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> That balance can certainly result in tragedy when people make horrible choices. The thing is, someone may not be rational enough to make that choice. I’ve be
by kayodelycaon 2y ago
> That balance can certainly result in tragedy when people make horrible choices.
The thing is, someone may not be rational enough to make that choice. I’ve been suicidal in the past. Reasoning goes out the window and you can easily make a decision you never wanted to make. You simply can’t choose to stay alive any longer.
I’ve lost a friend because they couldn’t hold out long enough for things to get better. They killed themselves because of a temporary situation they could have easily recovered from.
I’ve saved a friend by preventing him from going down that route. It took over a year for him to be healthy. He doesn’t want to die now.
I’m always going to side with stopping people from suicide until they’ve had a chance to be mentally sound enough to make an informed decision.
There have been people I’ve known who did make that decision and did so rationally. All of them had medical conditions they could never recover from without divine intervention. In their case, they wanted to spare themselves and others from a long, painful death. They should be able to make that choice.
- cwillu 2y ago> I’m always going to side with stopping people from suicide until they’ve had a chance to be mentally sound enough to make an informed decision. The problem is that “mentally sound” is partially defined as not wanting to die. It doesn't matter how stable and coherent you are, as long as you keep saying “on net, I don't feel like my life has been worth living and I would prefer to end it painlessly if I could”, they will not let you out. Getting out is a process of learning the lies you need to tell the doctors and nurses.
- bawolff 2y agoMy understanding is that for many (not all) suicidal people, the time period of actually wanting to die can be remarkably short. Like on the order of 20 minutes, and then thought passes (at least for a little while)
- kayodelycaon 2y agoIf you mean at extreme risk of carrying through with a plan, that seems fairly accurate in my experience. I had a number of safety plans I’d use to remove myself from the means I’d use until I could get back to passively suicidal instead of actively suicidal.
- kayodelycaon 2y agoThe fact the current process isn’t perfect doesn’t change how I think things should work. Determining another person’s mental state is difficult and you’ll always run into problems. On a whole, more people ultimately wish to live afterwards than those who want to die. So any system is going to err on the side of caution. As I mentioned, there are situations in which a rational decision is easy to understand and verify. Our current system in the US does not allow for these cases.
- nullindividual 2y ago> The problem is that “mentally sound” is partially defined as not wanting to die. Unless, of course, you have an illness that happens to be something other than mental illness. Because pain and suffering can only come from physical ailments /s