Venting Arguments against suicide

[Ardesevent]

Whenever I hear someone talk about how you shouldn't commit suicide- it's always these three arguments- "suicide is selfish." "suicide is the easy way out." or "your life might get better." It's always these three, and none of them even make any sense, but I just keep hearing them over and over again. I'm getting sick of it.

"Suicide is selfish."
I'll admit that suicide is kind of selfish. But stopping someone from committing suicide is also selfish. But someone saying this is shoving ideas down someone else's throat, and expecting them to live through their misery because of it.

"Suicide is the easy way out."
Yes, some people would rather be dead than struggle through their lives everyday. That's not that difficult to accept, and I have no idea why people think this is an argument.

"Your life might get better."
But it probably won't. No sane person would put themself through forty years of a horrible existence just because it might suddenly stop being like that one day.

It seems like the majority of pro-lifers just repeat these over and over, because they can't form their own opinions on suicide. Suicide is such a broad topic, one that could have tons of sides and debates, but pro-lifers always seem to think that these are the only things that it can boil down to.

 

[sapegato95]

None they're aren't any valid reasons against it other than you could have enjoyed your life

 

[BitterlyAlive]

I fucking hate it when people say "suicide is selfish uwu" Chances are they've never been suicidal, or I doubt they would say such a thing.

 

[Dr Iron Arc]

Imo only the last argument really holds up sometimes because it really is true that things "can get better" for some people at least. Life can deal just as much joy as it does hurt but negative experiences just stick out more in the human mind. There's tons of celebrities and artists or whatever that have created some of their most treasured works or made their biggest accomplishments after hitting what seemed to be their lowest points at the time.

That being said, whenever I get told this argument though I've sometimes replied back that "yeah, me dying would be better." and so far I haven't heard a viable retort to that.

 

[Checkmate3]

Pro-lifers are demons in disguise. This phrase suits them: "Villainy wears many masks, and the most dangerous is the mask of virtue".

 

[sapegato95]

I can't seem to convince someone that's my right in my personal life seems odd to me.

 

[mediocre]

The most silly one to me is "suicide is cowardly" no actually it's probably the bravest thing you could do.

 

[Morphosis]

Don't forget this one.... "Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem."
Hmmph. Some problems aren't so temporary. And what's wrong with a permanent solution anyway? Personally I would be delighted with a permanent solution to my "not-so-temporary" problems.
The only people who claim it's the easy way out, are those who've never experienced that level of torment and desperation and can't imagine or empathise with those of us literally and metaphorically clinging onto the edge of a cliff by our fingernails.
And instead of helping me up, I'm much more likely to have some do-gooder stomp on my fingers and knock me right over the cliff edge.

 

[psychoticxerror]

I have this pro-lifer "friend" who has known me for a while, and the last time I mentioned ctb to her she told me that she would no longer talk to me about the subject because I simply have no right to take my own life. People can be so strange. Why do they prefer for us to suffer for our entire lives if we don't have to?

 

[glittergore]

I have this pro-lifer "friend" who has known me for a while, and the last time I mentioned ctb to her she told me that she would no longer talk to me about the subject because I simply have no right to take my own life. People can be so strange. Why do they prefer for us to suffer for our entire lives if we don't have to?

"No right?" Jesus. If we don't have the right to determine our own lives, what do we have?

 

[Lone_Gray_Wolf]

The thing is that I've been on both sides and I'm in both sides. I'm a pro-life when it comes to other people and sometimes myself but a pro-choicer when it comes to me. It's very hypocritical, I know but there's nothing I can do. Sometimes being both at the same time bring some very disturbing inner battles.

 

[psychoticxerror]

"No right?" Jesus. If we don't have the right to determine our own lives, what do we have?

My thoughts exactly. According to her, we have the beautiful gift of life that we're just wasting. Sigh.

 

[ptsdgoblin]

Literally the only thing that makes me think twice is "what have you got to lose now", meaning that if you're already going to kill yourself then you might as well make some final last ditch effort at making life worthwhile.

Obviously easier said than done. Doing something like that almost always requires resources like time, money, access to things like therapy, which we've all probably tried before. It does give me pause though and make me think about blowing every resource I have on one final thing. Sometimes just thinking about it will stop me, or I'll actually try something and whether it works or not it changes the pace enough to push me slightly above suicidal.

All the other arguments tend to be full blown hot stinky garbage tho, all made with an anti-choice sentiment in mind.

 

[lostangel]

Pro-lifers are an odd species. I often wonder how they come to the conclusion that life is worth living for everyone.

 

[Wisdom3_1-9]

I also hear "Suicide doesn't end the pain. It just passes it in to others."

We have no control over how others react to our deaths. Furthermore, if others would listen and try to understand our logical reasons for suicide, perhaps they wouldn't feel pain at all. Perhaps they'd be glad we finally found peace.

 

[BabyBirch]

I also hear "Suicide doesn't end the pain. It just passes it in to others."

We have no control over how others react to our deaths. Furthermore, if others would listen and try to understand our logical reasons for suicide, perhaps they wouldn't feel pain at all. Perhaps they'd be glad we finally found peace.

I think it depend entirely on the circumstances. I am chronically ill and disabled and my mom killed herself over finances in the middle of a pandemic. I understand her own logic and rationale, but she agonized over my CPTSD and emotional/physical pain. I only existed because she wanted me. She was my sole caretaker. I am now poor, in a remote area with limited access to medical help for my disease. I lost my home, healthcare and my mommy. She put my life at risk even from a purely pragmatic perspective. She did not have her affairs in order and the burden of clearing out her place under threat of eviction fell on me by myself, i had to move 150 miles away to escape my brother who tried to kill u less than two years before she killed herself so no help from brothers or dad. Her respite was by rolling the rock over onto me, abandoning me. I am suffering greatly from her decision. She could not have picked a worse time to leave her high-risk daughter and i very well may die due to inaccesibility to preventative care now. Emotional damage aside there is so much more than the loss attached to something like that that makes it staggeringly hard to move on.

 

[Wisdom3_1-9]

Good points, @BabyBirch. I'm sorry you've had that kind of experience. I've done what I can to get my affairs in order so my loved ones don't have to deal with an aftermath that is more troublesome than necessary.

 

[greyo]

You don't produce any of the sweet utils society expects from you :( :( :(

 

[BabyBirch]

Good points, @BabyBirch. I'm sorry you've had that kind of experience. I've done what I can to get my affairs in order so my loved ones don't have to deal with an aftermath that is more troublesome than necessary.

I respect that- she did so little, including leaving her federal laptop and patient files in our apartment with no instructions on what to do with them. I ended up leaving them in her office because patient records cannot leave the state and must be in the custody of a licensed psychiatric professional- something she should have set up years ago. So I just have very, very conflicting opinions about the "selfishness" of suicide on a case-by-case basis, I guess. She knew how much I loved her. She didn't even bother to tell my disability appeal was turned down. My brothers are perfectly healthy and live with my father. I needed her. And she was on here, saying she didn't want to die, but that we would get money. I don't want money. I want my mommy. I'm trying to live for her so that her sacrifice was not in vain, but it's hard to forgive her for the way she did it. Not so much that she did, if that makes sense? She knew I had no one else but her, and hugged me so tight two days before she did it, because I said my life felt like a punishment for doing something bad. She said I never did anything bad and didn't deserve such rotten luck. And then she did this and left me in the blast zone. So yeah, I think there are varying degrees of ethical executions and that those you leave behind are allowed to resent you for saddling them with your personal affairs in the midst of their own bereavement, and it has nothing to do with "envy" or whatever some of the pro-choice rhetoric sometimes projects onto anti-choicers. You can accept somebody's death by suicide and still find it stupid, irresponsible, and irrevocably cruel. Those that love you do not cease to just because you have already detached- to presume so is basically solipsism. If you're allowed to take your own life, people are allowed to resent you for it because it really is a grief like no other. Sorry for the tangent, I just think about this a lot as someone who has been passively suicidal for most of my life and did everything I could to stay alive to see if things got better and cuz I knew how much she did for me and that it would destroy her and be like spitting in her face for all the work and care she put into making sure I had lots of love and good medical care and someone in my corner. It was us against the world... and now it's just me. She didn't even leave a note.

 

[ceelo]

"being in agony is worth it!" oh wait yeah, no theres no good arguments.

 

[Sprite_Geist]

"Suicide is selfish."
I'll admit that suicide is kind of selfish. But stopping someone from committing suicide is also selfish. But someone saying this is shoving ideas down someone else's throat, and expecting them to live through their misery because of it.

People that say suicide is selfish are often times the same people who want nothing to do with said suicidal person when they were alive. They don't want to be a part of your life, they don't want to be your friend and they certainly don't want to give you a shoulder to cry on. But once you leave they get angry and act offended as if you are being mean; even though they never cared about you in the first place. What does that make them?

"Suicide is the easy way out."
Yes, some people would rather be dead than struggle through their lives everyday. That's not that difficult to accept, and I have no idea why people think this is an argument.

Suicide is never easy despite what the anti-choice crowd thinks. If it was easy then there would be a method that is both quick, painless and 100% guaranteed to work... Except there isn't; there's always some compromise that has to be made and with the risk of failure. Not just this but when someone wishes to end their lives they do so out of a heavy heart, it's never a decision that's made without any forethought.

"Your life might get better."

Try telling this to someone with a terminal or chronic illness, and that is what suicide and depression are - cancers of the mind.

 

[mapletree]

I respect that- she did so little, including leaving her federal laptop and patient files in our apartment with no instructions on what to do with them. I ended up leaving them in her office because patient records cannot leave the state and must be in the custody of a licensed psychiatric professional- something she should have set up years ago. So I just have very, very conflicting opinions about the "selfishness" of suicide on a case-by-case basis, I guess. She knew how much I loved her. She didn't even bother to tell my disability appeal was turned down. My brothers are perfectly healthy and live with my father. I needed her. And she was on here, saying she didn't want to die, but that we would get money. I don't want money. I want my mommy. I'm trying to live for her so that her sacrifice was not in vain, but it's hard to forgive her for the way she did it. Not so much that she did, if that makes sense? She knew I had no one else but her, and hugged me so tight two days before she did it, because I said my life felt like a punishment for doing something bad. She said I never did anything bad and didn't deserve such rotten luck. And then she did this and left me in the blast zone. So yeah, I think there are varying degrees of ethical executions and that those you leave behind are allowed to resent you for saddling them with your personal affairs in the midst of their own bereavement, and it has nothing to do with "envy" or whatever some of the pro-choice rhetoric sometimes projects onto anti-choicers. You can accept somebody's death by suicide and still find it stupid, irresponsible, and irrevocably cruel. Those that love you do not cease to just because you have already detached- to presume so is basically solipsism. If you're allowed to take your own life, people are allowed to resent you for it because it really is a grief like no other. Sorry for the tangent, I just think about this a lot as someone who has been passively suicidal for most of my life and did everything I could to stay alive to see if things got better and cuz I knew how much she did for me and that it would destroy her and be like spitting in her face for all the work and care she put into making sure I had lots of love and good medical care and someone in my corner. It was us against the world... and now it's just me. She didn't even leave a note.

I don't have anything useful to say but I'm so sorry that happened to you. The only family I really have is my mom, so I appreciate you posting and giving me the privilege of seeing it from a reversed perspective. I don't really have any easy answers or responses. Your feelings are valid though. I guess that's all I can say.

 

[Bauhaus]

And the most moronic statement by pro-lifers: "Suicide is a permanent solution for a temporary problem." Yeah right, like all problems are temporarily.

 

[IrRegularjoe]

I've never agreed that suicide is selfish. It does not even fit the definition of selfish. Selfish means it benefits you somehow.

 

[Deleted member 17949]

Thing is they aren't really arguments. They are not systems of logic that anyone wants you to look at and they are not supposed to disprove anything you are currently thinking. These are phrases meant to make you feel guilty or regretful. The goal of these is to try to get you to feel some of what the other person feels about suicide so that you don't do it.

 

[ixkitty]

Suicide is selfish:
Honestly, it could be. As a person that has lived her entire life trying to please others and has made nothing but selfless decisions. So what if its selfish? People are selfish every. Single. Day. Cutting people off on the road because they really want to get to X or Y. People not helping others in the work place. Go to any store, you'll see someone not wearing a mask because it inconveniences them, neverminded the immunocompromised people around or the elderly or anything like that. How often does someone call and offer to help me because they know I'm having a bad time? NONE! I have called my family asking for something very simple, it was an inconvenience to them to take me to work because my car was being serviced. They call me quite often asking for 5$ or 10$ or 20$. That's all they call me for. Am I the only one being selfish for this one act? Just about every aspect of my life is being controlled by someone. Work, family, a failing relationship. I want ONE choice. This is my ONE choice that I don't want anyone to take from me.

Suicide is the easy way out:
Work smarter not harder. When have you known a person to ALWAYS do hard work for a satisfactory result. Just about everyone I know cuts corners to make their job easier and more manageable. Why can't I? People in corporate always pass the hard work to someone else because they feel like it. This gets trickled down the masses to the lowest person on the totem pole. Even then, that person finds some way to make their job easier. Why can't I make my life easier by ending it?

Things will get better:
So what if it will? Does that mean you'll stay in the same job until something happen to make it better? The point is I'm tired of TRYING, I'm tired of the ups and downs of life. You don't tell a person who just got their leg bitten off "it'll get better" because they will have to pay the thousands of dollars for surgery, rehab, prosthetics, Physical Therapy, Doctor appointments... Unless they're already well off and have good insurance and the works, that'll be a pain in the ass to deal with for YEARS! It might get better, but why do I want to stay and suffer for someone else, that's selfess and I've done that for years. Don't be selfish with MY life.

 

[Dookieshoes]

It seems like the majority of pro-lifers just repeat these over and over, because they can't form their own opinions on suicide. Suicide is such a broad topic, one that could have tons of sides and debates, but pro-lifers always seem to think that these are the only things that it can boil down to.

I wonder if it's less of a can't and more of a won't. Admittedly, I didn't really stop to think about it so critically until I lost someone very dear to me. The topic is uncomfortable. It forces one to think about mortality, and it usually presents with someone in great pain. I don't think people are comfortable with suffering in general and to add more emotional weight makes avoidance or consuming canned responses much more acceptable. My $. 02.

 

[TAW122]

Another argument that isn't mentioned is the common misconception that suicide is irrational and also that people are mentally ill, which is clearly a bullshit argument. Throughout human history, there are many people who committed suicide, and I don't consider them to be mentally ill nor irrational, but rather they knew that death was their sweet release from what otherwise may be a living hell for them. Also, some would rather have death before dishonor (pride). This misconception is toued and echoed throughout the mental health and psychiatric industry like it's gospel. It's absolutely disgusting.

 

[Sarahlynn]

I honestly think that suicide definitively can be selfish.

I can use myself as an example. I want to die because I find it too hard to live with my mental pain. But by killing myself, I will cause massive mental pain to at least five other individuals. One of whom is a kid who has already endured plenty of shit in his short life. He is happy now, but maybe my suicide is what finally tips him over the edge, and he ends up with the same mental pain that I have suffered. My lovely, elderly parents who will suffer through the trauma of losing a child. By ending my own pain, I will transfer that pain onto others. And it's tearing me apart.

I am not saying that I think everyone should think like me, and I know there are plenty of people here with shitty families who should care more about themselves than the people they happen to share genetics with. So the blanket statement that "all suicide is selfish" is wrong, but there are absolutely cases where it is a selfish action.

 

[Dr Iron Arc]

Really, how can suicide always be selfish? Tons of stories real and fictional show people making noble sacrifices and popular opinion rarely bats an eye at that. Many people can take their own life for the greater good.

One cheeky argument against suicide could be "Well Hitler committed suicide so if you do that you'd be just like him." Unless you're comfortable with being compared to him then the argument is moot.