to continue them. Respecting that freedom does not require approving of suicide; it requires recognising that politicians, judges, priests, and doctors have no greater claim over a person’s life than the person living it.
Self-Ownership
The strongest argument for legalising euthanasia is also the simplest: your body belongs to you. Free societies are built on the principle of self-ownership, trusting adults to make deeply personal decisions about their own lives.
The state exists to protect individuals from harm inflicted by others, not to compel them to remain alive against their will. Choosing euthanasia does not violate another person’s rights; it is a decision made solely about one’s own body and one’s own life.
Furthermore, since an individual has the right to reject treatment knowing it will result in death, how could one justify denying them the right to choose a peaceful, medically supervised death instead? Thomas Szasz captured the underlying inconsistency: “The right to reject treatment is so similar to the right to be left alone to commit suicide as to make them medically, morally, and legally equivalent.”
If we truly believe in bodily autonomy, then that principle should not disappear simply because someone is approaching the end of their life. The right to control one’s own body must include the right to decide when unbearable suffering has become too much to endure.
The Slippery Slope Is Not an Argument Against Liberty
One of the most common objections to euthanasia is the so-called slippery slope, that the legal criteria and eligible groups will gradually broaden over time. This indeed has been the case countries such as Belgium and Canada.
But it doesn’t make the case for euthanasia any weaker.
The principle of self-ownership does not depend on how many months someone has left to live, or if their suffering is deemed “bad enough” by the state. If bodily autonomy is the guiding principle, then expanding eligibility is not evidence that the principle has failed. It simply reflects a broader recognition that individuals, not governments, should decide when their own suffering has become unbearable.
Palliative Care Is Not a Substitute for Choice
Another common argument is that improving palliative care removes the need for euthanasia. Better pain relief, hospice care, and emotional support undoubtedly improve the quality of life for many patients and should be advanced along with euthanasia.
However, such reasoning disregards why many people seek euthanasia in the first place.
For many patients, the issue is not physical pain alone. It is the irreversible loss of independence, dignity, and control over their own lives. The prospect of being forced to spend their final months entirely dependent on others for every basic need can amount to an intolerable loss of dignity.
No amount of palliative care can restore that choice.
The goal of legalising euthanasia is not to replace palliative care but to complement it. Patients should have access to the very best end-of-life care available. But they should also retain the right to decide, according to their own values, when enough is enough.
Abuse Is a Reason for Safeguards, Not Prohibition
One of the strongest objections to euthanasia is the possibility of abuse. Could vulnerable people be pressured into ending their lives? Could doctors misuse the system?
These concerns deserve to be taken seriously. Abuse can happen. But the evidence suggests that, where euthanasia is legal and carefully regulated, serious breaches are rare.
Out of 9,958 reported euthanasia cases in 2024 in the Netherlands, only six were found by the regional review committees to have failed to meet one or more legal due-care requirements, around 0.06% of reported cases. This does not mean the system is perfect, but it demonstrates that strong safeguards can substantially reduce abuse.
More importantly, the possibility of abuse has never, by itself, been sufficient reason to abolish a liberty.
Every freedom carries risks. People abuse freedom of speech through defamation. Financial freedom enables fraud and scams. Driving results in dangerous and sometimes criminal behaviour. Surgical procedures can be performed negligently. Yet we do not ban speech, driving, financial transactions, or surgery because some people misuse them. The appropriate response to abuse is to punish those who abuse the law, not to deny every competent adult the freedom to make decisions about their own body.
Needless to say, the argument presented here applies only to competent adults capable of making informed, voluntary decisions free from coercion.
Religious Beliefs Should Not Determine Public Law
For many opponents of euthanasia, the objection is ultimately religious. They believe that life is sacred, that only God has the authority to decide when it ends, or that intentionally ending a human life is morally wrong.
People are entirely entitled to hold these beliefs. But they should not be entitled to impose them on everyone else.
Europe is home to people of many different faiths, as well as those with no religion at all. In a liberal democracy, the law should protect the freedom of individuals to live according to their own conscience, not enforce the moral teachings of one particular religion.
Those who believe euthanasia is morally wrong remain completely free never to choose it for themselves. Legalising euthanasia forces no one to end their life. It simply prevents the government from forbidding that choice.
Compassion Means Respecting Human Dignity
Opponents of euthanasia often argue that assisted dying undermines human dignity and that preventing it is an act of compassion.
A liberal perspective reaches the opposite conclusion. Human dignity is rooted in individual autonomy. Respecting someone’s dignity means recognising their ability to make profound decisions about their own life, including how they wish to face its final stages. Treating competent adults as incapable of making that decision for themselves is arguably a greater affront to their dignity than respecting their autonomous choice.
Likewise, compassion should not be confused with paternalism. Preventing euthanasia may be well-intentioned, but forcing someone to continue living despite repeatedly and competently expressing a wish to die is not necessarily compassionate. It is the state substituting its judgment for that of the individual.
Compassion means caring for people according to their own values, not imposing our own. Respecting human dignity ultimately means trusting competent adults to decide what a dignified end to their own life looks like.
Legalising euthanasia does not create a “right to die”; it recognises that the government does not own its citizens.
No one is compelled to choose euthanasia, just as no one is compelled to refuse it. It simply allows competent adults to make one of the most personal decisions imaginable according to their own conscience and values.
Reasonable people will continue to disagree on the morality of euthanasia. Some will oppose it because of their religious beliefs, others because of ethical concerns. They are entirely free to hold those views and to never choose euthanasia for themselves. But in a free society, those beliefs should not be imposed on everyone else through the force of law.
Ultimately, the question is simple: who should decide when unbearable suffering has become too much to endure: the individual living through it, or the government?
The liberal answer is clear.
