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See all MNHQ comments on this thread

Original poster

To think it's actually a lie when argue that suicide is always a selfish act, that others get hurt by it?

460 replies

ChristmasFuckOff · 19/12/2016 23:28

Firstly, MNHQ as you always comment on these threads - this isn't somebody making a post about being suicidal. I'm not. Dunno why not because I probably should be and maybe I will be later this week but right now...no.

I'm sick of all the stuff out there saying how if somebody commits suicide, there will be people devastated. That it's always selfish. Often people who are suicidal say they don't want to be a burden, is that not actually a reasonable argument?

I think a lot of people out there, with friends and family, can't seem to understand there are others out there who literally don't have good relationships. So it doesn't affect anyone else.

OP posts:
OurBlanche · 22/12/2016 14:32

Which is why euthanasia is a different debate. That I agree with, 100%. But your odd semantic fascination is wholly out of step with the rest of the thread!

U2 Flowers for you too!

UnbornMortificado I doubt there is any need to apologise. The thread has been, almost wholly, a dignified exchange of perspectives. Like you my DH considered it after his DMs suicide. He drives all over the UK and had a morbid fascination with the base of motorway bridges for about 3 years... a long time, but still temporary!

Having read some very angry threads recently I am glad this one remained calm, a proper exchange of thoughts and experiences.

Sorry if this sounds pompous or mawkish, but thank you all.

Sallystyle · 22/12/2016 15:40

Thank you :)

It's tough, but he really is worth every second of hardship it can cause. He is the kindest, most gentlest man I know.

BeckerLleytonNever · 22/12/2016 15:57

its not selfish, som etimes its the on ly way out, and I get tired of those 'left behind' saying they are devasteated, they should have helped more.

they are the selfish ones, only thinking about themselves.

and I speak from experience. these are the same 'left behinds' that make you feel worthless and stupid and should never have been born.
and you just don't want to be worthless anymore.

then they'll say you were selfish.

disclaimer- I know thete are cases of a person outwardly semmingly fine and no one would have any idea what theyre about to do, but that's rare IMO.

Phoebex · 22/12/2016 16:15

I can't say if its selfish but I can say my life has been altered forever since finding a stranger who'd committed suicide

UnbornMortificado · 22/12/2016 17:44

OurBlanche I should know better then to give a sweeping statement.

I agree the threads not been a nice read but informative and though provoking.

MotherofPearl · 22/12/2016 18:16

Becker, I was 16 when my father killed himself. None of us saw it coming. As a child, I don't think I (or my younger siblings) could really be expected to have 'done more', surely? Confused

LauraTheCucumber · 22/12/2016 18:51

Pearl I am so sorry for your loss Flowers. I don't think anyone could reasonably expect that you as a child would have been able to do anything to help your father.

I think the comment was aimed at adult friends who do selfishly little to support a suicidal person whilst s/he is alive but then complain about his/her selfishness after his/her passing.

SnatchedPencil · 22/12/2016 19:13

OP is completely right. Suicide is the least selfish thing anyone can do.

Why? If someone is suicidal, they believe that their life has no value, that they are worthless, that nobody will miss them and the world would be no worse, possibly better, without them. With this in mind it is impossible to consider suicide to be a selfish act.

The person is probably wrong in those beliefs, but that doesn't mean that they realise it - if they did, they wouldn't be suicidal! I've been at the edge a number of times and made a couple of very half-arsed efforts. At the time I had those feelings, I knew I was worthless and I knew nobody would miss me. I was probably wrong but at the time, I was 100% certain of those "facts".

Suicide is almost always the result of mental health issues. Mental illness is just as serious as physical illness. Blaming a person for committing suicide is as idiotic and offensive as blaming someone for being born blind, or for being paralysed because they were knocked down on a zebra crossing by a driver who didn't obey the highway code.

It's often said that "suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem." But this is the exact point - it is a solution to a problem, and most likely the only solution that the victim can see.

Whenever people state that suicide is somehow "selfish" I ask them this: what exactly did you do to help the person overcome whatever problems they felt they couldn't face any longer? Why didn't you do more? Probably because you didn't notice because you were too busy, or simply didn't care enough because their problems were not important to you.

So, who is the selfish one then?

BoneyBackJefferson · 22/12/2016 21:04

Whenever people state that suicide is somehow "selfish" I ask them this: what exactly did you do to help the person overcome whatever problems they felt they couldn't face any longer? Why didn't you do more? Probably because you didn't notice because you were too busy, or simply didn't care enough because their problems were not important to you.

So, who is the selfish one then?

Posters have already said that they have asked themselves these questions.
But what you have essentially is put the blame for the actions of those committing suicide on those that remain.
That is (quite frankly) a shitty thing to do.

BeckerLleytonNever · 22/12/2016 21:05

Snatchedpencil spot on.

DeleteOrDecay · 22/12/2016 21:35

I don't think Snatched is putting the blame on anyone, more like illustrating that people who claim suicide is selfish can often behave quite selfishly themselves therefore are in no position to point the finger at the deceased and I agree with her. Suicide is tragic for all involved but in the large majority of cases it's not selfish.

bibbitybobbityyhat · 22/12/2016 21:57

The onus is not on the mentally healthy to somehow make the mentally unhealthy well again! Unless you have been actually cruel or negligent towards someone who has committed suicide, then do not feel guilty at all! Feel angry/sad/distressed - yes, all quite normal.

Snatchedpencil: to employ the oft-trotted out analogies on this very thread, would you ask the friend or relative of a cancer patient to cure their illness?

IonaNE · 22/12/2016 22:05

PeteSwotatoes : And now you know me, so there's one
No, I don't. You are a username on an anonymous message board.

UnbornMortificado: I'm the catholic poster. (...) You don't get to tell me what I should believe
No. The Church does.

PeteSwotatoes · 22/12/2016 22:11

Iona actually I'm not a username, I'm a real person with a life, a family, a career and emotions. But thanks for being so bloody callous.

PeteSwotatoes · 22/12/2016 22:12

Snatchedpencil: to employ the oft-trotted out analogies on this very thread, would you ask the friend or relative of a cancer patient to cure their illness?

No, but you'd expect them to do whatever they could to help support them during their recovery, which is the opposite of what the mentally ill get from friends/family in the main.

BoneyBackJefferson · 22/12/2016 22:13

DeleteOrDecay

The blame is being passed as soon as you say "what did you do?"

I think that suicide isn't wholly selfish, but how can you ask the person on the train, the lorry driver, the policeman, the coroner, the witness what could they have done?

IonaNE · 22/12/2016 22:23

PeteSwotatoes I'm not a username, I'm a real person with a life, a family, a career and emotions
That could well be but should the case be the contrary, you would still say the same. For all intents and purposes you could be posting under 5 different usernames on this thread. This aside, my point was that even if you assure me that you are a person with just this single username, I still don't know you. Also, to address another point you have made: yes, I can imagine that I have met people who have attempted suicide, just haven't told me. But nearly every poster here seems to personally know someone who has hanged themselves or thrown themselves under a train or took an overdose. What I meant to say was that I have never known personally anyone, who has done or attempted this; and am amazed at the number of people who know someone who has done this.

bibbitybobbityyhat · 22/12/2016 22:28

"No, but you'd expect them to do whatever they could to help support them during their recovery, which is the opposite of what the mentally ill get from friends/family in the main."

No, that is just not true, in the main.

haveyourselfamerry · 22/12/2016 23:45

Ubiquity, I am glad you wrote this:
"Suicide has only been legal in the UK for a few decades. Agree wholeheartedly with the comments about suicide being made deliberately difficult and therefore violent and unpleasant by comparison with the assisted suicide of Dignitas.

But when you look at suicide from a historical perspective, you see that it's chiefly a matter of property and financial obligations and not personal autonomy: for example, when debts were personal and not automatically inheritable, you could rescue your family from penury by jumping off a bridge. While you were alive your dependants were legally your responsibility; once you were dead they became someone else's problem. You didn't belong to yourself, but to your family and community.

That led to the obviously absurd position that suicide was a capital crime confused so it was absolutely imperative for a failed attempt to be dressed up as an accident.

But nowadays we have a concept of someone's rights over their own destiny and their own self, and we inherit debt, and life insurance excludes suicide (and so on) so suicide stops being a crime against the community and starts being ... what?

If suicide were made easy, how many people would go for it? How many people would be nudged towards it by malicious "friends"? At what point would the NHS be offering it as an alternative to intrusive life-extending or ineffective palliative care?

I don't know. It's easy to be supportive of someone's decisions when they're reversible. It's harder to draw a line on personal agency when we're talking about "permanent solutions".

Will think then post again or this will get too long.

haveyourselfamerry · 22/12/2016 23:56

I presume it was the Judaea-Christian tradition that started the idea of suicide being a crime? Something to do with your life not being yours but belonging somehow to a monotheistic god?

UnbornMortificado · 23/12/2016 01:14

Iona normally I would strongly tell you to go away. I don't think questioning and trying to upset possible vulnerable people is very Christian.

I'm going to ignore your sanctimonious bollocks that is ruining a very interesting discussion.

Pete I would just ignore it. I doubt many RL people would tell some preachy so and so their problems. I certainly wouldn't.

LauraTheCucumber · 23/12/2016 07:00

bibbity it istrue.

One of the constant, continual things that MH professionals are trained to tell suicidal people is "you need to take responsibility for yourself". As in, dont blame anyone else for how bad you're feeling, don't expect anyone to support you, don't ask anyone around you for help. It's Western neoliberal individualism on steroids.

The problem is, by then saying "but if you choose to die by suicide, you'll be selfish" is that it undermines the whole ideology behind the saying it. If we are truly responsible for ourselves and only ourselves, then suicide cannot be selfish because our lives are only our own and it shouldn't matter what impact our death might have in other people. But if we are intrinsically and interconnectedly part of a family and a community (which, beyond the West, most people believe) then the perceived selfishness of a potential suicide then places a responsibility on the family and community to help prevent that suicide.

The mental health system, and UK society in general, wants it both ways: it's the victim's problem they're feeling so desperate, and the victim's fault for upsetting others.

We need to make our minds up.

FruitCider · 23/12/2016 09:05

bibbity it istrue.One of the constant, continual things that MH professionals are trained to tell suicidal people is "you need to take responsibility for yourself". As in, dont blame anyone else for how bad you're feeling, don't expect anyone to support you, don't ask anyone around you for help. It's Western neoliberal individualism on steroids.

The only time I would say this phrase "I would be sad if you were to do that, but ultimately it's your choice, I refuse to take responsibility for that" is when a patient is attempting to blackmail me in to doing what they want me to do by threatening to harm themselves if I do not meet their perceived needs.

Other than that I would NEVER tell a patient "you need to take responsibility for yourself" at the point of contemplating suicide. How is that helpful?!?!? Identifying protective factors is much more useful I find!

Devilishpyjamas · 23/12/2016 09:21

Probably haveyourselfmerry - certainly in Japan suicide is often seen as a responsible thing to do & as the morally 'correct' choice (less so recently, but that's because some of the reasons for suicide have changed - there are still cases that would be seen as honourable).

I suppose it's the same for termination. I lived in Japan in the 90's & was surprised to find that termination was generally seen as a 'better' course of action than bringing up a child without a father.

LauraTheCucumber · 23/12/2016 09:35

FruitCider I am so pleased to hear you say that. Something in my eye Flowers

All I can say is, my own experience of the countless MH professionals I sought help from whilst suicidal always delivered exactly the same line to me about, which was just as I described it. Maybe times have moved on. It was 10-15 years ago.