6 - Survivors’ Responses

Summary

Unlike preceding chapters, this one will focus entirely on survivors’ construals of electors’ choices to die and their consequent responses to those choices. In particular, we have to consider how to best understand survivors’ responses to evaluate whether they are likely to be appropriate or inappropriate to electors’ decisions, and so may be potentially harmful to both electors and survivors themselves.

Appropriate responses are those that recognize and either support or do not impede soundly reasoned and acceptably motivated choices to die that serve electors’ best interests. Responses also are appropriate if they oppose or impede choices to die that in one or another way fail to be soundly reasoned and acceptably motivated or do not serve electors’ best interests. Inappropriate responses are those that support or do not impede choices to die that are not soundly reasoned and/or are unacceptably motivated or are against electors’ best interests. Responses are also inappropriate if they support or encourage elective death that does not serve electors’ best interests. In a secondary way, survivors’ responses may be inappropriate if they incur negative psychological and emotional consequences for them because of failure to understand electors’ reasoning or motivation, involve feelings of guilt of the sort I consider below, or are driven by unreflective adherence to iconic or coincidental cultural values, beliefs, and practices.