Is suicide not the best way out when pains exceed your resources to cope up with them?

Question

Some people think suicide is crime. Why is it a crime? Is not it better to end your own life rather than hurting others/yourself? Besides, is not it a good way to cope up with population pressure? I am not advocating suicide as the first or second or third option when your pains (physical/emotional) exceed your resources to cope up with the pains. It should always be THE LAST option. Can anybody give some philosophical reasons why or why not suicide is crime?

Answer 1

I think it comes close to being a crime because it violates an unspoken agreement among the living to keep up the facade that is life. The existentialists believe life is essentially meaningless and everything else including words are merely distractions and means to delude themselves and escape the truth. I suppose people commit suicide when they cannot deal with or accept the meaninglessness of life, or the pain/sorrow/confusion that comes with that realisation. (Albert Camus wrote that the only problem of philosophy is that of suicide.) When one commits suicide, it affects the living in profound ways because an individual amongst them has CHOSEN to give up life-- it makes them aware that everyone has a choice to do so too, but it is an unspoken agreement to live for one another and strive to find alternative solutions and not give up.

Suicide is seen as selfish because the individual would be escaping his or her problems in life but create more for the living, for example if suicide was not a crime and actually seen as an accepted practice, society would have a lot of problems like finding replacements for roadsweepers, managers, ministers, quite regularly, almost daily? Suicide is illegal though it doesn't make sense since it would only encourage attempters of suicide to make doubly sure that there is no chance of them surviving the suicide attempt. Perhaps the law is there merely to affirm the general common consensus that life is sacred.

Answer 2

That's the argument for some forms of euthanasia: if a person is in so much pain that suicide would be better than suffering through the pain, then euthanisia may be justified.

There are also other considerations, such as ensuring that it's voluntary and maybe depending on how the person is killed (either actively, such as pulling a plug, or passively, such as withholding treatment). Also, the pain must be real and permanent, so that rules out teenage depression or angst as a reason for suicide.

Basically, if you think there are some lives not worth living, like one in which there's a lot more pain than happiness or in intolerable poverty with little chance of escaping, then suicide would appear to be a sensible option. But again, these are extreme cases, and most people considering suicide probably don't have the right objectivity or perspective to properly evaluate their situation.

Against euthanasia, the usual objections are generally religious in nature, e.g., it violates the sanctity of human life, etc. You have to accept certain metaphysical beliefs (that are very difficult to prove) in order to maintain this position.

Answer 3

I don't think it is a crime, but I don't support it as being wise. There are many extenuating factors that surround a suicide decision and few of them are good reasons to end ones life.

I think it is safe to assume that someone who committed suicide did so feeling it was the best last option, but how many times is that assessment accurate? Cases of chronic, painful illness when death is assured aside, there are always options that would be better than suicide.

It is possible to get out of debt, depression, abuse, anger, loneliness, etc. People do it all the time. I've done it! Heck, if I can do it--anyone can.

I do believe suicide is a crime in the fact that it denies the world the presence of someone unique. Talk to people who seriously contemplated suicide, but did not kill themselves. I'll bet they are happy they failed.

As an aside, I am a fundamentalist Christian. I do not believe people would be banished to hell for suicide because the Bible does not say this. I'm just throwing this in because I know you'll have some answers to that effect.

Answer 4

I follow a Buddhist path of tolerance, compassion, learning, truth and respect. I hope I would not ever end my life - any more than I would end someone else's - but there are circumstances where life becomes intolerable for some people.

We are here. We suffer. We learn from it. We become better people. We suffer again. We learn from it. If you do these things often enough, you become enlightened and no longer suffer. That is Samsara.

However, bodies don't often last long enough to achieve this state and we have to get new ones every 70 or so years so that we can continue the journey. If you take your own life, you are merely moving the suffering on to another one but there is no shame in that. If you feel it is time to leave and that you have learned enough, who has the right to stop you?

This is probably the most personal decision you would ever make and, like abortion, no-one has the right to make that decision for you.

However, before making the decision, one should reflect on the effects this course of action will have on other beings around you - from "who will look after your cat" to the absolute devastation to the minds of those who love you. This is not a trivial act and should only be entered into once EVERY other option has been explored.


That which does not destroy us, makes us stronger.

Answer 5

I don't know why it is a legal crime but I can see why it may be a crime against humanity....there is always a rise in suicide rates when one person commits suicide. Family members are more likely to commit suicide if there is one in the family. There is always a way to cope. Reaching out is a way to cope....even reaching out to people on the Internet is a way to cope......there is always something besides giving up.....I went through a time when I thought suicide may be what I had to do......then I got scared of thinking maybe there might be something to eternal damnation and didn't really like that idea. If life was hard here, eternal damnation sounded worse. Then there is the idea that if you cut your life short then you have to come back reincarnated and do it again and the conditions of the next life might be worse. I don't really believe that is true, but if there is even the slightest chance of having to start over I was having none of it. Get thourgh this one, talk to God alot and reach out.....I am a good one to reach out to if you need to do that, I promise I,ll answer. If your just posing a question and you don't need to talk to someone.............never mind.

Answer 6

Historically, and later from the North American pioneer perspective, suicide was especially deemed to be a crime at a time when having every person available to pitch in and help out, made a difference to their survival. It was also a time when there was a 50% mortality rate by the age of five.

From the religious view of one to two millennia ago, God (Jehovah, Allah, whatever name you want) gave us life and it was destroying what the deity had created that was considered a sin.

That said, there have been times when the suicide of an ill person was considered an act of courage because it meant the survival of the remaining people. In this case, it is seen as the ultimate bravery.

However, in the North America of the 21st century:
For the people left behind, it is confusing and often painful. If the suicide didn't leave a note, it can lead to fruitless soul searching and survivors' guilt. I say fruitless because, if a person is determined to kill themselves, all the pleas and help and love in the world won't stop them.

Answer 7

Like most personal choices in life, the act of suicide must be considered from different perspectives to really appreciate it's nature. Whether an act is criminal or not depends less on perspective then on the laws of a particular jusridiction, but it is interesting to consider in light of your question.

From the perspective of the person committing suicide, there is some reason, in that particular moment, that is so overwhelmingly compelling as to subjugate their will to live. Since the will to live is arguably one of the most powerful of human motivators, what is it that would make a person want to kill themselves?

Well, according to some studies (see below) it is estimated that in up to 75% of suicides, bi-polar disorder and/or depression are contributing factors. In another study, cited on the same website, white males, the largest demographic group represented in suicides, are seven times more likely to commit suicide while under the influence of alcohol and drugs.

So clearly, a large number of people who kill themselves are not in a very good state of mental health when they make the decision to kill themselves. Their choice is probably not usually a good one because it is being influenced by mental ill ness and/or drugs. Mental illness is not a crime however, and in most counties it is used as a defense of criminal actions.

What about people who are not mentally ill or otherwise impaired to who chose to commit suicide? In some societies, notably Japan, suicide is, or at least historically was, an honourable, ritualized way of avoiding capture by ennemies, or atoning for shame. Rather than being seen as a crime, it was seen as a reasonable alternative.

The fact that suicide is a crime in North America probably has more to do with the fact that it is considered a sin by christians that will condemn one's soul to eternal damnation, rather than for any practical reason.

Answer 8

never give up, life can be to great to let it go. you made me think what if pain never exceeds your resource but if that we're true what about the people in Africa or being help captive by others. your tortured and then your killed how is that any kind of life which makes me think there has to be re incarnation or something else if some people suffer like this, and there's never a way out just pain then death. our sub-conscious or souls move on after we die but we are our souls so if we die like 2 minutes after birth how much life experience could we have had and will be come back. why do some people live longer then others?

Answer 9

Suicide was once a criminal offense in Britain which you could be arrested, tried and if found guilty jailed for. I think they stoped that in the 60's by changing the law. Much of the law is connected with Religion as it's foundation and in Christianity suicide is a sin. I would imagine that suicide is probably against the law in some American states as well.

Answer 10

In some jurisdictions, an act or failed act of suicide is considered to be a crime. Some places consider failure to be attempted murder, with the victim being oneself, and will prosecute such offenders for attempted murder. In the U.S. suicide has never been treated as a crime nor punished by property forfeiture or ignominious burial. (Some states listed it on the books as a felony but imposed no penalty.) As of 1963, six states still considered attempted suicide a crime--North and South Dakota, Washington, New Jersey, Nevada, and Oklahoma.Assissted suicide is, however, legally outlawed. A different matter than you are asking about and a whole different set of views. Suicide is one of the most debated, least understood phenomenons. No one, doctors, law makers, religious leaders, philosophers, can understand suicide. It is the most intensely personnal decision humans can make.
Philosophically, suicide has been a focus of examination in the West since at least the time of Plato. The simplest moral outlook on suicide holds that it is necessarily wrong because human life is sacred. According to this ‘sanctity of life’ view, human life is inherently valuable and precious, demanding respect from others and reverence for oneself. Hence, suicide is wrong because it violates our moral duty to honor the inherent value of human life, regardless of the value of that life to others or to the person whose life it is.
For libertarians, suicide is morally permissible because individuals enjoy a right to suicide. Attempts by the state or by the medical profession to interfere with suicidal behavior are essentially coercive attempts to pathologize morally permissible exercises of individual freedom.
Others, socialists and utilitarians, argue whether we have a liberty right to suicide, whether suicide violates any moral duties to others. Those who argue that suicide can violate our duties to others generally claim that suicide can harm either specific others (family, friends, etc.) or is a harm to the community as a whole. Suicide can also cause clear economic or material harm, as when the suicidal person leaves behind dependents unable to support themselves financially. Suicide can therefore be understood as a violation of the distinctive "role obligations" applicable to spouses, parents, and other caretakers. However, even if suicide is harmful to family members or loved ones, this does not support an absolute prohibition on suicide, since some suicides will leave behind few or no survivors.
Under the law, the only case that can be made is that suicide is murder, or attempted murder, but to me, being considered murder is a broad and corrupted interpretation.
There are many, many more philosophical views on the matter. Ultimately, no amount of debate will ever suffice to make it understood or accepted.