{"id":6049,"date":"2019-07-15T03:41:36","date_gmt":"2019-07-14T19:11:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/exitinternational.net\/?p=6049"},"modified":"2019-07-15T19:24:11","modified_gmt":"2019-07-15T10:54:11","slug":"the-worlds-leading-euthanasia-advocate-designs-a-death-pod","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.euthanasia.net\/exit\/the-worlds-leading-euthanasia-advocate-designs-a-death-pod\/","title":{"rendered":"The world\u2019s leading euthanasia advocate designs a \u201cdeath pod\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

Philip Nitschke\u2019s \u201cSarco\u201d shines a harsh light on everything screwed up about our cultural attitude toward death.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The industrialized West doesn\u2019t know how to deal with death. Culturally, we only seem capable of engaging with the end of a human being\u2019s life in one way: as a problem. That problem can be \u201csolved\u201d by medicalizing it into a million little pieces, throwing money and fantasy at it, or simply\u00a0turning away from the people facing its natural approach. Rituals of acceptance, dignity, or even beauty around death are not part of our social firmware\u2013which is why a project like Philip Nitschke\u2019s Sarco may seem sincere, obscene, crass, and humane all at once.<\/p>\n

Sarco is a suicide chamber: a coffin-size pod you get into in order to painlessly and peacefully kill yourself on purpose. It\u2019s the brainchild of\u00a0Nitschke, a former physician from Australia who became an extremely vocal and active advocate of euthanasia for humans (in 1996, he became the first doctor in the world to administer a legal, voluntary lethal injection). It\u2019s no disrespect to\u00a0Nitschke\u2019s views to describe them without mincing words: he believes that people of sound mind should be able to kill themselves if they feel they have good reasons and do so in a way that doesn\u2019t require hiding their plans from the law or loved ones, or resorting to grotesque and unreliable DIY methods. Everybody says they want \u201ca peaceful death,\u201d and Sarco is a product intended to deliver that, via a strange combination of futuristic convenience and conspicuous consumption.<\/p>\n

\"Sarco<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cThere is no dignity, let alone beauty, lying on a rubber sheeted bed in an institution, hooked up to beeping machines working hard to provide us with a few more seconds of life,\u201d\u00a0Nitschke tells Co.Design via email. \u201cThe role of design is to turn something that is hitherto thought of as terrifying, and sometimes repulsive, into something that [is] nothing to be scared of, and even something that is to be embraced.\u00a0A process\u2013an experience\u2013that is self-directed by the person, reliable (so there can be no doubt about the outcome and there is no need to worry about failure), dignified (in that there is no need to be hooked to a machine, you don\u2019t have to undress or wear special clothing). I would also add \u2018bold,\u2019 in that a death in a Sarco will never be seen as a withering away. Rather, any person who would choose to use a Sarco is also making a very deliberate statement to the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

We won\u2019t belabor the details of how Sarco gets the job done, but the short version is that it rapidly replaces the oxygen in the pod with nitrogen gas, causing a quick, painless \u201chypoxic death\u201d without any of the physical panic reactions that come from being asphyxiated.<\/p>\n

Nitschke has been called \u201cthe Elon Musk of assisted suicide,\u201d\u00a0and Sarco\u2019s concept, created by designer\u00a0Alexander Bannink, treats death with a similar swagger: it\u2019s not a final resting place, it\u2019s a futuristic \u201ctransport\u201d device.<\/p>\n

\u201cEverything about the capsule\u2019s design is about travel, from this world to the next (whatever that may be),\u201d\u00a0Nitschke says. The idea is that the Sarco can be transported to any setting that the \u201cuser\u201d desires, with the large viewport in the pod offering an expansive view of something other than the \u201charsh lighting and dismal artwork\u201d of hospitals and other end-of-life institutions. \u201cI strongly believe one\u2019s final visual outlook on the world should be of one\u2019s choosing,\u201d\u00a0Nitschke says. \u201cIf you want the mountains, or the surf beach or the Australian outback (like I do) then the Sarco makes it possible. Take it where you want.\u201d<\/p>\n

He\u2019s got a point. Whether it\u2019s ashes being scattered into the ocean from a favorite beach, or simply a stately burial in a quiet cemetery with flowers, most of the serenity and beauty we do allow (and intentionally design) around death only happens after the person is already gone. Why shouldn\u2019t surroundings and experiences like this be available to the person as they pass, so they can enjoy them?<\/p>\n

Nitschke allows that \u201cmany families experience loving, caring and heartfelt deaths of their loved ones\u201d in institutional settings like hospitals and hospices. \u201cBut everyone is always making the best of a bad lot,\u201d he asserts. \u201cInstitutions by their very nature are not intended to be humane. While I don\u2019t think any ever set out to be overtly inhumane, and many hospices work hard at softening that space, that is often the unintended consequence.\u201d<\/p>\n

But is Sarco a better alternative? Either way, you can\u2019t buy one: you can only download the plans, which you must then use to 3D print and assemble Sarco on your own (in addition to sourcing your own liquid nitrogen). Right now, a prototype version is on display at the Venice Biennale.<\/p>\n

Maybe that\u2019s the point of an intentionally provocative product like this: to forcefully pose the question and force us to consider that perhaps \u201cthe way to do it\u201d\u2013that is, assuming that death is a problem with only one \u201ccorrect\u201d solution\u2014is a formidable cultural obstacle unto itself.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Philip Nitschke\u2019s \u201cSarco\u201d shines a harsh light on everything screwed up about our cultural attitude toward death. The industrialized West doesn\u2019t know how to deal with death. Culturally, we only seem capable of engaging with the end of a human being\u2019s life in one way: as a problem. That problem can be \u201csolved\u201d by medicalizing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0},"categories":[1],"tags":[25,131,15,132,35],"yoast_head":"\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\t\n