How would you like to die?

Aeva117 wrote:Why does it matter what the reason is? If people want to kill themselves, they should do it. I'll never understand why so many people try and stop them.

In some cases I guess it's just a reflex, but in most cases it's common sense that, if someone could just kill themselves but, instead of doing it, they let someone else know thay they're thinking about it, then that means they need some kind of help but don't know how to ask without making things worse. You don't knowingly and voluntarily give other people chance to stop you or try to change your mind if you have truly made up your mind about something.

A choice is not a real choice if it seems like the only possible one. But on the other hand, even if it is a choice, "respecting it" is usually complicated. Suicidal people often want a reaction from other people or from someone in particular, to be shown that someone cares whether they live or die in no uncertain terms. For those people, "having their wish to die respected" is actually the opposite of what they want, and it makes them feel worse.

How come nobody wants to die by anorexia?
Or alcohol poisoning, which is perfectly legal and easy. Everyone wants to die in impossible ways. Bullets, guillotines, 100% pure heroin...

Puddings

under ice wrote:How come nobody wants to die by anorexia?

That sounds totally ridiculous, but then again, there was time when a lot of people actually did want to die of tuberculosis... Which is even more ridiculous.

People are weird.

Envisioning my death, I am always younger than 45 and the death is either in pursuit of something relatively trivial (Hedonism) or escaping consequences ("Well, that was a good run. Cya!"). It's usually exciting (though not always) but is always under my control. In thinking about it, I understand the risk of what I'm doing and it doesn't phase me. It's kind of like "There's a correct way to do this. Go on "

I don't wish to die but I'm not sure I would care about the prospect so long as it were in the pursuit of something that made me feel good and made me feel alive - then the risk was worth it.

Dalloway wrote:

Aeva117 wrote:Why does it matter what the reason is?

The majority of suicides happen because of short term emotional turmoil, like from a break up. These people clearly have bad support and bad impulse control, which can be helped. If they have some distance and still want to “see the radishes from below” as we say here, I totally agree, there should be legal ways.
Also there are organic reasons. If you're suicidal because of depression because of a brain tumor that's treatable, the suicide booth maybe shouldn't be the first choice.

Aeva117 wrote:I'll never understand why so many people try and stop them.

Don't give up on yourself. Good question. I think that's a status thing.
People want to feel safe. The ever so untouchable, holy human life (although we kill everything left and right and each other for that matter) is like the basis of every constitution and religion. If someone freely ends their life, it feels like life isn't so holy and untouchable after all.
So basically it's: you're not allowed to kill yourself, so the status I want my life to have doesn't get a scratch.
Does that make sense to you guys?

I understand from an evolutionary point of view why humans want to help those around them and I understand that people DO feel obligated to preserve life, but I do not understand what that feels like. For those that feel attached to the suicidal person- you're going to have to mourn their death at some point, why should they have to endure possibly decades of suffer so you can delay your own short-lived emotions?

Yes, I do find it idiotic that people want to commit suicide over miniscule bumps in the road, but honestly, if they can't handle those tiny bumps and are just going to lose it every time something minor happens, they should just get it over with.

I am anti-theist and have almost no empathy so the religious argument is absurd to me. I understand the logic behind it but since I believe it's based on a false premise, I can't help but feel animosity towards those who follow it. People like to stick their heads in the sand and pretend that death isn't inevitable or natural. I'm not saying people shouldn't strive to enjoy their lives but...they seem to forget that it's all temporary. Life is not holy or untouchable, it's a result of chance.

Come to think of it, I guess I sort of dodged the question with my original answer.

Sometimes I'm running and I think "I could stumble and fall and crack my skull and die", but then I think "That's okay. I like to run, and it's very unlikely that something like that will happen anyway". So, to sum it up: ideally I don't want to see it coming, and I would like it to be the result of an unavoidable risk of doing something I like. That's a scenario I'm instantly okay with.

I had said that my ideal death would be pursuing something trivial that makes me happy but your running scenario felt entirely underwhelming. I need to work on my theory

Why bash on my guilltotine idea?

big Anatoly wrote:Why bash on my guilltotine idea

Have you ever seen the movie "Taxidermia"? There is a character who constructs a machine with which he succeeds to behead himself completely alone (not a guillotine, though).