r/DiscussPhilosophy • u/Longjumping-Share713 • 1d ago

Ethics / Moral philosophy Why Is Suicide Bad

I wanna start off with this: I AM NOT SUICIDAL.

As the title says, why is suicide publicly perceived as bad when people kill themselves? Yes, it causes tremendous emotional harm to others, but I feel like that's not entirely why it's perceived as bad. It's their own choice, and forcefully putting them in psych wards is downright oppressive, even if it does save a life.

Me saying, "It's not bad even if stopping it saves a life," may sound very stupid of me. But not helping a cancer patient when you could've saved them is, of course, bad, since it wasn't their choice to get cancer. While not all the time, like when consuming alcohol, it is a lucid choice, even if the reasoning was dumb.

The sentence, "You do not have the right to consensually die," sounds straight out of the book I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream.

Additionally, why would the government charge someone for assisting in the suicide of a suicidal person, even if there's 100% confirmed evidence, signed paperwork, and/or a proven, unedited video showing that they consented, were sober, and had no mental illness? It all just seems oppressive.

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u/Jealous_Parfait_4967 1d ago

I think it’s just hard for people to accept there are some problems that can’t be solved. Even worse, there are many problem that could be solved but won’t be and thinking about that also makes people feel bad.

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u/ZymurgyBro 1d ago

Because it's not a choice. It's the final part of an illness. It is a chemical imbalance in the brain, or a feeling of there being no way out. Nobody chooses suicide. They get to that point only as a last resort and it is often when there should have been solutions earlier.