This comment was posted at Thread: [Trigger Warning!] Your Opinions on Suicide.
A few years (months? I don't even remember) ago my opinion on suicide was the same as mainstream society's. I came to a better understanding when I interacted with people who were considering suicide (Thankfully nobody died yet).
I class them into 2 categories, and approve of one and disapprove of the other.
The first is Euthanasia, where the person is terminally ill and has no hope, absolutely 0 chance of living a life even somewhat satisfying. They are terminally ill, and every attempt to save them will just increase the period of their agony. They will simply feel guilt over straining resources of others and will also hate their perpetual agony. In such cases suicide/killing is understandable.
The second class is when life wrecks havoc on you. When you lose "too much too fast" you feel that you have lost everything, even though you have not. It's the "rate of change" that really drives you to that point, not necessarily the change itself. A "slow and gradual" break up will not cause as much devastation as a sudden one. Getting poor gradually does not have the same effect as losing everything in a single go.
I do not approve of suicide in this case.
There are two reasons behind this:
1) I live in India, and I see lots of 6 year olds polishing shoes instead of going to school and 80 year olds doing manual labour to survive. They have enough reasons to be sad, yet they do exist. For suicides related to money, education, or any thing like that, I feel that it would be an "insult" to the people who did not have your privileges in the first place. Not only that, if you ask those people if they ever consider suicide, you will get the same percentage of people giving a "yes" as you would in a more privileged society (Students in the highest ranking colleges committing suicide over failing a grade is just as common in the papers as farmers committing suicide over failed crops and the inability to cope with debt). This implies that it is a state of mind present amongst every segment of society and does NOT depend on how poor or un educated you are or will be, but rather relies on our inability to meet our expectations, the shattering of our dreams. As I said before, it is the "rate of change" rather than the "change". This by definition makes suicide an act of impulse, our inability to cope with change. You can still live a satisfying life if you lower your expectations. When you have lost everything, the hope of getting it back (or learning to live without it) is the only thing you have left. Do not throw it away.
2) I have changed as a person as I have grown up, so I know people are capable of changing. My priorities have changed, my outlook has often changed, even my lifestyle and economic conditions have often changed. Many things a "spopo of the past" would do are things I can never imagine "spopo of the present" doing. spopo (Never capitalized >:O) of the past would place money over other things, while in my present outlook money has very little value. spopo of the past was VERY VERY bad at social interaction, but I have improved and I have quite a large friend circle (including women!) now. If, at any point in the past, I had done something that would cripple my present (Hypothetically, if I had taken a workshop of "How to eat noodles" over a life changing course of "How to make friends") I would never forgive myself (Provided I knew what my alternate present could be like). Being a chronic procrastinator this is very relevant to me, spopo of the present highly disapproves of spopo of the past's actions.
Similarly, a person is capable of recovering from depression. If he is lucky and skilful he may lead a relatively happy life. By killing yourself today you are not giving your future self a chance to exist. Now this will be a little difficult to understand and perhaps even borderline mad. Hold on:
The choice to take a decision lies with everyone who will be affected by the outcome
The future you will definitely be affected by the outcome of your present actions. I am a COMPLETELY different person than I once was. If today a person who is a replica of my past sits with me and we need to take a decision that affects both of us, we would disagree completely.
Similarly, you are wrong to take away future you's chance to exist because he *may* just be a completely different person who would go to any lengths to continue living. Do not take a decision that will take away his right to exist.
(Counterarguments:
A: "If you commit suicide, future you does not exist and therefore you are not infringing on anybody's rights."
S: "Yes, but if you DO NOT commit suicide then future you does exist, who may not approve of even the thought of suicide."
S: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epimenides_paradox
S: "It is a paradox one way, but not the other!"
A: "This same logic goes for abortion. Are you pro-life?"
S: "...no. Don't ruin this for me please."
This will be a topic for another thread, I guess.
)
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Now there is no actual "absolute" way to distinguish between the two kinds of suicides. Euthanasia implies hopelessness, which is something even the other kind of suicide has. My qualitative distinction is that euthanasia involves absolutely 0 hope, while the other kind of suicide does have some degree of hope (Even if it is far-fetched). I have never had a case that falls on the blurred line between the two, but I suppose it is possible. Like, a person who is totally paralysed neck down! I feel that he can still contribute to society and gain some happiness by acts such as writing books (Using a writer ofcourse). I have heard that the construction of Brooklyn Bridge was overseen by a totally paralysed man who communicated with his wife by blinking. (This would be a man of great substance, is it unfair for me to expect others to be like him? Perhaps, or perhaps not.)
I class them into 2 categories, and approve of one and disapprove of the other.
The first is Euthanasia, where the person is terminally ill and has no hope, absolutely 0 chance of living a life even somewhat satisfying. They are terminally ill, and every attempt to save them will just increase the period of their agony. They will simply feel guilt over straining resources of others and will also hate their perpetual agony. In such cases suicide/killing is understandable.
The second class is when life wrecks havoc on you. When you lose "too much too fast" you feel that you have lost everything, even though you have not. It's the "rate of change" that really drives you to that point, not necessarily the change itself. A "slow and gradual" break up will not cause as much devastation as a sudden one. Getting poor gradually does not have the same effect as losing everything in a single go.
I do not approve of suicide in this case.
There are two reasons behind this:
1) I live in India, and I see lots of 6 year olds polishing shoes instead of going to school and 80 year olds doing manual labour to survive. They have enough reasons to be sad, yet they do exist. For suicides related to money, education, or any thing like that, I feel that it would be an "insult" to the people who did not have your privileges in the first place. Not only that, if you ask those people if they ever consider suicide, you will get the same percentage of people giving a "yes" as you would in a more privileged society (Students in the highest ranking colleges committing suicide over failing a grade is just as common in the papers as farmers committing suicide over failed crops and the inability to cope with debt). This implies that it is a state of mind present amongst every segment of society and does NOT depend on how poor or un educated you are or will be, but rather relies on our inability to meet our expectations, the shattering of our dreams. As I said before, it is the "rate of change" rather than the "change". This by definition makes suicide an act of impulse, our inability to cope with change. You can still live a satisfying life if you lower your expectations. When you have lost everything, the hope of getting it back (or learning to live without it) is the only thing you have left. Do not throw it away.
2) I have changed as a person as I have grown up, so I know people are capable of changing. My priorities have changed, my outlook has often changed, even my lifestyle and economic conditions have often changed. Many things a "spopo of the past" would do are things I can never imagine "spopo of the present" doing. spopo (Never capitalized >:O) of the past would place money over other things, while in my present outlook money has very little value. spopo of the past was VERY VERY bad at social interaction, but I have improved and I have quite a large friend circle (including women!) now. If, at any point in the past, I had done something that would cripple my present (Hypothetically, if I had taken a workshop of "How to eat noodles" over a life changing course of "How to make friends") I would never forgive myself (Provided I knew what my alternate present could be like). Being a chronic procrastinator this is very relevant to me, spopo of the present highly disapproves of spopo of the past's actions.
Similarly, a person is capable of recovering from depression. If he is lucky and skilful he may lead a relatively happy life. By killing yourself today you are not giving your future self a chance to exist. Now this will be a little difficult to understand and perhaps even borderline mad. Hold on:
The choice to take a decision lies with everyone who will be affected by the outcome
The future you will definitely be affected by the outcome of your present actions. I am a COMPLETELY different person than I once was. If today a person who is a replica of my past sits with me and we need to take a decision that affects both of us, we would disagree completely.
Similarly, you are wrong to take away future you's chance to exist because he *may* just be a completely different person who would go to any lengths to continue living. Do not take a decision that will take away his right to exist.
(Counterarguments:
A: "If you commit suicide, future you does not exist and therefore you are not infringing on anybody's rights."
S: "Yes, but if you DO NOT commit suicide then future you does exist, who may not approve of even the thought of suicide."
S: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epimenides_paradox
S: "It is a paradox one way, but not the other!"
A: "This same logic goes for abortion. Are you pro-life?"
S: "...no. Don't ruin this for me please."
This will be a topic for another thread, I guess.
)
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Now there is no actual "absolute" way to distinguish between the two kinds of suicides. Euthanasia implies hopelessness, which is something even the other kind of suicide has. My qualitative distinction is that euthanasia involves absolutely 0 hope, while the other kind of suicide does have some degree of hope (Even if it is far-fetched). I have never had a case that falls on the blurred line between the two, but I suppose it is possible. Like, a person who is totally paralysed neck down! I feel that he can still contribute to society and gain some happiness by acts such as writing books (Using a writer ofcourse). I have heard that the construction of Brooklyn Bridge was overseen by a totally paralysed man who communicated with his wife by blinking. (This would be a man of great substance, is it unfair for me to expect others to be like him? Perhaps, or perhaps not.)