Is it better to let the poor and the sick die? || Acharya Prashant, with SPA Delhi (2023)

Acharya Prashant

Video Information: 22.02.23, SPA College (Online), Greater Noida  Context: ~ Why do people commit suicide? ~ What is the end of suffering? ~ Are we actually living? ~ What is the worst that happens when I die? ~ How to develop compassion?  ~ Do we really care about the poor? ~ How long should one live?   Music Credits: Milind Date  ~~~~~  #acharyaprashant

Transcript

00:00So, my question is that, so as we currently know, the earth is overpopulated and you know

00:18sometimes people around me very loosely say that the people who are physically, you know

00:24mentally or economically not so well off, they are better off dead. So, I want to ask that what

00:33is your take and what do you think is the reason of such insensitivity?

00:44Basic lack of love towards life which is consciousness, what else?

00:48You know, this question should be accompanied by the query, how do people manage to kill so many

00:57animals for flesh every day? Billions of animals every day. And someone who gleefully

01:08gloats over animal flesh and stuffs it in, how far is he from demanding that all the disabled and the poor

01:24and the destitute people be simply jettisoned?

01:31We are cruel people. We are very animalistic and if we can't see that, that's just because of our animalism.

01:46That's the problem, right? The more animalistic you are, the less you see that you are an animal.

01:52And then we are doing that every day. I mean, we call ourselves

01:56cultured and civilized and whatnot and look at the way these trucks and carriers full of

02:13chicken and goats and lambs, they weave through our cities.

02:21So many times, your own vehicle would have stopped behind one of those

02:32vehicles that carry those small cells in which chicken are stashed. Have you seen one of them?

02:42And you would have seen those birds and you would have just gone on, continued with your day.

02:53That's the kind of people we are. And you visit a great restaurant, a very expensive one

03:01and the more expensive it is, the more you have food items marked with red dots on the menu.

03:09In fact, it's becoming difficult to get even vegetarian food, leave alone vegan.

03:19I was traveling by this

03:28important airlines and they brought the food menu. This was just three days back. I was returning from

03:36IIT Guwahati and it happened both ways, to and fro.

03:42First of all, there was just one vegan option and that too was not available.

03:50So ultimately, in their vegetarian section,

03:57they had chole and paratha and the paratha too was made of ghee.

04:05So I said, just give me the chole, that's all, nothing else and some salad if you may.

04:14That's the kind of people we are. Think of an aircraft, a sophisticated piece of technology

04:28flying at 37,000 feet.

04:30Think of that, 37,000 feet above the clouds.

04:39And yet, we kill like beasts.

04:44That's what it is. In absence of self-knowledge, our intellect has fallen prey to the inner beast.

04:53The inner beast is commanding the intellect. So we have come up with

05:00sophisticated methods to kill.

05:07If you look for a modern slaughterhouse on the internet, it is very well managed, very professionally run

05:17and uses state-of-the-art technology.

05:22That's the kind of people we are. Now, how does it surprise you that if we look at

05:29someone who is debilitated and needs help, we start wishing that this person is gotten rid of ASAP

05:40because we don't want to take care of him and

05:42yeah, it's all quite bad and all very violent. Yes.

06:04Though there is something I would like to say,

06:07though there is something I would like to add to this.

06:18If I ever get terribly sick,

06:24obviously, I hope I have, I would have lived the kind of life

06:32in which I would not have surrounded myself with people who wish me

06:41an early exit just because they don't want to take care of me.

06:47So,

06:51obviously, there will be people around who will say, let him stay, let him stay, let's take care of him,

06:56even if he's on his deathbed, even if he's turned almost a vegetable,

07:03even if he has to be on the ventilator for long, let him be.

07:10That's what those people must say, if I have lived rightly, right? That's their dharma,

07:16that's their love, that's for them to say.

07:19But if I am that critically and that chronically and that irretrievably ill,

07:28my dharma probably would be to choose my own departure.

07:34That's my dharma, not yours. If you are by my bedside, you should be, you should be

07:41prepared to invest everything in my return. You should say, it does not matter how much money it

07:47takes or whatever, but I want this person to survive, and it's not about me in particular.

07:56It's about anyone you truly love.

07:59The role of the caretaker is to say, I want to see him back, I want to see him on his feet.

08:07Even if there is a 0.1% probability that this person can be retrieved from his deathbed,

08:16I want to see him on his feet. Even if there is a 0.1% probability that this person

08:23can be retrieved from his deathbed, I am prepared to bet.

08:35But the one who is in that kind of terminal state,

08:41hopeless state, it is upon him to then say, I am choosing to go.

08:55But those words must come from the one who is ill, not from the ones who are to take care of him.

09:07And both must follow their dharma. The one who is so ill that he sees that there is no point living

09:14on. It's just that too many resources, too much resources are being spent on me, and my life

09:24itself is now a waste on the time and energy of so many caretakers. So money is being wasted on me,

09:34time, energy is being wasted on me, and my life itself is of no good because I can

09:39not do any creative work anymore. He should all by himself then say,

09:46rather declare that it's time for me to go. Give me a loving and respectable farewell now. I am going.

09:59So it's not as if being compassionate would mean that the society must necessarily be full

10:11of old and sick and comatose people. No.

10:20If you have a society that has real compassion, and real compassion arises only from true

10:25understanding, then the dying one would also have the compassion to say that I want to now go.

10:36And I think this is something that each of us must necessarily choose.

10:45We are conscious beings, you see, and consciousness is choice.

10:49Death is not something that we should ever leave to chance.

10:54Just as all scientific progress is a choice to improve the quality of life,

11:03and so much progress in medical science is a choice to elongate both the quality and the

11:10length of life, similarly, you should exercise choice in the matter of your departure.

11:19Never leave it to chance.

11:23When you know for sure that you are not redeemable anymore,

11:29then it is my personal conviction that you should not just

11:37needlessly keep hanging on. You should have the courage to say goodbye at the time of your choice.

11:49That decision obviously cannot be made in a moment of desperation or despondency.

11:54You are feeling very ill or there is a lot of pain and then you say I want to die. No,

11:57not that kind of a choice, but a very informed and calm

12:06choice made with a still and sound mind.

12:19Such double standards we have. When it comes to others, we want to see them killed

12:27for the smallest and the

12:32lowest kinds of reason possible. I want to kill a little lamb because the meat is tender.

12:40What stupidity! It is not even a grown-up sheep, you are talking of a little lamb,

12:48sometimes just a few months old and you are saying the flesh is soft and juicy. I hate to

12:54use that word juicy for flesh and you want to see it killed and the lamb is just what three months,

13:03five, six months something. And when it comes to your own life,

13:09you want to keep hanging on even if you are 95.

13:14The three months old lamb is to be slaughtered and you are 95 now, go!

13:20You have overstayed your time, go! And it's not about being 95, it's about being useless now

13:27and it's not about being useless to the society, it's about being useless to yourself now.

13:32You are of no use even to yourself. Half the time you are unconscious,

13:38the other half you are preparing to be unconscious.

13:42What is this life? Purely on medicines you are surviving. Go and make an honourable exit.

13:52Let there be dignity even in death. Do not drag on.

14:22Yes, thank you.

14:24Thank you, sir.

14:26Hello, sir. I am Rashi and following up from the previous question, my question is about euthanasia.

14:33As we know, there have been many movies made on mercy killing and euthanasia has also been

14:38legalized in seven countries now with Canada recently extending the law to people with

14:43mental illnesses. I wanted to know what your views regarding this were and if there is a

14:49moral justification for it or not.

14:55Obviously, it is and it should not even be called as mercy killing.

15:01It's a part of your fundamental right to be alive.

15:09Today itself one of your batch mates queried me on article 21.

15:14Article 21 is not just right to live, it's the right to a dignified life.

15:22That's what the courts have said, the right to a dignified life.

15:26And a dignified life includes the death of dignity.

15:33There is no mercy in that. It's my right to die.

15:38It's my right to die.

15:40Obviously, I repeat, the decision to depart has to be made in equanimity, in calmness of mind,

15:50with due attention, deliberation. It cannot come from an emotional state.

15:55It cannot come from a state of pain. It cannot be akin to suicide.

16:04There has to be a difference between dying by suicide and choosing a death of dignity.

16:18When you say suicide, usually that comes from an impassioned state of mind.

16:24Usually that comes when you can no longer bear the suffering that life is.

16:30So, I am differentiating this thing, the right to go, the right to depart.

16:36Just as article 21 says the right to live, it should include the right to depart.

16:45So, the right to depart, it must be a very inalienable human right, a very fundamental right.

16:54Yes, it should be there. It should be there and if we live rightly,

16:58live rightly, then we will find that we are not leaving our death to chance.

17:08I repeat, consciousness is choice. If everything in life must be subject to your conscious choice,

17:15then so must be your death. Why must death be random? Why must death be accidental?

17:19The more medical science progresses, the more you will have control over everything that is

17:28accidental, you see. We have already increased our lifespans so much. The number of octogenarians

17:39and nanogerarians is at an all-time high. We never had so many old people in history.

17:44The number of people who are living beyond 100 is rushing into an unbelievably large figure.

17:53Average life expectancy in many countries in Europe, for example, is well beyond 80.

18:01Even in your own country, it is entering mid-70s.

18:07When we will have the census, it is due. We will have more precise figures.

18:14So, you have extended life and it is possible that average life expectancy can be stretched to

18:23even 100 or 125. Medical science is at its job. Researchers and scientists are doing what they

18:35must. So, you can be made to live for many more decades even after 100.

18:44Then it will become even more imperative that you get the right to depart.

18:53Choice must not lie only in extending life. Choice must lie also in ending life.

18:59Life is not just about being able to breathe or see. Life has to be purposeful.

19:07When you are alive, there has to be a purpose to life.

19:11It is another matter that those who have known life,

19:13they say that the purpose of life is to come to a point of purposelessness.

19:18What is the purpose of life? To come to a point where you laugh at this question.

19:39Coming to purposelessness is the purpose of life. So, there is a purpose. You cannot just

19:45randomly start saying that you are purposeless.

19:50At your stage where you are, you cannot be purposeless. You ought to have a purpose.

19:58And when you find that you are no more in a state to pursue that purpose,

20:03come on tell me why do you want to live any longer?

20:11Just lying somewhere like a vegetable. For what? For what?

20:23Let your life be high and let your death be an equal to your life.

20:33I just hope I am not encouraging those with suicidal tendencies.

20:44People can misinterpret anything.

20:47What I am saying is live a great life and when it's your time to go,

20:54then don't just stick around and delay and weep and what not.

21:03Yes.

21:05Thank you, sir.

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