Suicide Philosophy: part II

[wraithwitch]

Caveat: I am very interested in the opinions people (including myself) hold and why. I am especially interested in testing the logic/reasoning of those opinions and seeing if they hold up. That kinda thing fascinates me. As such, if any of this comes across as especially pokey or heartless, it's not supposed to, but it is (hopefully) meant to

Comments

[annwfyn]

On a basic level, I just can't reconcile the amount of mass misery left after a suicide. Yes, one person is presumably not miserable, if you don't believe in an afterlife (in which case I imagine the suicide must feeling rather bloody stupid), but the amount of misery caused by the suicide, the length of time it lasts, the ripples it sends out are just horrible

[duana]

On 2), I think people who are making a rational plan to end their lives, rather than a desperate response to a situation they can't deal with, often take this into consideration, for instance by sending a letter alerting the police so that the person who finds them will be trained and expecting it. It's still not nice, but it's better. It's why I don't think they should raise the barriers on the Golden Gate Bridge, jumping off it is very effective, not very messy, and the people who haul your body out are used to it. If you're set on killing yourself, that's got to be about the most considerate method you can choose.

[annwfyn]

I am told that the people who haul bodies out of rivers after they have jumped may theoretically be 'used to it', but actually never stop finding it upsetting. A friend of mine had a father who volunteered with the coastguard (or equivalent) up in the Firth of Forth. A lot of people jump off the Forth Road Bridge. He and his people were responsible for hauling the bodies out of the water.

They dealt with it, they made jokes to deal with the situation and made comments to the 'Queensbury Jumping Society' and told off colourn stories about the people they pulled out of the river (who apparently were nearly always naked by the time they came out of the water). However, it wasn't why they volunteered for that job, it wasn't something they liked and it never stopped being painful and unhappy-making.

So, not as utterly malevolent as just leaving your body for your family to find, but even if you kill yourself in that way, you're still making someone else's day worse, and causing them a measure of pain.

[wraithwitch]

1) Getting over it

[annwfyn]

Suicide is different. Very different. I don't quite know why, but I know it is. I've lost people I loved - I watched my mother die, very slowly and very painfully from cancer. I watched my best friend's family fall apart when her younger sister died very suddenly from meningitis. I've also been in the proximity of a suicide and it's totally and utterly different

[duana]

But is it fair to ask/expect someone to live in pain to save others from suffering? And is the pain of losing someone to suicide worse than watching them be miserable and tormented for years? I watched a documentary about people who had jumped from the golden gate bridge and several of the families/friends said that although they were obviously devastated, they understood why they had done it and respected their choice. They all seemed to feel that a person who had been suffering was now at peace. That's how people often feel when someone with a terminal illness dies, so why should it be different if the suffering is mental rather than physical?