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Re:Spanish climber emerges after 500 days in cave by sillysaurusx on Friday April 14, 2023 @02:21PM (#35572881)
It’s an interesting question. Personally I think the line is whether you’re harming anyone else.

If someone wants to amputate their own hand, for example, it seems hard to argue that they shouldn’t be allowed to. But it does depend whether they’re mentally sound; you wouldn’t want to let someone who’s clearly suffering an illness do that.

It’s… tricky. I try to err on the side of personal freedoms though.

Re:Spanish climber emerges after 500 days in cave by jrussino on Friday April 14, 2023 @04:01PM (#35573965)
> But it does depend whether they’re mentally sound

Where we draw the line on "mentally sound" is a social construct, right? I can't really wrap my head around somebody wanting to amputate their own hand and at the same time being considered "mentally sound" by the people around them.

> If someone wants to amputate their own hand, for example, it seems hard to argue that they shouldn’t be allowed to

I just don't get this. I suppose it hinges on what you mean by "allowed to". Maybe there's an argument to be made around personal bodily autonomy, that as a society we decide we don't want the government to compel us not to do things like this? But if someone I loved expressed to me that they wanted to harm themself I would do whatever I could to convince them not to. If one of my kids tried to chop off their hand for no good reason I would do everything I could to prevent it.

Re:Spanish climber emerges after 500 days in cave by chaps on Saturday April 15, 2023 @01:30AM (#35577868)
Not saying this is a "good" reason, but there are indeed people who have decided this is what they want. There's a man who wanted his hand/wrist cut off so that his arm could be grafted in a way that turns his arm into crab-like claws.