Suicide, the easy way out?

[candle]

If you can't see the repercussions of your actions at all, I suppose you're not quite sane enough to be held accountable for your actions anyways. Committing suicide isn't hurting the neighbor more than him being surprised with the whole, "he used to be such a nice boy," but it IS hurting your family/friends/people who care about you.

The basic reasoning of a suicide is 'escape from life', but honestly, being so short-sighted as to not care or even consider the repercussions of your actions is ludicrous. I know the way to my work like the back of my hand, that doesn't mean I drive with my eyes closed.

So you're saying that if I decided to crash a plane into a building and didn't
think about how it would affect the world as a whole, I can't be held acountalbe for what I've done?

Dude, that's just retarded. you are always acountable for everything you do, regardless of the circumstances. The thing is that most people don't think about how their actions will affect others. Say you did drive with your eyes closed, besides being a very stupid thing to do, you would most likely end up totaling your car, and in the hospital. You could also have smashed into a bus full of first graders going to the zoo. That bus could cause a semi to tip, and that would cause a huge pile up.

I can garuntee you that you wouldn't be thinking about any of that until after it happened. At most you'll be thinking something like, "Look, ma! No eyes!"

 

[Andy6000]

So you're saying that if I decided to crash a plane into a building and didn't
think about how it would affect the world as a whole, I can't be held acountalbe for what I've done?

Dude, that's just retarded. you are always acountable for everything you do, regardless of the circumstances. The thing is that most people don't think about how their actions will affect others. Say you did drive with your eyes closed, besides being a very stupid thing to do, you would most likely end up totaling your car, and in the hospital. You could also have smashed into a bus full of first graders going to the zoo. That bus could cause a semi to tip, and that would cause a huge pile up.

I can garuntee you that you wouldn't be thinking about any of that until after it happened. At most you'll be thinking something like, "Look, ma! No eyes!"

Good god this is why I stopped posting in the symposium. That 'not sane' thing was a godamn joke in reference to the person posting before me. That whole POST was a damn reference to thinking about consequences. And that driving to work with my eyes closed IS stupid. But I suppose sarcasm is pretty hard to detect through writing, eh?

 

[candle]

actualy, it is. Sorry that I didn't get that.

 

[Shadow_Strike]

If you can't see the repercussions of your actions at all, I suppose you're not quite sane enough to be held accountable for your actions anyways. Committing suicide isn't hurting the neighbor more than him being surprised with the whole, "he used to be such a nice boy," but it IS hurting your family/friends/people who care about you.

The basic reasoning of a suicide is 'escape from life', but honestly, being so short-sighted as to not care or even consider the repercussions of your actions is ludicrous. I know the way to my work like the back of my hand, that doesn't mean I drive with my eyes closed.

Okay, bad example.

So you should please your family before you?
Last time I checked, I did things for me in conjunction with my family and/or friends, but always me in priority (usually 60% me, 40% everyone else).
For example, if I had a girlfriend who was good with my family, you know, plays a cute face and attitude, helps with the chores to gain their trust and friendship, but the moment we're alone she's abusive and controlling. I would call it over oh so very quickly. Why? Because its hurting me more than my family. And its my family's duty to understand that it was ultimately my choice to end the friendship, for my happiness, and to end my torment.

Am I being selfish? By your words, yes. I have ended something that my family enjoys because I wanted to have something.

 

[Andy6000]

Okay, bad example.

So you should please your family before you?
Last time I checked, I did things for me in conjunction with my family and/or friends, but always me in priority (usually 60% me, 40% everyone else).
For example, if I had a girlfriend who was good with my family, you know, plays a cute face and attitude, helps with the chores to gain their trust and friendship, but the moment we're alone she's abusive and controlling. I would call it over oh so very quickly. Why? Because its hurting me more than my family. And its my family's duty to understand that it was ultimately my choice to end the friendship, for my happiness, and to end my torment.

Am I being selfish? By your words, yes. I have ended something that my family enjoys because I wanted to have something.

That logic works fine, but given that you're A. cutting off torment, and B. cutting off all potential for anything on top of hurting your friends and family deeply, it's... Not usually an alright thing to do. Yes you should be basing your decisions primarily off of your wants, but you've got to think about how it's going to affect others too, and suicide pretty rarely affects everyone around you in a positive way, and only in your viewpoint affects yourself positively. It's really a 'nice happy' viewpoint from which you can call suicide in all forms selfish, the viewpoint that you can fix what's wrong if you'd try hard.

 

[Fallofthetyrant]

Suicide, the way of the weak. Whenever you got problems, you deal with them the best you can.

 

[Goodchild]

Second of all, few (if any really) people are islands onto themselves. Someone commit suicide will affect someone else, whether it's family, friends, lovers, roommates, acquaintances, whatever. The person committing suicide doesn't have to deal with that aftermath that comes with their decision. Honestly, I think people who do commit suicide either a) don't realize who they're leaving behind or b), they do and they're too self-centered to give a shit.

Recently there was a group-suicide in my country, Australia, and information regarding the suicide was supressed by psychoanalysts in order to prevent potential suicidal behaviour in OTHERS affected by the incident. Strange, don't you think?

Most suicide or para-suicide (attempted suicide) is purely an attempt to get attention from people we love, or anyone who happens to be available. This is because our needs are not being met. One of the ripple-effects of suicide is envy and anger among the survivors. For why shouldn't they be given such attention? This can and indeed does lead to further related suicides.
So it would seem that suicide victims really DO get the attention they so desperately need -Ironically only AFTER they have become deceased.

The things that cause someone to actually 'do it' are dissociation ('detatchment' from reality) coupled with overwhelming emotions such as fear, anxiety and rage.
Many suicide victims arise out of conflict with religious programming, the notion of Original Sin and the guilt associated with this, as this programming can become a key factor in the suppressing of normal everyday emotions that creates stress and anxiety -though its not without help. Other factors include social programming, and indeed school social structures and 'peer pressure' play an enormous part in this development.

Though there are usually many contributing factors, there is also typically an event which serves as a 'catalyst' for the victim. Something which pushes him/her 'over the edge'. The break-up scenario described by the OP is a common trigger, as it concerns our primary fear: Rejection.

 

[Shifter]

I can see what brings people to commit suicide...but I think as someone said it has a lot to do with depression. I do think it is an easy way out..a cop out...and cowardly. It is not easy to kill yourself..but it sure might be easier than dealing with consequences of bad choices and a bad life...

I myself have contemplated suicide many times in my life... now don't confuse contemplating it with actually wanting and thinking I was going to do it. I would never do it because as Lene said...it hurts others. I would never leave my parents and friends and kids alone in the world like that.

Anyways...*sigh* sad that life has to be a way that would make people think of doing such a thing. I never thought I would be there...EVER..and yet I was..and still am sometimes...

 

[___]

Well, I'm going to sound (more) like a bitch but, yes I think that suicide is a easy, selfish and cowardly way out of life. If someone thinks their life is bad, well, chances are there is someone else out there in the world who has it worse and they're still on this earth finding a reason to wake up in the morning!
Second of all, few (if any really) people are islands onto themselves. Someone commit suicide will affect someone else, whether it's family, friends, lovers, roommates, acquaintances, whatever. The person committing suicide doesn't have to deal with that aftermath that comes with their decision. Honestly, I think people who do commit suicide either a) don't realize who they're leaving behind or b), they do and they're too self-centered to give a shit.
So this:
I do not agree with. And hell yeah, I'll cheapen it because suicide, in my opinion, isn't worth shit. If someone considers never being able to see the people they supposedly care about ever again a hardship, well then why the heck is suicide an option?

Few people have the mettle to commit suicide over something as simple as a fight with a girlfriend. A person at that level of depression has deep, serious problems that often start at early childhood. The basic drive to live, fuck and die old is burned out of them systematically and they don't get your reason for going on any more than you get their reason not to. Frankly I think it's at least as selfish and self-centered for people to get angry about it as it is to do it in the first place - as if protecting friends and family members from a sense of loss should be the motivation for a person to go on. Their lives and feelings are so important that they never stopped or intervened in the abuse that brought these people to suicide in the first place and now they're angry because that suicide made them sad. How pathetic is that, really.

Besides it's not as cut and dry as you'd like it to be, and if there's not an inkling in you that knows better consider yourself privileged. I don't know why we all seem to like to hide behind a wall of ignorance and claim that nobody has a good reason for feeling bad. Honestly, I think we're scared of the fact. Heaven forbid we accept it and start finding ways to fix what's causing it instead of putting it in a cheap little moral box and preaching some crap about natural selection or moral strength or something. Maybe instead we should, you know, stop intellectually, verbally, physically and sexually abusing eachother in the first place? Probably won't because it's not as profitable and doesn't make us as many friends.

 

[Goodchild]

Here here!

Sure suicide is the easy way out, but whoever said that taking the easy way out was wrong??
I think the important questions to ask ourselves when we reach this dangerous stage is 'why am I thinking this way? What is causing me to feel like this?' Because often we are so dissociated that we don't really know! Its hard to question yourself like this when you are on the verge of panic, and often suicide looks like a much better option than the opposite. I think at this stage that it is also important to be honest with yourself; suicide IS an option: one of many. But I think that most human beings would rather know WHY things happen the way they do, and that curiosity and interest is what stops most people from actually commiting suicide.
There's a whole range of possibilities that open up to us when we stop using 'right' and 'wrong' as a means to define our world, and start looking at the facts. This increases our ability to argue with others and indeed OURSELVES, it allows us to understand our feelings better and feel safer in this often-turbulent world. Knowing that things have happened, and WILL happen for a reason.
I believe in science!

 

[Redblade]

Mmm i made a topic about this a long time ago =S Yes suicide is an easy way out but its not worth it in the end speaking of which some guy hung himself off a tree last friday near me over failing an exam and he hasnt ever known to be a depressed person at all. so insome cases maybe suicide just isnt thought out enough? someone wants a decision to be made quick and thats the quickest one they got. i dunno though =S

 

[Goodchild]

Perhaps so, but most suicide victims are percieved to be 'normal', often right up to the event!
I agree with you that sometimes it is simply not thought-out enough, indeed its often the attempt to escape THOUGHTS or FEELINGS that leads to suicide in the first place.

 

[Roman Candle]

I disagree with what you said earlier about being dissasociated. I think suicide almost always comes as result of an inability to distance yourself from the situation; not being able to see anything past your current feeling and the world as you percieve it at any one time.

 

[___]

@Redblade, Roman Candle: Once again suicide is rarely, if ever, a spur of the moment thing. Someone else in this thread gave a little bit better psychological profile on who commits suicide and how the depression builds up.

When I look at suicide cases I see the same basic escapist desire that you see in drug and sex addiction, obsession with fiction, etc. just taken to a greater extreme. What is so wrong with our world that we have such a huge need to get out of it or forget it exists? I think we can all agree that there's definitely something wrong with it. Some things are obvious - abuse, poverty, social inequality. But what about the rest of us who have steady jobs, happy relationships, good families, food on the table and a roof over our heads? Why is there still something in the back of our minds telling us we need to get out? I think it's important to discover that and work toward changing the way we live to correct it.

Escapism is definitely a part of the human experience; we all want to do something different from the day to day every once in a while. People have been telling stories, going on journeys, and abusing drugs since probably before they were what we'd consider "people" in a modern sense. But more and more people are becoming dangerously obsessed with it. I once knew a woman who buried herself in romance novels and star trek fan fiction most of her waking hours because she couldn't cope with her life - she had some good reasons that I won't elaborate on for feeling that way, but I'm noticing a lot of seemingly normal people approaching that same level of obsession and it deeply bothers me.

 

[Goodchild]

I disagree with what you said earlier about being dissasociated. I think suicide almost always comes as result of an inability to distance yourself from the situation; not being able to see anything past your current feeling and the world as you percieve it at any one time.

True. But 'dissociation' isn't distancing yourself from an emotional situation -thats typically a GOOD thing Dissociation is distancing yourself from REALITY as a whole.

 

[Mezmerize]

Today I walk home for lunch like any normal day. I walk back to school, its chaos. A grade 12 student went missing friday night and his body was just found yesterday. Jumped off a bridge. This kid had a life everyone dreams of. Beautiful girlfriend, easily the most popular kid in the school, just received a full basketball scholarship to university and on top of that, is graduating in a month.

Supposedly he had a fight with his girlfriend Friday night at a party. Is this really reason enough to kill yourself? I mean, what possesses a person to do something like that?

Depends how you look at it. Its sad when I read anything about suicide, especially when its someone who had a good life.

It all comes down to how much you put into that commitment really. One of my favorate quotes from Domino: "Women, they know how to kill us."

 

[sixtyandaquarter]

The hard thing isn't taking you're life and walking away, it's putting that razor to flesh long enough to slice and not crying or whining or whatever loud enough for someone to hear you. A friend sliced her own throat, though it wasn't deep enough to kill her fast ((according to the report she would have been conscious for nearly passed an hour - would have been able to convey a need of help))), and she apparently forced herself to stay quiet in a room without a door - only one of those sheet things- in an apartment with a room mate watching TV on the couch not 12 feet away.

That takes guts. I still think it's a worthless act, but that's gotta be one hell of a hard thing to do. And since then I've never thought suicide to be anything the sort of easy.

 

[Brimstone-x]

It does take some guts to kill yourself, but its the cowards way out. BIG TIME. Think of all the people your leaving behind, all the people who have to live with the fact that you killed yourself. I mean, unless you like, some familyless shut in who has no friends, theres no reason for it.

 

[DestinMancer]

There's always another way that does not involve killing yourself. Suicide will only bring more pain. Nothing is solved by it.

 

[Flaepru]

?f you commit suicide, then persons close to you will suffer you problems