> Why not permit people to allow themselves be killed in entertaining ways, for a pay per view audience, with their surviving family getting 80% of the proceeds?
We already allow shades of that, and society hasn't collapsed.
Ie we seldom allow people to consent to outright death, but we certainly allow them to take on a great deal of risk of injury or death in return for fame or money. If you repeat a 1% chance often enough, you are going to hit the jackpot sooner or later.
So I'm not sure your reductio ad absurdum works here.
We certainly do allow such activities (MMA fights, extreme sports competitions etc). But such activities are fundamentally different in my view. While risky, they are not designed to permanently damage the competitor. If a participant emerges victorious and unscathed, they can enter next year's competition. That's not the case with selling a kidney (nor with my admittedly extreme example above).
We already allow shades of that, and society hasn't collapsed.
Ie we seldom allow people to consent to outright death, but we certainly allow them to take on a great deal of risk of injury or death in return for fame or money. If you repeat a 1% chance often enough, you are going to hit the jackpot sooner or later.
So I'm not sure your reductio ad absurdum works here.