Discussion What duty of care do we and this site possess?

[chloramine]

What level of responsibility do you think we hold here?

There are people who want this site shut down. I believe that would do far more harm than good and demonstrates a fundamental lack of understanding of what this site provides for many people. The idea that this site is brainwashing anyone doesn't really make sense. You don't end up here unless you're suicidal to start with. On the other hand I do personally sometimes feel uncomfortable with people recommending methods or giving advice on how to accomplish a method. Overall I think even that information does more good than harm and I wouldn't want it to be censored but. Sometimes it's hard to say where the line should be.

I don't believe forcing people to live against their will is okay or helpful, but I do believe society and individuals should (where possible) provide support to people. In reality that's not something people receive and pretending like help is available if only people reach out is dismissive and harmful.

Within society as it is now I wouldn't change anything regarding this forum. I don't know how that would shift as the wider world changes. I can see the argument that some people died who may have otherwise recovered because of information found here, but they also could have unwillingly suffered for decades. In the end shouldn't that risk and choice be up to the person who lives or dies?

Do people here think this site crosses lines that it shouldn't or that it should go further? At what point do we become complicit in someone's suicide?

 

[FuneralCry]

To me it's necessary to have method information available otherwise people would likely resort to risky methods and this could cause them to get damage from failing. I think that there are many people who would have likely attempted ctb by overdosing or cutting if they had not found the information on this website. I personally think that there is nothing wrong with methods being discussed, after all people choose to research methods and go through with it themselves, it's all their personal decision, nobody is being forced to die.

Having method information means that people have a choice over when to exit, it may make them not feel as trapped in this world anymore and can be a relief for them. I think that it's wrong for other people to want to restrict this as after all they are not living that persons life and experiencing life the same way. We all have our personal limits as to what we can cope with in life so it should be up to us when to leave. Trying to force people to stay here against their wishes is only ever prolonging suffering, if others want to live then that is their decision but it doesn't mean that they should force their beliefs on others.

 

[Pluto]

There is one enormous complication regarding the concept of choice, which is rarely brought up here as it makes people uncomfortable.

When ex-suicidal people go on to achieve a full recovery, they usually look back and feel immense gratitude towards those who steered them towards working through their problems.* The word choice is complicated when a mind in a sick, abused condition uses distorted logic, overriding the wounded person underneath secretly yearning for solutions and healing. The combination of a desperate, unstable mind making an irreversible 'choice' presents a uniquely profound ethical dilemma for us here.

From this perspective, a response consisting of being nonchalantly advised of methods and sent on one's way can be literally a grave mistake, even if apologists can retort that it was their choice to go through with it. In the fullest context, this is a dubious defense.

A further problem is that many people here are desensitised to the tragic aspect of suicide and its consequences, especially as this site, like all forums specialising in a particular subject matter, is an echo chamber. Some members lack mature life experience themselves and endlessly espouse soulless intellectual theories and philosophies of life which will effectively steer the indecisive in the direction of death.

Method information is readily available here and elsewhere regardless. An individual asking for such advice despite it being a search away can be a red flag in itself.

The logical solution is something that fortunately does often happen here, despite not being an official part of the site's ethos: people who are obviously young, confused and in 'cry for help' territory should be supported to express their feelings, then given a stark reality check regarding the seriousness of the decision that they are making and solutions that they may have overlooked. Some sort of judgement should be exercised here for ethical reasons. There's no telling if the same ones whining about 'suicide gatekeeping' or 'pro-life rhetoric' could later be on their knees in gratitude for having had some sense talked into them.

As for the remaining majority of us who are in more advanced stages of suicidality, the website is functioning perfectly well, unlike the twisted society that gave rise to it.

* Fun fact: a song by Elton John entitled Someone Saved My Life Tonight is based on a true story of this exact nature.

 

[Sakura94]

I think it's best to steer people away from suicide especially when they make an impulsive thread.

Example: "I am going to kill myself tonight but my parents want me to visit them this weekend."

The person has included that detail about their parents for a reason, they want an out and people to let them know it's okay to live a little longer.

They can't post this on normal mediums (certainly not social media), without being spammed Samartians links and suicide hotlines which is really acting like a glorified spambot and so on. Usually the threads are shutdown and the efforts made to dox and get the police called and so on. Nothing of the sort happens here.
Suicide discusison is literally blacklisted on basically everywhere but here. Maybe 8chan had a board for it but that site is dead.

 

[rationaltake]

There is one enormous complication regarding the concept of choice, which is rarely brought up here as it makes people uncomfortable.

When ex-suicidal people go on to achieve a full recovery, they usually look back and feel immense gratitude towards those who steered them towards working through their problems.* The word choice is complicated when a mind in a sick, abused condition uses distorted logic, overriding the wounded person underneath secretly yearning for solutions and healing. The combination of a desperate, unstable mind making an irreversible 'choice' presents a uniquely profound ethical dilemma for us here.

From this perspective, a response consisting of being nonchalantly advised of methods and sent on one's way can be literally a grave mistake, even if apologists can retort that it was their choice to go through with it. In the fullest context, this is a dubious defense.

A further problem is that many people here are desensitised to the tragic aspect of suicide and its consequences, especially as this site, like all forums specialising in a particular subject matter, is an echo chamber. Some members lack mature life experience themselves and endlessly espouse soulless intellectual theories and philosophies of life which will effectively steer the indecisive in the direction of death.

Method information is readily available here and elsewhere regardless. An individual asking for such advice despite it being a search away can be a red flag in itself.

The logical solution is something that fortunately does often happen here, despite not being an official part of the site's ethos: people who are obviously young, confused and in 'cry for help' territory should be supported to express their feelings, then given a stark reality check regarding the seriousness of the decision that they are making and solutions that they may have overlooked. Some sort of judgement should be exercised here for ethical reasons. There's no telling if the same ones whining about 'suicide gatekeeping' or 'pro-life rhetoric' could later be on their knees in gratitude for having had some sense talked into them.

As for the remaining majority of us who are in more advanced stages of suicidality, the website is functioning perfectly well, unlike the twisted society that gave rise to it.

* Fun fact: a song by Elton John entitled Someone Saved My Life Tonight is based on a true story of this exact nature.

Spot on. Thank you.

 

[makethepainstop]

This site is therapy. Better therapy than anyone here has ever received. I'd think it a lovely thing if the people who wanted us shut down were to have their pictures, addresses, and places of work displayed online. Why anything might happen to these hypocritical S.O.B's! My goodness anything is possible, nowadays, vandalism, battery, robbery, burglary, assault, arson, accidents, car fires, plumbing issues, modern society at its finest. I have always felt than anyone demanding you that you must live YOUR life, their way, should be painfully silenced. Life is a great gift for few, problematic for many, and pure hell for others. Every human being is granted the greatest gift of devine providence, free will. Let us always rejoice and enjoy our right to choose. Rant over, love to all who come here.

 

[Girl-shaped Wound]

To me it's necessary to have method information available otherwise people would likely resort to risky methods and this could cause them to get damage from failing.

Another point is avoiding needlessly hurting people by choosing a method that involves others as witnesses. You have no idea how many times I've heard normies bitch about being late to work because someone jumped in front of a train. Those idiots do not understand that some people pick this horrifying method because they do not have access to anything else (much less N, the golden solution). And while those people may not deserve the empathy that they deny the person who just died to suicide (after months, if not years, of suffering), the train driver does. Then there are very sad cases when someone jumps and falls on top of another person, making them disabled for life. Even witnessing someone commit suicide is traumatic, and can lead to more suicide.

I 100% agree with @Pluto and @MizzShadows about impulsive users. There is a huge difference between someone making a well-thought, calculated decision and a person crying for help.

 

[chloramine]

To me it's necessary to have method information available otherwise people would likely resort to risky methods and this could cause them to get damage from failing. I think that there are many people who would have likely attempted ctb by overdosing or cutting if they had not found the information on this website. I personally think that there is nothing wrong with methods being discussed, after all people choose to research methods and go through with it themselves, it's all their personal decision, nobody is being forced to die.

Having method information means that people have a choice over when to exit, it may make them not feel as trapped in this world anymore and can be a relief for them. I think that it's wrong for other people to want to restrict this as after all they are not living that persons life and experiencing life the same way. We all have our personal limits as to what we can cope with in life so it should be up to us when to leave. Trying to force people to stay here against their wishes is only ever prolonging suffering, if others want to live then that is their decision but it doesn't mean that they should force their beliefs on others.

I agree that method information is also a safety issue and that's a large part of why I support its inclusion. In addition having more peaceful and less traumatic methods is just. Better for everyone and is important for dying with some measure of dignity. The personal discomfort is more when people offer explicit advice. I don't think it should be banned or anything it's just personally uncomfortable and I'd avoid giving out advice like that because it's more involvement than I'm okay with.

There is one enormous complication regarding the concept of choice, which is rarely brought up here as it makes people uncomfortable.

When ex-suicidal people go on to achieve a full recovery, they usually look back and feel immense gratitude towards those who steered them towards working through their problems.* The word choice is complicated when a mind in a sick, abused condition uses distorted logic, overriding the wounded person underneath secretly yearning for solutions and healing. The combination of a desperate, unstable mind making an irreversible 'choice' presents a uniquely profound ethical dilemma for us here.

From this perspective, a response consisting of being nonchalantly advised of methods and sent on one's way can be literally a grave mistake, even if apologists can retort that it was their choice to go through with it. In the fullest context, this is a dubious defense.

A further problem is that many people here are desensitised to the tragic aspect of suicide and its consequences, especially as this site, like all forums specialising in a particular subject matter, is an echo chamber. Some members lack mature life experience themselves and endlessly espouse soulless intellectual theories and philosophies of life which will effectively steer the indecisive in the direction of death.

Method information is readily available here and elsewhere regardless. An individual asking for such advice despite it being a search away can be a red flag in itself.

The logical solution is something that fortunately does often happen here, despite not being an official part of the site's ethos: people who are obviously young, confused and in 'cry for help' territory should be supported to express their feelings, then given a stark reality check regarding the seriousness of the decision that they are making and solutions that they may have overlooked. Some sort of judgement should be exercised here for ethical reasons. There's no telling if the same ones whining about 'suicide gatekeeping' or 'pro-life rhetoric' could later be on their knees in gratitude for having had some sense talked into them.

As for the remaining majority of us who are in more advanced stages of suicidality, the website is functioning perfectly well, unlike the twisted society that gave rise to it.

* Fun fact: a song by Elton John entitled Someone Saved My Life Tonight is based on a true story of this exact nature.

Unfortunately we have no real way of knowing who can recover and be grateful that they did and who is in it for the long haul regardless of what they do. I agree it's something we need to be cognizant of.

I don't think it's fair to automatically assign the label of distorted thinking to someone because they're suicidal, but distorted thinking could definitely lead to being suicidal. Because suicide is a symptom and not a cause, we have to acknowledge that some cases have a higher probability of the root problem being resolved. As you said giving people space to safely express themselves is essential regardless of which categories they may fall into.

I think it's best to steer people away from suicide especially when they make an impulsive thread.

Example: "I am going to kill myself tonight but my parents want me to visit them this weekend."

The person has included that detail about their parents for a reason, they want an out and people to let them know it's okay to live a little longer.

They can't post this on normal mediums (certainly not social media), without being spammed Samartians links and suicide hotlines which is really acting like a glorified spambot and so on. Usually the threads are shutdown and the efforts made to dox and get the police called and so on. Nothing of the sort happens here.
Suicide discusison is literally blacklisted on basically everywhere but here. Maybe 8chan had a board for it but that site is dead.

It's definitely safer to caution. Personally I worry about becoming invalidating or being another voice suggesting they have to live. It can be hard to balance support and caution in ways that let people feel heard.

The fact that it's not safe to talk about this anywhere else without risking your autonomy bothers me so much. Forcing one idea of help on a non consenting individual tends to be harmful even outside of suicide. It's infuriating that people will suggest that others should reach out if they have thoughts of suicide and then make it unsafe to do so. In fairness that's not the intention, but it is still the result.

 

[Hirokami]

What our naysayers fail to realize is that sites like this are important to many. For starters, there are guides for safe ways to ctb. Not everyone wants to live, and they should be given the right to end their lives humanely; hardly, if any, other sites offer such consideration. Even if this site ceased to exist, people would still ctb. However, their methodology would be a lot riskier and likely end up with them living with irreversible bodily damage. Even for the people who are on the fence about ctb, there's still a benefit. This is perhaps the only site I know of where people actually try to help one way or another. No false platitudes, no shame for having such thoughts, just understanding and support. It's cathartic to talk about one's suicidal thoughts freely and in-depth. While I wouldn't try to deter any one from therapy, at the very least I can talk about wanting to shoot myself in the head without being carted away. As for giving people advice on how to end their lives, I would only do it if it could deter them from an ineffective yet harmful method. For example, if it's something like overdosing on painkillers, I would state how that has only 1.5% success rate and they would likely end up with a permanently damaged liver. Though, I still wouldn't feel comfortable suggesting "better" methods.

 

[akirat9]

Trying to force people to stay here against their wishes is only ever prolonging suffering,

it is all

 

[lionetta12]

What level of responsibility do you think we hold here?

There are people who want this site shut down. I believe that would do far more harm than good and demonstrates a fundamental lack of understanding of what this site provides for many people. The idea that this site is brainwashing anyone doesn't really make sense. You don't end up here unless you're suicidal to start with. On the other hand I do personally sometimes feel uncomfortable with people recommending methods or giving advice on how to accomplish a method. Overall I think even that information does more good than harm and I wouldn't want it to be censored but. Sometimes it's hard to say where the line should be.

I don't believe forcing people to live against their will is okay or helpful, but I do believe society and individuals should (where possible) provide support to people. In reality that's not something people receive and pretending like help is available if only people reach out is dismissive and harmful.

Within society as it is now I wouldn't change anything regarding this forum. I don't know how that would shift as the wider world changes. I can see the argument that some people died who may have otherwise recovered because of information found here, but they also could have unwillingly suffered for decades. In the end shouldn't that risk and choice be up to the person who lives or dies?

Do people here think this site crosses lines that it shouldn't or that it should go further? At what point do we become complicit in someone's suicide?

I think it would be a shame if the site got shut down for whatever reason. I also think that would push more people into irrational CTB. This is one of the only places on the clear open web where you can discuss suicide mostly, freely, and openly, without being censored, banned, recieving toxic positivity and being told that suicide is selfish, just to name some out of many examples. It helps people who are considering CTB feel that they can talk about it with like-minded people that also struggle and that actually understands. It helps us talk to those who are on their journey to CTB, as well as those who are trying to recover or might even have done so already.

A lot of people who struggle to the point of considering CTB, already have a hard time talking to people about this in general usually and feel shut down, why make it worse? A lot of them feel lonely because they get judged by their friends and family if they open up about this, and they feel like a burden. Here you do not have to feel such ways.

This site has a lot of resources and information. There are many threads every month about new members who for example want to try to OD on whatever medicine they have at home or try irrational partial hanging, and we can reply and let them know that it will be very harmful for them to do that and that they will most likely survive, and we don't want them to end up with organ failure. We literally are able to educate people on how to avoid pain and hurtful and high failure rate attemps.

This website is very useful to me and probably for a lot of others. I hope it does not get shut down.

 

[freedompass]

I concur with what OP and others have said. I am very glad SS exists. I do however sometimes feel frustrated by unthinking knee jerk responses to desperate posts which seem to confirm them in irrational and potentially harmful beliefs.

One particular user has posted a great deal about how everyone in her real life abuses and bullies her, especially so called helping professionals. Agreeing with her that *everyone* is cruel with bad intentions may well just fuel her paranoia. I feel half the time they haven't even bothered reading her posts let alone reading between the lines, before sending hugs or other validation of her supposed desire to die.

I feel this person does not need confirmation of how all possible professional help she could access will only harm her. She is completely alone and sounds very vulnerable and alienated with very significant real life problems. 'Crying for help' is an understatement. Whatever she may say or think, random hugs on a suicide forum will not cut it. I felt very concerned that a misguided or even ill intentioned user could approach her through pms and talk her through ctb as she keeps asking them to do. All of this plays right into the misapprehensions of outsiders who would like SS wiped off the face of the internet.

 

[KuriGohan&Kamehameha]

It's a hard question for sure, because we're only getting a tiny glimpse into the lives of the people we interact with behind a screen. We can't accurately appraise the wishes of another person, especially not via text alone. It can be hard to tell who has reached this conclusion through ample contemplation and deliberation of their particular life circumstances, and who is acting rashly in a moment of weakness, thus making a decision they may regret (which is nothing to be ashamed of btw, it doesn't make their situation any less serious or deserving of empathy)

This space is unique in the sense that you can express suicidality without judgement or recourse, there are no threats of forced interventions or socioeconomic consequences like losing your job, being cut out from your friend circle, etc being hung over your head when you are honest about wanting to die. This unfiltered openness can be a very cathartic thing. However, you're right that it muddies the water a bit when we begin to interact with other users. Do we have an obligation to stop them?

What is our duty of care and how can we quantify it? To 99.9% of society, preventing suicide at all costs would be the goal. Use of force and revocation of bodily autonomy and freedom is seen as a justified and necessary measure. At the cornerstone of medicine and its institutions is the vow to preserve/save life no matter what. To sanction suicide, is to campaign for an idea that goes against the ethos of most cultures, societies, governments, and collective institutions.

Acknowledging that not everyone can be "saved" is completely contradictory to these rules and regulations, even if reality begs to differ. There will always be exceptions to rules, cases that can't be solved, diseases that can't be cured, and in most environments there is 0 consideration for these edge cases. These social codes of conduct are black and white with no room for nuance.

A friend of mine, when I spoke about being suicidal to him, said he had to tell someone. Not out of care for me, or concern, but because in his own words, he didn't want to potentially find himself in legal trouble. That's what the problem boils down too in many cases, and it's just so wrong. Duty of care should come from actual care, love, and desire to help. Most suicide prevention tactics are crafted from a litigious standpoint and designed to reduce risk of liability for any parties involved with the suicidal person.

There is a big difference between genuinely being invested in someone's wellbeing, and simply wanting to avoid a lawsuit. For the people who can be helped, we should do what we can to empathise with them and offer pragmatic suggestions, while respecting their wishes if those solutions don't pan out. I always appreciate when people try to offer ways to help ease my pain or words of compassion, even if I know in my head it's not going to change anything because I've been suicidal for well over a decade.

But for someone else? Those words might just pull them out of the hell they're experiencing. There are often influxes of new users who don't post very often, lurk for a few weeks, then will say they are leaving the site to recover. It's often people who do have support networks in real life, or ways of coping, mitigating and managing their pain, and these individuals actually did go through the classic temporary suicidality that all suicidality tends to get characterised as.

Should those people have been steered towards a last resort immediately? I don't think so. The nature of issues that would make a person suicidal varies so much, and there's a key difference I think between short term and long term problems. I think it's easy to get desensitised to the reality of what we're discussing here, like Pluto said.

After awhile, you do become reconditioned and stop viewing ctb through the lens that most of the world does. It's no longer seems like this very shocking and crisis invoking act, but rather another cruel facet of the universe that you have no control over much like a natural disaster. Thus, you have to harden yourself emotionally to distance yourself from it.

It wouldn't bother me to comfort another suicidal friend because I've seen so much suffering and can handle it, but most people I know wouldn't want to do it or couldn't handle it because they are conditioned to think it's a crisis and they shouldn't have to deal with the risk involved with potentially saying or doing the wrong thing.

So there's both pros and cons to being exposed to such grim subject matter, I think, but I wish I never had to know. There have been several lovely people I met here who passed on. It really hurts to kindle friendships knowing you could lose them at any moment. In the cases of the people that I knew, there was nothing that could be done to help. They'd tried just about everything, and that was the most frustrating aspect of it all. They'd just get accused of not trying hard enough over and over again when in reality they had went through hell trying to recover and never got to experience peace and relief in life. Being told their feelings were wrong only made them worse and worse. Especially when it came down to psychiatric resources not helping them, people just wouldn't believe that these efforts weren't fruitful.

In those cases, I don't think you can do anything but try to empathise and comfort the other person. Just like I don't think people on the fence should be persuaded one way or another, or made to feel they have no options when they haven't tried to improve certain aspects of their situation yet, I don't think we should brute force people into living against their will. I do appreciate that this site takes a harm reduction stance and advocates against methods that won't actually kill you but can cause permanent harm.

I often see smokers outside, sitting on the same benches taking the same drags day after day. These people know that smoking is probably going to kill you eventually, in a very painful way too, yet they do it anyway. We can't yank the cigarettes from their hands, or force them to quit suddenly, even when we know their decisions will eventually have fatal consequences. It's always felt off to me that the world doesn't have this same attitude towards suicidal people who have exhausted all options.

I think we have a duty of care to understand and empathise with others, but I don't think that users of this site can be blamed or held accountable if someone else does ctb. No matter how much you love someone and try to dissuade them, if their heart is set on that decision, they will do it regardless.