What’s wrong with wanting to die?

[A-A]

Everyone I've ever met says that wanting to die is bad but can someone explain to me why.

 

[R_N]

Since all of us wil die I don't see why wanting to die is bad personally.

Others see it as "bad" because it goes against our nature, traditions, religions etc.

I think people take everything too seriously and just end up in their little boxes. Nothing really matters unless we give it a meaning.

 

[Forever Sleep]

I guess people see it as unnatural for a start. The 'normal' functioning organism does whatever it can to survive so- I think they tend to slap on the labels of mental illness/depression on people who differ. That then usually becomes their core argument- this person isn't thinking clearly. They wouldn't be making that decision if they were.

I think the only exception to this for some people is when a person's life quality is obviously terrible. If they are visibly ill, they may just squeeze out enough empathy to realise that they too wouldn't want to live under those conditions. Otherwise, I think they just think we need to overcome.

I think some people feel a greater obligation to keep living. Could be for themselves- to achieve their potential. Could be for the sake of others. Could be because they are religious and think it's sinful to commit suicide.

Really though- it's them you should be asking. Most people here likely don't feel that way.

 

[drearybreadd]

Everyone I've ever met says that wanting to die is bad but can someone explain to me why.

It's bad because it indicates mental illness, which is something society sees as something wrong that needs to be treated. Of course there's rational reasons to want to die but generally it's a result of mental illnesses. Also in most cases improving quality of life is possible which is where the phrase "permanent solution to a temporary problem" comes from. Also murder is bad so that's connected to murdering yourself being bad as well. There's a lot of reasons it's considered bad.

 

[LaVieEnRose]

Because it could be a function of an addressable problem or not rationally sound for some other reason. It can be hard to discern what counts as that and what doesn't. Clearly all suicidal people by default believe their suicidal desires to be rationally sound and we tend to be unwilling to critically examine our feelings.

 

[WAITING TO DIE]

The so-called normal people don't understand the struggles of people like us.
If they did, then they would view death as a beautiful release from a tormented existence.
They are too attached to life because they have never suffered as we have.

 

[Meteora]

Nothing. I ask myself the same question since people seem to be shocked if somebody wants to die.

 

[doneforlife]

I guess people see it as unnatural for a start. The 'normal' functioning organism does whatever it can to survive so- I think they tend to slap on the labels of mental illness/depression on people who differ. That then usually becomes their core argument- this person isn't thinking clearly. They wouldn't be making that decision if they were.

I think the only exception to this for some people is when a person's life quality is obviously terrible. If they are visibly ill, they may just squeeze out enough empathy to realise that they too wouldn't want to live under those conditions. Otherwise, I think they just think we need to overcome.

I think some people feel a greater obligation to keep living. Could be for themselves- to achieve their potential. Could be for the sake of others. Could be because they are religious and think it's sinful to commit suicide.

Really though- it's them you should be asking. Most people here likely don't feel that way.

Well there are 3 things. Indoctrination of religion, severe attachment to worldly stuff , all painless ways of exit made illegal. If these 3 are removed, then a better assessment can be made.

You will be amazed to know that in certain parts of the world, people renounce worldly attachments, go to mountains and focus on prayers. They also die , but it's not called suicide. It's called "Samadhi". Like , when you willingly leave your material body , but not because of sorrow , suffering , but because you have no more desires. Nirvana.

 

[samsara_96]

There are number of arguments against the desire to die. Buddhism (except the one in Thailand) is a religion that is most lenient on suicide and they would consider most suicides to be due to ignorance and voluntary euthanasia of enlightened individuals and the mentally or physically ill are not considered to be morally wrong. On the other hand, Abrahamic religions condemn suicide strongly. They expect even the most miserable individual to hold on to life as much as they can. The difference lies in their interpretation of existence.

In the case of religions that portray afterlife using reincarnation, suicide is welcomed under certain conditions. There are some temples of Buddhism and Hinduism that would condemn all forms of suicide as well but the worst case scenario is that you will become a wandering ghost instead of continuing your cycle of life and remain that way until you find a soul that will take your place. However, these beliefs are confined to a small number of temples in India and Thailand and they do not reflect correctly the idea behind the cycle of life. First and foremost, even Buddha himself did not consider suicide under the first sin (murder) or the fifth one (taking intoxicants, i.e. alochol and drug addiction). Suicide still is not the best way to end one's life and, once again, it is considered an ignorant action that might give you bad karma (if you are not ill or enlightened).

In the case of religions that have an eternal punishment system like the hell-heaven system of Abrahamic religions, suicide is deemed irrational because this life is finite and the after life is infinite. We exist because God (if exists) wanted us to exist and going against God's will is a sin. Hence, since we are committing a sin against an infinite being, our sin is multiplied infinitely and we are sent to hell to rot eternally. However, suffering infinitely is worse than suffering finitely and thus, we should just endure our finite pains.

In the case of atheism, I would analyze them under two different categories because currently there are too many people who claim to be atheists but some lack essential insight into life to be claiming that. The first category is a typically successful engineer who has been indoctrinated with positivism all their life without even realizing. These people will typically consider their lack of philosophical and mystical insight into existence as their superiority in intelligence. However, this lack is only a manifestation of their ignorance and they only argue against suicide because they are mostly scared of thinking about metaphysics. Hence, they do not have any sort of argument against suicide that is worth examining. Most their arguments will read as "But better days will come...", "I was there too...", "But you have a family...", "But psychology (that is built on false positivist premises) states that...", "You have a chemical imbalance in your brain and you should take some pills..." etc.

The second category is a self-aware atheist who examined their existence. Now, in this case there is not a single position because atheism simply refers to non-believers. Firstly, most atheists will not consider suicide to be morally wrong and, in fact, they have the highest likelihood of committing suicide as far as I know. It is also important to note that some sources will call people who do not follow an Abrahamic religion atheists; some will only include those individuals who do not practice a religion; and some sources will only consider people who argue against the existence of a God to be atheists. I will use the third criteria and try to argue from the position of a person who argues against God. The most convincing argument is from a nihilist perspective and it simply states that nothing matters anyway so why even bother taking your own life. Another convincing argument is since this is the only existence that we have and existence is better than non-existence, you should try to keep it as long as possible.

Now, I have a more nuanced view on the validity of suicide and I can explain it in more detail if you are interested but the above captures the most popular views against suicide. I guess that most people you met either used the arguments of the Abrahamic religions or the ignorant positivist atheists. However, it is important to note that the majority of the world do not think that suicide is necessarily evil. In fact, Buddhists, Hindus and self-aware atheists would not even bother arguing against the suicide of a person who is clearly in pain. They would only warn against committing suicide in the case of temporary pain.

 

[pthnrdnojvsc]

Imo Nothing wrong with wanting to die.

1.To me there is no objective purpose to life or to want to live .

The only real thing to me is extreme pain and suffering.

People will say but it's so good that yootube video , that sports, that sandwich "um um um so good" . But that garbage is nothing compared to the worst imaginable torture that can befall a sentient being like a human.

Wanting to die imo is logical to avoid extreme torture

2. We all will die anyway so why prolong the suffering in this oppressive world as a small animal that is under constant threat of extreme torture. There is no guarantee something very horrible won't happen to a human any day .

3.Only death / non-existence forever can guarantee no pain no suffering no problems

4. 80 years in this hell is too long.

It boggles my mind that anybody would want to live that long in this evil oppressive anti-suicide prison world and as a small animal that is under constant threat of extreme torture. But they all act shocked if you say you want to escape the prison . This is an upsidedown world.

A nonconsensual act like having children is glorified but a consensual act like assisted suicide is made a crime and vilified . nobody asked to be born. But if someone wants to escape suffering they say you can't have anyone help u

5. Why nobody talks about any of this nor even of the fact that we are all going to die and life is short. It's because of indoctrination brainwashing . How can people not talk about the horrible things that can happen to a human and the fact that we are all going to die but instead hide those and many more? That we are all going to die is the first principle the most absolute truth but no one talks about it . Hmmm .

I could write a book expounding on each of these sentences and continuing on this

 

[SpiritualDeath]

80 years in this hell is too long.

This! If you look carefully you'll see that the quality of life becomes very low when people get old. Even if you argue that there's some good in life when you're young, life's still gonna become pure torture when you get old, and you'll realize that all the "good" in life is actually a privilege instead of a guarantee. To me it's far more understandable and reasonable to never want to get old and suffer from inevitable old age related problems.

Yet instead of legalizing VAS, people encourage child birth (creating new slaves and bring about suffering), so that the children can take care of the parents when they become old/ suffer from illness/ can't move/ can't live on their own/ etc. It's like they want to live long while knowing that this kind of suffering is inevitable, and they even want the suffering to continue after they die (so they have children and encourage others to do so). I'm perplexed tbh.

 

[FuneralCry]

Those who believe that come across as so incredibly deluded and brainwashed to me I'm never able to understand pro-lifers and their insane, insensitive views, they lack any compassion.
Existence is what is wrong to me, and in my case I see it as better that the horrific mistake that is having the ability to exist is erased and forgotten about, existence just causes harm which is why only death comforts me.

I see it as a curse to be trapped inside this repulsive, decaying flesh prison where there is no limit as to how much agony one can feel when in comparison nobody can suffer from not existing which is why I see it as preferable to cease existing under all circumstances. Wanting to find permanent peace from all suffering is all that feels rational to me, it's so evil how suicide is purposely made so difficult despite the fact that the only true relief from all harms could ever lie in death.

 

[Darkover]

a better question is whats awrong with wanting to live
everything is awrong with these shitty horrible lifes

 

[doneforlife]

I guess people see it as unnatural for a start. The 'normal' functioning organism does whatever it can to survive so- I think they tend to slap on the labels of mental illness/depression on people who differ. That then usually becomes their core argument- this person isn't thinking clearly. They wouldn't be making that decision if they were.

I think the only exception to this for some people is when a person's life quality is obviously terrible. If they are visibly ill, they may just squeeze out enough empathy to realise that they too wouldn't want to live under those conditions. Otherwise, I think they just think we need to overcome.

I think some people feel a greater obligation to keep living. Could be for themselves- to achieve their potential. Could be for the sake of others. Could be because they are religious and think it's sinful to commit suicide.

Really though- it's them you should be asking. Most people here likely don't feel that way.

I don't think that people want to end it only if their quality of life is terrible. To want to live, one has to have deep attachment to someone or something. Take that away and the switch gets flipped. The quality of life may still be good. And I am not talking about loss of loved one to death. It could be that you don't find anyone or anything for which you want to hold on tightly to life..l mean, look at all those celebrities who committed suicide...

 

[Forever Sleep]

I don't think that people want to end it only if their quality of life is terrible. To want to live, one has to have deep attachment to someone or something. Take that away and the switch gets flipped. The quality of life may still be good. And I am not talking about loss of loved one to death. It could be that you don't find anyone or anything for which you want to hold on tightly to life..l mean, look at all those celebrities who committed suicide...

Yeah- very true. I just think- from an outside perspective- 'normie' vision- people may understand it more if someone's quality of life was (very) obviously bad.

For people who are suicidal themselves, I think they can be more open to a variety of reasons someone may feel like this. The feeling alone is intense enough to warrant compassion. Doesn't matter so much what the motive is.

Similarly, I'd argue that physical illness tends to garner more sympathy from the 'normies' than mental illness because physical illness is more visible I think. Plus- probably better diagnosed.

 

[darkenmydoorstep]

Everyone I've ever met says that wanting to die is bad but can someone explain to me why.

It's been baked into our culture becoming default and without people really considering the merit/implications of it.
I suppose it goes against popular theories doesn't it? And as with any situation , people immediately imagine if they were you, how they would feel and of course it's a very subjective thing….

 

[DEATH IS FREEDOM]

There is nothing wrong with wanting to die. We are all going to die. Most people are afraid of death. These people are in denial of death.

 

[sserafim]

Everyone I've ever met says that wanting to die is bad but can someone explain to me why.

Nothing. I don't think that it's wrong to want to die. I think normies may consider it abnormal though because they're scared of death. The default mode is life and living and anyone who wants to deviate from the norm is seen as weird and mentally ill. People also think that life is a "gift" and I guess the majority of people think life is enjoyable and don't understand why anyone would not want to live it anymore.

People just don't understand our suffering, they don't have the empathy to understand why we want to die so they try so hard to keep us alive and make safe peaceful ctb methods so inaccessible. They can't put themselves in our shoes and see why we want to die.

There is nothing wrong with wanting to die. We are all going to die. Most people are afraid of death. These people are in denial of death.

^^This

There are number of arguments against the desire to die. Buddhism (except the one in Thailand) is a religion that is most lenient on suicide and they would consider most suicides to be due to ignorance and voluntary euthanasia of enlightened individuals and the mentally or physically ill are not considered to be morally wrong. On the other hand, Abrahamic religions condemn suicide strongly. They expect even the most miserable individual to hold on to life as much as they can. The difference lies in their interpretation of existence.

In the case of religions that portray afterlife using reincarnation, suicide is welcomed under certain conditions. There are some temples of Buddhism and Hinduism that would condemn all forms of suicide as well but the worst case scenario is that you will become a wandering ghost instead of continuing your cycle of life and remain that way until you find a soul that will take your place. However, these beliefs are confined to a small number of temples in India and Thailand and they do not reflect correctly the idea behind the cycle of life. First and foremost, even Buddha himself did not consider suicide under the first sin (murder) or the fifth one (taking intoxicants, i.e. alochol and drug addiction). Suicide still is not the best way to end one's life and, once again, it is considered an ignorant action that might give you bad karma (if you are not ill or enlightened).

In the case of religions that have an eternal punishment system like the hell-heaven system of Abrahamic religions, suicide is deemed irrational because this life is finite and the after life is infinite. We exist because God (if exists) wanted us to exist and going against God's will is a sin. Hence, since we are committing a sin against an infinite being, our sin is multiplied infinitely and we are sent to hell to rot eternally. However, suffering infinitely is worse than suffering finitely and thus, we should just endure our finite pains.

In the case of atheism, I would analyze them under two different categories because currently there are too many people who claim to be atheists but some lack essential insight into life to be claiming that. The first category is a typically successful engineer who has been indoctrinated with positivism all their life without even realizing. These people will typically consider their lack of philosophical and mystical insight into existence as their superiority in intelligence. However, this lack is only a manifestation of their ignorance and they only argue against suicide because they are mostly scared of thinking about metaphysics. Hence, they do not have any sort of argument against suicide that is worth examining. Most their arguments will read as "But better days will come...", "I was there too...", "But you have a family...", "But psychology (that is built on false positivist premises) states that...", "You have a chemical imbalance in your brain and you should take some pills..." etc.

The second category is a self-aware atheist who examined their existence. Now, in this case there is not a single position because atheism simply refers to non-believers. Firstly, most atheists will not consider suicide to be morally wrong and, in fact, they have the highest likelihood of committing suicide as far as I know. It is also important to note that some sources will call people who do not follow an Abrahamic religion atheists; some will only include those individuals who do not practice a religion; and some sources will only consider people who argue against the existence of a God to be atheists. I will use the third criteria and try to argue from the position of a person who argues against God. The most convincing argument is from a nihilist perspective and it simply states that nothing matters anyway so why even bother taking your own life. Another convincing argument is since this is the only existence that we have and existence is better than non-existence, you should try to keep it as long as possible.

Now, I have a more nuanced view on the validity of suicide and I can explain it in more detail if you are interested but the above captures the most popular views against suicide. I guess that most people you met either used the arguments of the Abrahamic religions or the ignorant positivist atheists. However, it is important to note that the majority of the world do not think that suicide is necessarily evil. In fact, Buddhists, Hindus and self-aware atheists would not even bother arguing against the suicide of a person who is clearly in pain. They would only warn against committing suicide in the case of temporary pain.

Wdym by "remain that way until you find a soul that will take your place"? How exactly would they take your place? They would be stuck on the wandering plane instead of you?

Yet instead of legalizing VAS, people encourage child birth (creating new slaves and bring about suffering), so that the children can take care of the parents when they become old/ suffer from illness/ can't move/ can't live on their own/ etc. It's like they want to live long while knowing that this kind of suffering is inevitable, and they even want the suffering to continue after they die (so they have children and encourage others to do so). I'm perplexed tbh.

Ikr, this is so absurd

 

[RichardFirst]

It's not a natural desire for an organism to want to self-delete. I would say that humans are alone in experiencing existential dread, and this is likely a "bug" from our evolution. I think we all experience at some level a desire to throw in the towel, but few of us ever experience it strongly. When "normies" encounter this in another person, it makes them uncomfortable.

 

[sserafim]

It's not a natural desire for an organism to want to self-delete. I would say that humans are alone in experiencing existential dread, and this is likely a "bug" from our evolution. I think we all experience at some level a desire to throw in the towel, but few of us ever experience it strongly. When "normies" encounter this in another person, it makes them uncomfortable.

Yeah, I guess wanting to die is unnatural. All organisms just want to live and reproduce. They want to keep themselves alive no matter what. Even we still have pesky survival instinct. I think we humans have enough consciousness and awareness to understand the reality of the world and life though and how miserable and horrible it is. Other animals don't

 

[stilhavinightmares]

Society.

 

[samsara_96]

remain that way until you find a soul that will take your place

I read that in a book on ghosts and I am loking for that section now and I have read in another book on suicide that Buddhist temples in Thailand condemn suicide different from other interpretations of Buddhism, so I figured that that belief must be the reason why they differ. Some Buddhists seem to think that if you kill yourself using a rope or by jumping into a lake, you will become a wandering ghost and you will be stuck in your moment of death until you trick someone else to take your place. I guess this concept is used often in Asian Horror movies too. But, this does not seem to be the norm in Buddhism. It probably stems from an older belief system. I do not know if it is real or not though because I have never met a ghost and I do not know if they are real.

 

[Epikur]

So much had been written in this and other threads so I dunno whether my 2 cents would make a diffence ...

Anyway, there will be no simple answer to your question. Biology tells us that every organism is programmed by its DNA. This program simply makes the organism to survive, adopt to the environment, reproduce and finally die. Religion tells us (for most parts) that suicide is a sin. From the epistemic viewpont, both believe systems (biology vs.religion, empirism vs. belief) would conclude that suicide is not good or normal, respectively.

Now come to philosophy. Some philosophers have argued that suicide is immoral, mostly because one would run off one´s societal obligations. This is too simple for me and heavily reminds me of religion. There is no moral in the universe, or at least no one has found it yet. It´s all in the head of people who want to convince the rest of the world that their belief is the right and only thruth.

But now lets look at the question of free will. Does it exist? Some say yes, others reject the idea totally. Homo sapiens is the only species as far as we know that anticipates his own death. Animals don´t kill themselves (don´t believe this lemming bullshit narrative, it´s fairy tale). The emerging question is therefore: Is suicide an act of free will? Psychiatrics will definitely say no. They insinuate that free will may exist, but the monemt you consider ending it all you are somehow disordered. This is where I would make the decisive difference: a spontaneous suicide in the middle of a mental crisis might tighten your perspectives. A well-considered suicide where you have gauged all pros and cons and come to an autonomous decision is an act of free will and has to be respected. And is not bad at all.

 

[sserafim]

Now come to philosophy. Some philosophers have argued that suicide is immoral, mostly because one would run off one´s societal obligations.

Wdym? I don't think that anyone has any "societal obligations".

 

[Kempel556]

People say death is bad because they fear it and want to continue living their happy lives, unlike us that see death as a happy ending to the suffering that we face everyday

 

[sensenmann]

I will never understand why ppl see death as the worst possible outcome of life, I can think of so many situations where living would be much much worse.

 

[lwlaiet8887]

Many of the opinions held by the general public are demented.

 

[ddn.ctb]

Nothing is wrong with that. It's. Choice like any other.

 

[3ndl3ss-v0id]

Everyone I've ever met says that wanting to die is bad but can someone explain to me why.

Not knowing what's afterlife scares them, they don't want to accept anything they'll do will matter at the end cuz that'll make em feel worthless and like everything is pointless and the try to avoid suffering the death of a close one.

 

[TransientEternal]

Most of modern society doesn't agree with it. Also, you are more of a resource than a living being. Most of society wants you for the material value you can offer, and most people want you to stay because they don't want to feel bad. In the end, all selfish reasons. There's no objective reason not to do it.