How come people who commit suicide are considered cowards, unless someone famous does it?

[VyseRogueKing]

I think suicide is a way for weak willed people to run away from their problems.

I just refrain from saying so every time it's mentioned because all it accomplishes is upsetting people (especially when it's a beloved celebrity), something the "omg rip in peace, you hero" crowd don't have to worry about.

Any form of torture if long enough and cruel enough will reduce the strongest of wills to dust. Depression isn't really a problem it's a chemical imbalance in the brain that forces you to be sad and the longer this goes on the more you will see that it's somehow your fault and then beat yourself up for it. In this particular case it's even noted that he has sought help but even that wasn't enough. That takes a lot of strength because the rational mind works really poorly when experiencing any form of sorrow.

Having suffered through depression at the hands of anxiety med side-effects I can tell you it freaking sucks. In the span of half a year it turned me into a enfeebled mess who ended up unable to leave my bed except to eat when it feels like my stomach would eat itself if I didn't. Some people aren't even so lucky. I didn't even know what the feeling was because never experienced it before in my life but it sapped away at me even before the bedridden state no matter how good a day was the moment I was left to my thoughts it all disappeared into self-inflicted psychological torture and then that would make the next day harder. Suffice to say it all spiraled downward.

I count myself lucky that all I had to do was stop taking a pill to get better. Other people suffer through this their entire lives and I could barely handle a half year of it. It isn't a matter of weak will it's more of a fact that their will has been broken having fought a long battle to no avail.

TLDR those who experience depression are experiencing a form of torture most people never experience. It destroys rational thought, it eats their mind, and crushes their will. Suicide is the end result of not receiving enough help in enough time. It cannot be overcome easily. Please instead of realizing it offends people think about why it offends people because it's still insensitive to think poorly of someone when you don't understand their strife.

OT:
1) People who say people who commit suicide are cowards don't understand that the victim has suffered some significant emotional trauma that most of us could never dream of.

2) Hell no. I only wish that they could have been saved in time but it's never that easy.

3) It's terrible. No one should willingly take their lives. It may seem like it's the only way to be free of pain and maybe they see it as doing a service to the world but it only hurts those they care for and throws away everything including a chance however slim to overcome whatever caused their pain. I can only wish that whatever the next life is that it be free of pain so they can live on in peace.

 

[BanicRhys]

I don't think people who kill themselves should be demonised or painted as failures, I just believe that it takes a certain amount of strength to hold on to hope that life will get better, even when things are at their worst.

coming from an emotionally healthy person.

I won't bother you with some sob story about my state of mind, I'll just say that your assumption of my mental health is wrong.

Now, having said that, please don't proceed to belittle my problems because my opinion on this matter differs from yours.

people because it's still insensitive to think poorly of someone when you don't understand their strife.

Same goes for you.

 

[Vareoth]

They're not cowards. It takes a lot before any sane person would commit themselves to ending their own life. It's tragic, nothing less. Thinking otherwise derives from a failure to understand what depression and desperation truly entails.

Even so, I do consider myself a massive coward for even having considered it at one point. But I decided that I like living way to much to even consider suicide for any reason.

Edit: And I've already some nice examples on this thread.

 

[Lord Rothschild]

A) I call them on it even if they are famous or not

B) depeneds on why they commit suicide

C) If the reason for wanting is a disease that has no cure and will turn you pain then i beleive you have the right to die befor the pain gets too bad, but if you want to die because you don't get enough cuddles, then fuck you, you selfish ****. What about all the people that you are clearly ignoring? "Oh no-one is nice to me" ***** YOUR ENTIRE FAMILY IS SO BENT OVER BACKWARDS FOR YOU THAT THEY TALK TO FROM THE FLOOR BECAUSE THEIR HEAD IS BETWEEN THEIR KNEES get over your pissy "I need to have the world feel sorry for me" bull shit and harden the fuck up

 

[VyseRogueKing]

I don't think people who kill themselves should be demonised or painted as failures, I just believe that it takes a certain amount of strength to hold on to hope that life will get better, even when things are at their worst.

people because it's still insensitive to think poorly of someone when you don't understand their strife.

Same goes for you.

I never assumed any negative assumptions about you. I merely sought to educate. If you're talking about my experiences not being up to snuff then I can say a glimpse into the abyss is enough to change the minds of many a man.

If you had worded your initial comment like you had here, while I still disagree, it wouldn't have sounded nearly as bad.

 

[McElroy]

Well, I have zero perspective on depression or other such mental illnesses apart from stuff I read/hear on the web, and so I'm on the mindset that suicide is a pretty weak thing to do. My sympathy doesn't extend to the grave. And the fact is that it's good for everyone that my mindset would never change, because in order for it to change, someone close to me would have to off him- or herself.

 

[Lil_Rimmy]

A) I call them on it even if they are famous or not

B) depeneds on why they commit suicide

C) If the reason for wanting is a disease that has no cure and will turn you pain then i beleive you have the right to die befor the pain gets too bad, but if you want to die because you don't get enough cuddles, then fuck you, you selfish ****. What about all the people that you are clearly ignoring? "Oh no-one is nice to me" ***** YOUR ENTIRE FAMILY IS SO BENT OVER BACKWARDS FOR YOU THAT THEY TALK TO FROM THE FLOOR BECAUSE THEIR HEAD IS BETWEEN THEIR KNEES get over your pissy "I need to have the world feel sorry for me" bull shit and harden the fuck up

Fuckin' aye.

I have a rather numeric view on suicide. Basically, if you are sad, unless you have literally been raped, stabbed, shot and in general broken into tiny pieces with zero friends and a dead family, if you live in a first world country you have it better. Straight up, you have it better, because as you whine that no-one likes you whilst ordering a pizza and soda, some kind halfway round the world has no family and his water looks dirtier than your toilet after a night of spicy curry. First off, if you do off yourself you are an asshole. If your family still breathe and they care about you, no matter your whiny view on how much they hate you, then when you off yourself they are going to be fucking devastated, not to mention the idea of "Did I cause this?" "How could I have stopped this?". I know someone who is the sweetest lady I know and she is like a second mom to everyone. She works a janitors job for shit pay, but every time I walk by she'll talk my ear off and try and snag me a free meal or two, because she is that goddamn nice.

She once travelled home after a long day of work, to walk into a dark house and bump into something. Upon switching on the lights, well it turns out she bumped into her fucking sons legs as he hung from the ceiling. A while later, as she is still recovering her daughter needs some help with her fiancée. They want to start a brand new life in their own house but they need a bit of extra cash. This lady, being sweet as all hell lends them ten thousand, only for her daughters fiancée to run off with the money, revealing he was already married. This poor lady breaks again, but eventually she starts to recover from constant nervous breakdowns and terrors.

She has never considered suicide, and for that she is the strongest lady I know. Her life got fucking throw upside down by her son offing himself and for years she will pick up the pieces. Fuck that guy.

But, let's say it really is that bad. You have no friends, no love, no job, no family and you live a shit life or live in a 3rd world country. Or, you have some kind of disease that can't be cured and will only result in more and more pain as life goes on until your every moment is pain. Perhaps you are so old that everyone you know is dead, and you can't even move around on your own anymore. All of these examples, you can happily off yourself. I would consider that your choice, neither brave nor coward, just simply you going "Well fuck it, this is my lot in life, eh, let's see if those fucking pearly gates exist."

The problem is that these problems as so few and far between in suicide cases, where most of them are people who are teenagers who were bullied and went "waaaah, pay attention to me! waaah, my life is so bad I'll kill myself". Fuck those people, unless you fit into a category above you have it better. You can walk down to the super market, get a job, work for a while, buy a laptop, get steam, play games, watch videos, whack it to porn and all of that lovely stuff. Because you have it better, and if you let someone going "lol your e a ****** faggyfag" get to you so much you kill yourself then you are a fucking coward and weak.

 

[pearcinator]

I'll play Devil's Advocate here and try to explain why.

A) How come people who commit suicide are considered cowards, unless someone famous does it?

Mental Illness is extremely difficult to understand and even more difficult to 'cure'. It's considered cowardly because in many cases people are aware of the mental illness and try their best to help (despite not actually knowing HOW to help). When the person commits suicide it's seen as cowardly because at the end of the day, they are the ones with the mental illness and it is up to them to fight it. It feels as if we (the 'helpers') have done everything for them and don't understand why they aren't feeling better.

Them taking their life feels like a waste, not only of their life but of our time and effort used to help them. They didn't fight it therefore they are cowards.

B) Do you think people who commit suicide are cowards?

I don't personally but I can understand why people do. There has to be some effort made by the person with depression (and they have probably made a huge amount of effort) but it seems that it only takes one little 'incident' (something as little as a thought) to undo all of that progress and put them back down into the black hole of depression.

C) What is you're opinion on suicide?

It is a very sad thing. A person's life is always special and they have carried the burden of the (often invisible) black cloud of depression for as long as they could.

With that said, no-one should be blamed for what happened. The public has not 'failed' them, they have not 'failed' themselves. The only thing you can blame is the invisible entity that exists in all of us. It's just that this invisible entity has 'taken control' of many peoples lives.

 

[Scarim Coral]

Well I didn't called him a coward but a hypocrite (in that Robin Willaim thread I commented due to that tumblr post I found of him saying suicide is not the solution).

Anyway-
A. Really? In saying I don't read suicide news that often.
B. No.
C. Not the way to go. There is always another path that is not suicide.

 

[Qage]

I haven't heard of anyone calling Robin Williams a coward or selfish, although I haven't really been hanging out on any social media since it happened, but I've heard people say it in regards to suicide in general. Usually the people who say it, in my experience, tend to be mentally, physically healthy individuals who are incredibly opinionated and it always makes me laugh seeing them express their ignorance in such a manner.

Although I believe that there is nearly always another path to take, I do not believe it to be a cowardly solution, considering the immense amount of thought and strength it must have taken to [I/]end their own life![/I]

 

[CGAdam]

I'm going to skip A, because that's not the question I wanted to weigh in on. For C, I say it's the person's choice to live or die, and they deserve that right.

B is the big one for me. It completely depends on the motivations of the person in question. If they commit suicide to avoid negative consequences of an action they took, yes. If they kill themselves because they're suffering from a biological disease (i.e., cancer) and don't want to be in physical pain anymore, no. If they're suffering from something like depression and don't want to be in emotional pain anymore, it's a little more of a gray area. It's certainly the most tragic, especially if you're leaving people behind. I don't think I'd call it the same type of cowardly way out as the guy that kills himself to avoid jailtime, though.

 

[Batou667]

Yikes, a lot of people here lining up to scold the OP for using the c-word. I think OP had a point: William's suicide has on the whole been reported very, very sympathetically, and I think it's fair to say that a less famous or positively-viewed person wouldn't have gotten the same treatment. (Did any newspapers describe Harold Shipman's suicide as a final act of bravery? I think not.) Even a more "normal" suicide of, say, a stressed middle-aged man, is often couched in the terms of the problems he's "running away from" and the family he "abandoned".

I've been reading plenty of Robin Williams death reports and obituaries that are packed with little caveats and PSAs about how "suicide isn't cowardly" and "guys, depression is real, guys" and so on. And that's all well and good and heartwarming, but I think the OP has a point in saying that certain celebrities get special dispensation.

I'm not sure whether this was really news outside of the UK, but a couple of months back Peaches Geldof died (daughter of moralising, sometimes-rocker Bob) - tributes poured in for a "life cut short" and a "mother cruelly taken away from her child" and so on. There were the usual crocodile tears on social media, a tackily-painted coffin, the works. Then, after all that, the results of the autopsy came back and the elephant in the room was finally pointed out: she'd died of a heroin overdose. Now, if Peaches had been a council estate mum on benefits, she'd have been described as a junkie, a smackhead, a callous harpy who prioritised her personal instant gratification over caring for her child. I mean, what kind of loser would take heroin, alone in the house, while leaving their infant unsupervised in the next room? However, that's not what happened. Her death was chalked up in the media as a tragedy, the bitter result of a "lost battle" with addiction (euphemistic vocabulary usually reserved for people dying of cancer), and even the hint of fate or inevitability as tabloids clamoured to point out the similarities to her mother's overdose.

One rule for celebrities, another rule for the rest of us? There may be some truth to that.

[edit] Oh yeah, my opinion on suicide? To quote Robin Williams himself, "it's a permanent solution to a temporary problem".

 

[Xaio30]

A) I don't know if this is true or not.

B) I consider people who commit suicide out of selfish reasons to be cowards, with the exception of people in constant, incurable physical or psychological pain.

C) I think that regardless of what you think put you here in this world, you owe it to yourself to make the most out of it. There is almost always a way to change your life for the better. Anything less would be treason to the thousands of generations who got through their lives just so you could be born.

 

[Samael Barghest]

Then you're not talking to the right people. From the moment I heard about his death I've done nothing but call Robin a coward..

 

[stroopwafel]

Not everyone wins at life. Not everyone gets married, has kids, has friends, a thriving social life, or any of that "good" stuff, aka normal shit people expect out of life.
Not everyone has it great in life. Hell, not everyone even makes it to normal, or average.
The way I see it, miracles are for the fortunate, and not everyone's fortunate.

That?s true, to a certain extent. But Robin Williams had all these things and that didn?t prevent him from offing himself now did dit?

Fact is that life is not good or bad, it?s just..indifferent. People often try to search for reason or meaning where there isn?t any. So they worry and worry and plague themselves with ridiculous amounts of stress that corrodes their entire emotional wellbeing. And in doing so you?re just defeating yourself and nobody really cares. Simply b/c every person has their own issues to deal with.

In any hospital you?ll have an oncology department where children are dying of cancer. People whose lives haven?t even begun yet. If life was ?fair? would this have ever happened? No. But life isn?t fair. Life don?t care(that rhymed). Why do you think people invented religion? To mitigate the pain of existence. People also take themselves as the center of the universe, but how significant of a presence do you think you really are in the thoughts of others? The answer will probably disappoint.

As for suicide, I do wonder if clarity of thought is all but gone in people with depression that makes it impossible for them to reflect upon their irreversible decision. Without trivializing depression, I somehow doubt that. Whether it be suicide, criminal behavior or addiction; I?ve seen that ?excuse? of ?chemical imbalance? in the brain being used way too often to retroactively absolve people from personal responsibility.

If we are really just a leaf in the wind destined to go wherever the neurochemistry of our brain takes us, then what would be the purpose of our self-awareness? People have a choice. In the end people choose to do whatever it is they do. I don?t doubt people who are depressed suffer a lot, but if they decide to end their own life it?s ultimately their own choice.

In life you need to be your own best friend, not be dependent on the validation of others for your own self-worth and you need to increase your ability to cope with things. All of which can be learned. Whenever I read or hear the amount of self-loathing people with depression have, well, it would get me depressed and I?m one happy camper. Same goes for people who are obese, addicted or have otherwise negative attitudes. It just implicates not giving a shit about yourself in my opinion. If people in any such predicament will ever want to get better, that attitude needs to change.

But anyways, kinda lost track of what the questions were but I hope this answers (most of) them.

 

[x EvilErmine x]

I'll keep it short.

You can't choose to not die, but you can choose the terms on which you do.

That doesn't strike me as cowardly.

Pretty much sums it up for my opinion on it too. Though I would add that it should always be remembered that suicide is a permanent solution to what's often a temporary problem. With the right help you could get better.

 

[Colour Scientist]

Personally. I think anyone who commits suicide, baring exceptions, is a selfish bastard who doesn't deserve a funeral. Just chuck their worthless corpse and let the council deal with it.

Basically, if you are sad, unless you have literally been raped, stabbed, shot and in general broken into tiny pieces with zero friends and a dead family, if you live in a first world country you have it better. Straight up, you have it better
"waaaah, pay attention to me! waaah, my life is so bad I'll kill myself"...then you are a fucking coward and weak.

if you want to die because you don't get enough cuddles, then fuck you, you selfish ****. What about all the people that you are clearly ignoring? "Oh no-one is nice to me" ***** YOUR ENTIRE FAMILY IS SO BENT OVER BACKWARDS FOR YOU THAT THEY TALK TO FROM THE FLOOR BECAUSE THEIR HEAD IS BETWEEN THEIR KNEES get over your pissy "I need to have the world feel sorry for me" bull shit and harden the fuck up

Ah, The Escapist forums, dealing with hard-hitting sensitive issues with the respect and consideration they deserve since never ever.

 

[Angelowl]

The thing regarding suicide that makes me want to see the world burn is that the moment a person dies a floodgate opens and loads of people turn up with sympathy for the ones who knew them. But when a person is suffering and virtually screaming for help the very same people that will later be sympathic turn their back on the victim.

One is obligated to put up with any amount of suffering for the comfort of others, not exptecing the least bit of sympathy or aid. But when the line is crossed and one can't take it anymore, then the worst thing that could ever happen to normal people happens. The illusion of a perfect life is broken. Anyone daring to damage that is seen as the enemy of society.

Humans are pretty disgusting when living in packs. The comfort of the many always outweighs the needs of the few.

 

[TheYellowCellPhone]

A) Strangely enough, people are more likely to sympathize with famous people, even though they probably don't understand them. Oh, they worked so hard all their life to get where they are, they're always so stressed by being in the limelight to do their 100% and never do one thing controversial, that's why they fall into addiction and depression! Meanwhile they're writing off most other suicides as pointless.

B) As mean as it sounds, yesh, I do, unless it's suicide to escape an even more gruesome, imminent death.

C) That whole "Permanent solution to a temporary problem" argument. Yeah, I stand by that.

 

[Something Amyss]

It's the choice for the weak of will.

To the contrary, it often takes less "will" to simply keep living.

People frequently judge without understanding.