Assisted suicide: analysis of Debbie Purdy's article

Assisted suicide has always been a hot and controversial topic. I many countries, especially in the UK, the topic has caused debate in the media. One of the bearing protagonists on this subject is Debbie Purdy. She wrote and published an article shortly before her death in 2014 by the name of Right-to-die campaigner’s last article calls for more legal protection for those who assist suicide. This precipitated huge waves across the UK regarding the legislation of the law in which the Suicide Act from 1961 proclaims that it’s illegal to assist or encourage someone to take their own life. Multiple US states and a few European countries like Switzerland, Belgium and The Netherlands has in the early 2000’s in someway legally allowed assisted suicide. If and why the English ancient Suicide Act should be changed is what the, at the time, dying Debbie Purdy displays in her last article.

Debbie starts of by expressing this paradox, which is a rhetorical device: “As strange as it may sound, permission to get help to die felt like permission to live” (p.5 l.12) By framing it this way she preempts the wonderingly thought the readers might have when hearing this utterance. This is called rebuttal and is an effective argumentation method. In this quotation contrast words are also to be found in forms of “die” and “live.” This rhetorical device is a powerful way to influence the readers opinions on the topic. From the first three paragraphs the reader already gets a feel for Debbie and therefore the article. Witty comments like “(well, it was a plane that took me to Belfast)” (l.15) makes the harsh serious situation and topic more accessible for the reader. The language isn’t formal neither informal, since there isn’t use of slang or abbreviations. The sentence structure is slight complex with several subordinate clauses that functions as interposed sentences. There’s a good amount of adjectives from the start which present the text more adequate and can work as a pathos-tool for the righter and therefore sway the reader’s opinions and interests.