Is suicide selfish?

[Burning Hammer]

With the recent events of people pretending that celebrities are family and just can't quite hang around in this world anymore, I've decided this needs to be discussed.

On my end, I feel like suicide is ridiculously selfish. Yes, people have mental illnesses and they aren't thinking clearly when they commit suicide. That doesn't mean there isn't another option and that doesn't absolve it from being an immoral and selfish decision. There are people in poverty, hell there are people who aren't in poverty who commit irrational crimes or take irrational actions. We hold them responsible. Why is suicide treated any differently?

No I wouldn't want anyone in the War Room to commit suicide. No I don't want anyone I know to commit suicide. However I can't shake that this whole feel bad raise awareness thing is just a money making gimmick. It's not like these people don't know these lines exist.

 

[brothir]

It is selfish if it is done for selfish reasons, but I don't think that makes it immoral ipso facto. In principle it's entirely possible to kill yourself because your death may help others whereas you yourself want to live, but you decide to sacrifice that for the benefit of others.

The right to die follows rather trivially from the right to own yourself: because it is your life, no one can force you to live against your will.

So if you don't believe that people should own their body, then you can reject the right to die. Alternatively, you can inject some other principle into the picture that combines with self ownership in such a way that specifically the right to die is negated. But what would that be, and why do you feel the need to include that?

To me, suicide is another entry on the very long list of tragedies that befall people. I never understood why it needed to be singled out, as comparatively it is rather harmless with respect to, say, murder. Additionally, suicide can save people who suffer from chronic conditions a great deal of pain otherwise unavoidable, so as a tragedy it is sort of unique in the sense that it can have positive qualities to the person.

 

[BayAreaGuy]

I think it depends on if you have kids that rely on you and a wife.

 

[Devout Pessimist]

It depends on the person's situation. Some people are useless scumbags who only harm others and their suicide would greatly benefit society.

 

[DanMMAleague]

I'd say it can be.

With someone like Chester Bennington it sounds like a bipolar, drug induced/ manic depressive episode.

I'd heard he'd talked about suicide before but I'm not sure if people took him seriously he had a lot going for him.

 

[Cubo de Sangre]

No more than living is.

 

[Prex32]

how is it selfish when someone can't control it? It's just another illness

 

[Burning Hammer]

It is selfish if it is done for selfish reasons, but I don't think that makes it immoral ipso facto. In principle, it's entirely possible to kill yourself because your death may help others, whereas you yourself want to live, but you decide to sacrifice that for the benefit of others.

The right to die follows rather trivially from the right to own yourself: because it is your life, no one can force you to live against your will.

So if you don't believe that people should own their bodies, then you can reject the right to die. Alternatively, you can inject some other principle into the picture that combines with self ownership in such a way that specifically the right to die is negated. But what would that be, and why do you feel the need to include that?

To me, suicide is another entry on the very long list of tragedies that befall people. I never understood why it needed to be singled out, as comparatively it is rather harmless compared, say, murder. Additionally, suicide can save people who suffer from chronic conditions a great deal of pain, so as a tragedy it is sort of unique in the sense that it can have positive qualities to the person.

No can force you to live against your will, that doesn't mean it's the right thing to do nor a morally appropriate choice. The problem is it's permanent solution to a short term problem in most cases. I also see it as a form of ceasing to own yourself by taken these actions. You're forfeiting your right, and your responsibility to live. Most people who commit suicide are in great deals of pain. They are mental, and while physical pain may come from mistreatment of your body, I still feel it's not necessary.

 

[Burning Hammer]

how is it selfish when someone can't control it? It's just another illness

It's the illness that causes you to grab a rope, or a gun, or whatever and it's the illness that makes you tie the noose, load the gun, etc, and it's the illness that causes you to put your head in, put the gun to your head etc.

Notice there are actions that have to be taken place in order for something to happen?

 

[dontsnitch]

I'd like to hear an argument for suicide being immoral if you also subscribe to the "my body, my rules" axiom that the new zeitgeist so proudly proclaims.

If someone does not want to live anymore, why would it be immoral? It's no different than someone wanting to abuse drugs, or leave his family because he's not content.

 

[Falsedawn]

I was going to say that it depends on the reason, but after further thought, i'm going to say no outright. A person should have the right to die if they so desire, regardless of the circumstances. It's not a matter of selfishness just because you upset people by doing it.

 

[DannyNL]

I guess it's understandable for people to classify it as a selfish act, but I feel labeling someone who commits suicide as "selfish" is oversimplifying it. Obviously anyone who commits suicide is in a very strange frame of mind where reason and logic are no longer in play, so can someone that far gone mentally really be consciously selfish? I don't know the answer to that.

 

[lecter]

I believe it's an individual's right to commit suicide.
I still think in many situations it's selfish to commit suicide, yes.

 

[Shoemaker]

It's definitely a moral grey area and depends on intent case by case imo. If a guy builds a family, tells his wife she doesn't have to work because he'll take care of everything, and then 10 years later offs himself because it's hard work and they've had some kids I'd say that's pretty immoral. But if someone has Huntingtons disease or ALS and doesn't want to put their family (and themselves) through the pain and financial obligations of sustaining treatment until inevitable death, then I don't think so. Same if a soldier jumps on a grenade to save his fellow soldiers.

 

[Renard]

Spoken like someone who has never experienced any great deal of adversity. It's like living life on easy mode and being like "Wow, look at those weird people who committed suicide. Life so easy doe." Not shown: lifelong sexual abuse, daily beatings, parents incapable of feeling empathy, parents with drug/alcohol addictions, bullying at school, death, critical failure in the early years i.e. neurological damage. Most people can't even conceptualize how much damage that would cause because they've reached adulthood unscathed, now imagine if someone pulled out your entire personality out from your brain from its' roots, destroyed and bent it all out of shape, then put it back into your body. That would be you if you had lived through that, you wouldn't even be the same human being, and your entire sense of who you are and what the world is like would be flipped.

 

[HereticBD]

Doesn't selfishness involve some kind of benefit to one's self? I don't know if ending your own existence falls into that category.

 

[TheStruggle]

22 veterans a day commit suicide because they can't live with the shit they have done and the shit they have seen. You also have multi-millionaires who commit suicide because they can't handle fame. Clearly some circumstances are more understandable than others.

 

[ripskater]

sometimes

 

[Chest Rockwell]

the only thing more selfish is hanging on at the end of life....spending ridiculous amounts of time and money to try and live a few extra months/years at the expense of your families sanity....not to mention the expense society and the tax payer have to burden

 

[snakedafunky]

Everything you will ever do is selfish in one way or another.