Is suicide a human right?

I think we all automatically have the right to end our lives at any point despite what any laws say. I could end mines tomorrow and there's no-one or nothing that could stop me.

There is one complication that i can think of though and that is that some people aren't capable of doing this on their own and will require assistance in the act. This is what the law has a problem with.

I believe suicide is right for some circumstances and others not.

All living creatures have the right to stop living by their own hands. Since its nobody's life but yours, you have the right to end it.

reply to post by ukredstar


Assisted suicide is the tough one, I had to do a project on it and it was hard to avoid the religious aspect of it when I had to make a counter argument. It's a shame that some people have to suffer because their family and state don't want to see someone go.

reply to post by Covertblack

Who are you people to say what is right or wrong?

Well, I think people have the right to feel however they want about how they want to live or end their own lives. No one here is pushing a belief on other people. Each post has detailed what they believe is good for the individual, not other people. Your question is a little hostile, considering people are posting what is good for them, not you.

reply to post by Skepticesque

It may be a right, but if the Tibetan Buddhists are correct, good luck navigating the bardos (doors of the afterlife) if you do.

A rather irreversable choice - things do change, for the better, and oftentimes, depression and bipolar disorder symptoms begin to lift as we grow older.

It's a terrible choice, and it matters not what the law is, since you can't be charged with committing suicide.

You're certainly not going to get a permissive thumbs up on it from me, personally I cannot support it.

reply to post by Skepticesque


This is your mother talking. I gave birth you to, I love you, if you killed yourself I'd would never be happy again. Your family and friends will never understand why you did this, and will wonder how they failed you. Your life is not yours alone. It is a part of everyone who knows and loves you.

I know when you are so depressed that suicide seems to be the only option, you can not look past your own pain to see what losing you will do to those around you. They grieve beyond measure over losing someone close to suicide. It kills a piece of them, too.

No it is not your right to kill yourself. You are a human and humans don't have the right to take human life.

There is not any part of it that is right.

Hope you never do.

reply to post by sad_eyed_lady


But only one person controls their life, and it's not their family or friends. Suicide isn't selfish, suicide isn't weak or cruel or murder. Suicide is a unique decision in which a creature decides to no longer exist. If a family is selfish enough to make their loved one suffer in pain in the hospital after requesting to be killed, then who is the real bad person in that situation?

reply to post by Avalessa

What if there's nothing that "is not" and it's impossible to "not exist"..?

Then, like an unneccessary abortion, such a thing just short circuits the circle of life, and thus is a type of insult to life and the course and cause of life.

The problem with suicide is that it is usually a permanent solution for often temporary problems.

I think the issue of euthanasia because of a terminal medical condition is a different ethical issue altogether.

reply to post by NewAgeMan


If life didn't want to be insulted, life wouldn't include aneurysms, heart attacks, miscarriages, blood clots, diseases, or the ability to end a life. Animals commit suicide all the time but I don't see anyone lecturing dogs for jumping off bridges.

Overtoun Bridge
Wasp Commits Suicide

It's your life.

You can do with it as you please, so long as it harms no one else.

If your death brings harm upon others, than no.

reply to post by Avalessa


Life is not to blame, because it's better that there is something, than absolutely nothing at all.

reply to post by NewAgeMan


Tell that to someone who has never seen the sunlight because they have been locked in a cellar their whole life. Tell that to the child whose mother slams him against walls when he doesn't get dressed. Or the father that lasts his child in a tub of boiling water. Some people just want to ie and neither you or I or some guy in Zimbabwe has any control over that. If someone slit their wrists right now, nobody can stop them or save them. It was their choice and it will always be a choice to everybody. It's a right ranted to any living creature that decides they can't bear the pain any longer.

There are thousands of terminally ill people who desperately wish they could just be euthanized because they are so miserable and in so much pain. I would rather live the rest of my life without a relative or friend instead of having to see them suffer emotionally or physically. If they want it, they have every right to do it. Keeping a suffering being alive is as brutal as someone happy with life be mauled by a beast.

I don't think it is a right, I think Life is precious and sacred.

But, I was wondering, does anyone know if animals commit suicide? or trees or plants or any other creature or thing that lives? I always think of Life as a force or energy toward survival, a moving forward and growing bigger greater, onward. Like into a fullness of Itself. Like a seed, to a bud, to rose in bloom, and how all things work together to allow for that rose to bloom.

Yes, it does die, but it dies naturally, it does not do itself in. And, even if it is struggling for water or sunshine, it still tries to live--- Like those little flowers that bloom in a crack in the sidewalk with out any water and people stepping on it---Its pretty cool.

Those dolphins and whales that beach themselves, I don't think that is mass suicide, I think they have gotten disoriented by those underwater sonic noise blasts. I am only surmising this, but I think all life strives for survival.

Except some humans. Must have to do with a disconnect with their natural self. There must be some kind of detachment from reality or a sense of separation from themselves. Like they get caught up in a conceptual self rather than knowing or finding the real and authentic self. Well, something like that, I am guessing. Because our natural state of being does not want to kill itself, it just does not, no matter what it has to face or do or go through. Trying to kill the self just seems so unnatural.

Even those guys who get stuck in rocks and things and they literally chew or knife their arm off to survive, to live, that seems more like the nature of an authentic being.

I know animals do that too, they will chew off a limb in a struggle to free themselves from 'death' in a powerful urge toward Life, to live.

Remember Frank Carpra's "Its A Wonderful Life" all about how each of us is special and we each make a difference, we can make life better for others or we can make it worse, its up to us. I choose Life. I choose to Love this Life that God gave me, and do my best.

reply to post by Skepticesque


Define "right" is it a right? Yes. The only rights you have are what others let you have. Suicide is the only thing you have that nobody else can control. It may be your only right not given to you by the govt.

I am one of those folks that think you should be able to do what you want as long as you arent harming anyone or putting others in danger.

reply to post by Sweetmystery


Yes, animals commit suicide. Look up "Overtoun Bridge".

reply to post by Avalessa


I understand that you're talking about freedom, and I honor that, and realize that it can't be "controlled".

But where I'm coming from is this - that the strategy of suicide pins all of it's "hope", on nothing.

It's fundamental assumption is that if this physical body is killed, there is an eternal nothing on the other side ie: that life is contained by two eternal non-existences or forever nothingnesses. It's the act of a VERY strong atheist, or pure materialist, dying the existence of an eternal spirit which this body merely contains, for the moment, a very short period of time by any standard whether you die prematurely, or naturally. It's a big time gamble on nothingness and death as "the last word", which is indeed an insult to life and existence as it is in ALL of it's forms, right across the entire spectrum of ALL being and becoming in eternity. Heck of a gamble imo, and an arrogant presumption too.

Who is it who's HAVING these suicidal thoughts? Who is it who cannot live, with themselves or with life as it is? Are we nothing? Is it all for naught?

If it's fundamental presupposition is flawed, then the whole strategy of suicide as an "option" may also be flawed, while having no real purpose other than to proclaim that in nihilism there is triumph. It might even be absurd, when we really come to think of it, and listen to our innermost heart, where the eternal lives. It's a complete denial of the self, and gives the finger not to life, or the circumstances of life, however sorrowful, but to one's own true self, as life. There may be more going on than meets the eye. Are we to spit in that eye out of spite before we even know what it can see?

Suicide may be the act that takes the final joke out of the mystery of life. That can't be a good thing.

Originally posted by Avalessa
reply to post by sad_eyed_lady

 

But only one person controls their life, and it's not their family or friends. Suicide isn't selfish, suicide isn't weak or cruel or murder. Suicide is a unique decision in which a creature decides to no longer exist. If a family is selfish enough to make their loved one suffer in pain in the hospital after requesting to be killed, then who is the real bad person in that situation?

Suicide is selfish. I was there, I couldn't even think about how my kids would feel, I was that depressed.
There is no way back from suicide. I've had many extra years I wouldn't have had if I took that option. I have had many great times I would have missed. What stopped me? My faith. I do believe in Hell and I really did not want to risk spending anytime there.

I can only speak about my personal beliefs about requesting to be killed. I would not put murder on anyone conscious to relieve my misery. I have a living will and do not want to be on left on life support. Nobody will have to make that decision for me.

reply to post by Skepticesque


You can't take your life and you are not allowed health care. None of these are human rights.
You are legally obligated to prolong and endure unimaginable suffering as a tribute to anothers determination, and misguided ethics. It is like a cruel joke. Self determination is not a guarantee. You are a subject. And you are subject to the whims of the masters of your destiny. In a true Republic, my health and welfare as well as my right to die would be fiercely protected. We are so far from free.

Originally posted by Avalessa
reply to post by Sweetmystery

 

Yes, animals commit suicide. Look up "Overtoun Bridge".

I looked it up. It seems to me that the dogs are confused. One Dr. tested his theory that they were certain hunting dogs that got a powerful whiff of mink urine and their urge to hunt caused them to chase the 'odor' right off the bridge. Apparently, dogs don't jump off all bridges, and there is something about this patch of land, the bridge and minks that got the dogs.

But, thanks for that, it was really an interesting read. and it is sad and that is certainly odd. I had never heard of this place.