Venting "People who think they had the right to die are arrogant"

[noname223]

I often watch a religion or philosophy TV show. It is in German language so posting it here won't help the most people. In this video they interviewed a zenmaster. I am not into spirituality. He seemed for me a little bit weird. His name is Muhō Nölke. Allegedly he is very smart, exceptionally smart. He had suicidal thoughts in the past and this was also the topic of the conversation. He said when he was 7 years old he questioned the meaning of life and developed suicidal thoughts. The interviewer asked him what he would tell his 7 year old self if there was a possibility to talk to him. And he said the follwing: In order to comfort his prior self he would say that life has no meaning (?) And in general one should tell people who question life: " The world would be better without you" in order to comfort them. (???????????) Such an idiot.

The interviewer laughed out loud and said you cannot mean this seriously. But he did. To be honest this is so ridiulous. I could not take him serious anymore after this sentence.
Okay this sounds so weird I post the link so that you don't think I invent stuff.


Minute 46 the part with the world was better without you.

But it gets even better (irony). His stance on suicide. (Minute 52). Life does not belong to oneself. If one committed suicide the other people would suffer and this is why suicide was always morally prohibited. We should be thankful to the people around us instead of hurting them. (Yeah thanks mom and dad for abusing since I was 5. Jerk)

Then comes his "perfect logic". To make the decision whether to die is made in our head. Though our body wants to live. He gives an example. If one really wants to die one could simply stop breathing for 5 minutes and then one would be dead. However the body demands air hence the body wants to live. Our head does not have the allowance to kill our body. People who think that were arrogant.
Moreover our future self has the right to live because it cannot be asked in case we were dead.

I hope you are not getting very angry when you read that. When I listened to it the first time I just thought what the fuck it wrong with this dude.
Now when I write this post I get pretty angry about that guy. I think this is absolute black-white thinking. And exactly such a stance contributes to the fact many suicidal people think other people would not take them seriously. This stance is absolutely bullshit and detrimental. I need to cope when I listen to such a bullshit and this place is good way to cope with such horrible arrogance towards suicidal people. Not the suicidal people are arrogant rather judgmental guys like this dude.

 

[Fktw0rld]

F**k em! Their opinions won't have any effect on me when I'm dead

 

[FuneralCry]

That is just nonsense. It actually is unbelievable how some people are so pro life in a world as cruel as this. I find it hard to believe that someone even believes in those statements.

 

[StolenLife]

Lmao they are so brainwashed it's hilarious. When out of anti-choice arguments, they always use the selfishness argument. Is the fact that life has no meaning really supposed to make a suicidal person feel better? And if no one gives a damn about anyone else's suffering, how is that supposed to make anyone want to live?
To be honest this guy's energy radiates everything that is the exact opposite of zen. In fact, he is the one that radiates arrogance.

 

[Lynx.]

"Life does not belong to oneself."

That statement is kind of funny and lazy, coming from a supposed philosopher.
I understand people not having the same outlook on suffering and suicide, but to pretend that one does not have control over his own life because it can potentially cause suffering is kind of ironic, and a tad moronic.

Why is that principle always only applied to suicide? Why not extending it to reproduction, for example, since reproduction always harms the people involved and causes suffering?

You can't have it both ways... So much for enlightened thinking, I suppose.

 

[actual_fox]

Don't be angry he is just religious zealot, the same as the rest. Buddhists are calling them selves not religious but It is just like saying "not like other girls; likes to travel and watch netflix" on your tinder profile. He is old, washed out by years of religious practice, meditation and reading religious texts all the time. I do not see what else could he say.

Why is that principle always only applied to suicide? Why not extending it to reproduction, for example, since reproduction always harms the people involved and causes suffering?

Funny you say that, last time I checked they despised sex as It continues cycle of reincarnation, but everybody wants to be popular so they omit this often.

 

[locked*n*loaded]

I'm sure he makes money off of his lectures somehow, and probably doesn't even believe the malarkey he spews.

 

[Sprite_Geist]

Then comes his "perfect logic". To make the decision whether to die is made in our head. Though our body wants to live. He gives an example. If one really wants to die one could simply stop breathing for 5 minutes and then one would be dead. However the body demands air hence the body wants to live. Our head does not have the allowance to kill our body. People who think that were arrogant.
Moreover our future self has the right to live because it cannot be asked in case we were dead.

The majority of the human body is incapable of having the desire to die because most of its components, such as the organ systems, have no conscience, and this is because they do not need one; their only goals are to house and protect the main controlling unit: the brain. This means that what the body wants in the context of suicide is irrelevant since the body exists to sustain our brain, so that "it" is alive to make decisions about what to do with its bodily vehicle in the first place.

This could all be opposed by arguing that the brain and its conscience are not supposed to feel suicide due to the natural objective of survival, but this is another debate.

 

[Mofreeko]

I was once told that it's our duty to overcome the hardships god gives us. Fuck. That. First off it's not my "duty" to do anything. Second, how does that make a lick of sense when the hardships for people aren't equal?

 

[Forever Sleep]

If my life doesn't belong to me, then I definitely want out... His philosophy seems to be that we SHOULDN'T ctb because it will impact those around us negatively. I mean- yeah- I can't argue with that. What I would argue is that most of us simply being alive impacts other living beings negatively. Unless you're vegan from birth, we've all killed animals and I suspect the majority of us in the privileged first world has something made by someone suffering in the third.

Sometimes philosophy plays the whole 'life has no meaning' card (I think) to take the pressure of success and expectation off of people. Not saying it works but I guess the idea is that if nothing actually matters- you can do anything. Think we're supposed to feel freedom by it. Of course- it's utterly impractical. In this world you seem to need money to do most stuff and we are all ingrained with the idea that we DO matter and need to play our part in society.

His arguments are irritating and I don't even agree with them on a biological level. Pretty sure it IS our brains that control breathing- you need respiratory assistance when under anaesthetic. Our lungs don't know what to do without our brains. Still- it must be a certain non-conscious area that controls all that stuff and there- I would agree- that part of all of us desperately wants to live. Otherwise we wouldn't have to overcome SI to ctb. (I'm assuming that comes from a similarly non conscious part of the brain too). I doubt many of us identify with that part of ourselves though. By it's nature- it doesn't have a personality- it's mechanical... But we're thinking robots.

Plus the whole depriving your future self of life is a bit weird- feels like he sees it as a separate entity. It's still me- surely. I certainly don't thank my past self for pushing on through... If I were able to talk to my 10 year old self (when I first contemplated ctb) I'd say- do it now- it doesn't get better. Actually, maybe I'd murder myself then- not like I could go to prison for killing myself- and if my past self was dead, my future self would be too.