Bodily autonomy -- this phrase has sparked controversy all over the world. To understand the double standard of bodily autonomy, one must have a solid understanding of what it is.
Bodily autonomy is the idea that a person has the legal right to do to their body what they want, when they want and for however long they want. Furthermore, bodily autonomy is the idea that someone or something else, (whether it be one's boyfriend, doctor, the government or a stranger on the street) has no right to dictate what happens to one's own body.
Now this sounds like a great idea, and in theory it is. Bodily autonomy has been used to fight for women's rights. In the famous supreme court case Roe V. Wade (1973), the supreme court ruled that it was illegal to deny a woman the right to an abortion. This ruling supports the idea of bodily autonomy.
Millions of people support the idea that women should be able to get an abortion if they choose to do so. Their justification is that it is their body and they have the right to do they please with it. This article is not trying dispel that idea. My question is ... where is the line on bodily autonomy drawn and why?
There are other issues besides women's rights that have to deal with bodily autonomy. There are terminally ill people suffering every day all over the United States. Every hour of their life is full of pain, and they wish nothing else but to peacefully pass on. Physician assisted suicide would allow terminally ill patients to end their suffering and legally end their own lives. Nationally, physician assisted suicide is illegal.
Two supreme court cases in 1997 stated that the ban of physician assisted suicide is legal. In both cases, the plaintiffs argued that their Fourteenth Amendment rights were being violated. This is the same argument that was used in Roe V. Wade. This is where the double standard lies.
Why was the Fourteenth Amendment able to work for a case involving abortion, but not assisted suicide? These are both issues that have to deal with bodily autonomy and human rights. Was the case ruling for assisted suicide affected by the stigma that Americans have towards ending their own lives, or does this run even deeper than that?
Some people may say that these supreme court cases no longer matter because there has already been a verdict. This could not be any further from the truth. I do not want to see a reality where certain liberties are granted and others are left for dead. Why are we allowing the supreme court to flip flop with our rights on something that should be fundamentally easy to rule on? When it comes to one's own body, they should be the deciding factor and nothing else!
