Right to Die Billboards Appear Across Three States
Author: Final Exit Network
Published: 2010/06/16 - Updated: 2026/02/20
Publication Type: Informative
Category Topic: Palliative Care - Related Publications
Contents: Synopsis - Introduction - Main - Insights, Updates
Synopsis: This information covers the Final Exit Network's 2010 billboard campaign across California, New Jersey, and Florida, designed to raise public awareness about the right to die. The article outlines the organization's mission, its position that mentally competent adults suffering from fatal or irreversible illness should have the right to determine the circumstances of their own death, and the services it provides including counseling, home visits, and guidance on advanced directives. This is relevant reading for people with terminal or chronic illness, individuals with disabilities facing end-of-life decisions, seniors, caregivers, and anyone interested in the ongoing legal and ethical debate around death with dignity and end-of-life autonomy in the United States - Disabled World (DW).
- Topic Definition: Right to Die
The right to die refers to the belief that individuals should be permitted to choose voluntary death, particularly when facing terminal illness, irreversible medical conditions, or intractable suffering that renders their quality of life personally unacceptable. In practice, this concept encompasses several related but distinct legal frameworks including physician-assisted death, voluntary euthanasia, and the refusal of life-sustaining medical treatment. Laws vary widely by jurisdiction - some U.S. states have enacted Death with Dignity statutes allowing physicians to prescribe life-ending medication to terminally ill patients who meet strict criteria, while other states prohibit any form of assisted death. The debate draws in perspectives from medicine, law, ethics, disability rights, and religion, with advocates arguing it is a fundamental matter of personal autonomy and opponents raising concerns about potential abuse, the sanctity of life, and the risk of coercion affecting vulnerable populations including elderly individuals and people with disabilities.
Introduction
Right to Die Billboards - Final Exit Network Right-to-Die Billboards Appear in California, New Jersey and Florida
Final Exit Network has rolled out of billboards on the nation's highways to help raise public awareness and promote a dialog on the right to die. The first board appears in San Francisco, and others will follow in New Jersey and Florida. The message is simply, "My Life, My Death, My Choice," with the organization's contact information. Those who view the billboards are encouraged to be in touch with their local media and to share their feelings on the basic human right to a death with dignity.
Main Content
The boards are being paid for, in part, by member donations. Final Exit President Jerry Dincin said;
"Anyone wishing to make a tax-deductible contribution toward future billboards is welcome to do so by earmarking a check for the Billboard Fund to the Final Exit Network."
The Final Exit Network believes that mentally competent adults have a basic human right to end their lives when they suffer from a fatal or irreversible illness or intractable pain, when their quality of life is personally unacceptable, and the future holds only hopelessness and misery.
Such a right shall be an individual choice, including the timing and companion, free of any restriction by the law, clergy, medical profession, even friends and relatives no matter how well-intentioned.
The organization offers free service to all who apply, providing relevant information, home visits if possible and compassionate counseling for the individual and family. It further promotes the use of advanced directives and other legal instruments to document the intentions of any individual.
Final Exit Network is an all-volunteer organization dedicated to counseling, support, and guidance for those clients, who themselves choose the when, how, under what circumstances, and especially IF, to proceed.
Dincin stresses that:
"FEN does not encourage anyone to end their life, does not provide the means to do so and does not actively assist in the person's death. We do, however, believe in the ultimate human right of people to end their lives when circumstances justify, and to have support in carrying out their plan."
Final Exit Network is a five-year-old non-profit run exclusively by volunteers that is committed to serve many whom other organizations may turn away.
Insights, Analysis, and Developments
Editorial Note: The right-to-die debate remains one of the most deeply personal and ethically complex issues in modern society, and the Final Exit Network's billboard campaign was a deliberate effort to bring that conversation out of hospital rooms and into the public square. What makes this topic particularly significant for the disability community is the tension it raises between autonomy and vulnerability - the right of individuals to make decisions about their own lives weighed against concerns about how such policies might affect people living with chronic illness or disability who may face societal pressure rather than genuine personal choice. Whether one supports or opposes right-to-die legislation, the underlying questions about suffering, dignity, and individual freedom are ones that deserve open and honest public discussion rather than avoidance - Disabled World (DW).Attribution/Source(s): This quality-reviewed publication was selected for publishing by the editors of Disabled World (DW) due to its relevance to the disability community. Originally authored by Final Exit Network and published on 2010/06/16, this content may have been edited for style, clarity, or brevity.