1.Suicide (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/suicide)
“ the act or an instance of taking one’s own life voluntarily and intentionally especially by a person of years of discretion and of sound mind”.
2.Doublespeak (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doublespeak)
“language that deliberately disguises, distorts, or reverses the meaning of words”.
3.Die (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/die)
1: to pass from physical life : expire
2 a : to pass out of existence : cease b : to disappear or subside gradually
These definitions are not ambiguous.
Suicide is what it is. See definition 1. Let’s remember that while we deal with all the attempts to call the taking of one’s own life with assistance something else.
No one commits suicide unless he sees it (falsely has been the general consensus until recently) as the solution to some problem.
Dying is something that happens to absolutely everyone. It may happen suddenly, but in most cases is a process. See definition 3.
The dying process is a problem to some, but taking one’s own life to solve the problem does not make taking one’s own life not suicide. This is classic Orwellian doublespeak. See Definition 2.
Though dying can take place suddenly, it is typically a process, and it is with this process that people need aid, in the form of compassionate care, companionship, and pain relief.
Helping someone commit suicide is not aid in dying. It is not help with the problem. It eliminates the problem by eliminating the person.
When someone helps anyone solve a problem, dying or anything else, by helping the person commit suicide, what happens is assisted suicide. Calling it aid in dying, death with dignity, or any other euphemism coined to deceive people will not make it anything else.
Derek Humphrey, the founder of the assisted suicide lobby in the US, still calls assisted suicide what it is. “I think the DHS (the Department of Human services in Oregon, one of two states where assisted suicide is legal) should stick with ‘physician-assisted suicide’ – describing an action precisely.” (http://www.assistedsuicide.org/what-do-you-call-an-assisted-death.html)