Do People Have the Right to Commit Suicide?

[Dattebayo]

Like abortion and porn, I have mixed about suicide. A part of says that people do have the right to kill themselves and doing so will, like abortion, save the environment by decreasing the human population so animals from the endangered species list will slowly increase. However, another part of me says that it's against God's rules and you'll live an eternity in Hell if you take your own life away.

[freakyboy05]

You can do almost anything with any object that is legally yours, but your life isn't. God gave it to you as a gift and that would look horrible in his eyes. If your an atheist think of it as a gift from your parents.
In any way you look your life isn't yours, heck maybe even the goverment owns a little of it.
Anyway, people shouldn't have the right to suicide since your life isn't technically yours, and it would be like flushing away a non-refundable ticket to life...

[Mawile412]

How does everyone Know what God says!!!!???? you don't. so don't act like you do. and don't give me that 'oh its in the bible' crap. the bibles like thousands of years old.

God probably just wants everyone to be happy.

And why would God want them to be tortured even MORE in hell? they already suffered enough on earth.

[Machete]

Originally Posted by freakyboy05

You can do almost anything with any object that is legally yours, but your life isn't.

...

It's your life, and no one has the right to tell you what you have to do with it. If you've lost the will to live, you should be able to stop that suffering. Period.

Your parents/family might get sad? Well, you don't commit suicide if you don't have a really, really good reason. If you think that your family isn't a reason to live, you don't care about them, so making them sad will not stop you.

And really, if you want to commit suicide you don't care about gods, religions or hells. You know that you're suffering now, so you want to stop that real suffer; you don't care about a place that might not even exist.

[J.T.]

Originally Posted by freakyboy05

You can do almost anything with any object that is legally yours, but your life isn't. God gave it to you as a gift and that would look horrible in his eyes. If your an atheist think of it as a gift from your parents.
In any way you look your life isn't yours, heck maybe even the goverment owns a little of it.
Anyway, people shouldn't have the right to suicide since your life isn't technically yours, and it would be like flushing away a non-refundable ticket to life...

Um, what? My parents own my life? No. The life I am living right now is mine, not my parents. I will live the way I want to, and die when I'm ready or my time has come. If I decide tomorrow that I should end my life (and I won't don't call the police or anything), then I have every right to end my life, just as I have every right to destroy my possessions. My life is mine, nobody else's.

[dracoburn]

this debate practically kills me(noooo pun intended), i have really mixed feelings and it hits close to home.

my thought is, people should be able to swallow a gun or whatever, but if they fail they should be legally forced into a month long program in a mental institution.
my reasons-

1. my best friends mom faked(yes, faked. totally faked. cut her wrists, but intentionally missed veins, for attention too(we suspect borderline personality disorder)), and it tore their family apart

2. however, my best friend and i both suffer from depression(though im more or less convinced mine is bipolar) and i have schizophrenic tendencies

3. and ive cut myself for over a year and last year, around this time, actually, i attempted suicide, slitting my wrist. i hit the vein, but after passing out, i actually managed to wake up. i guess its because i ended up leaning on my wrist when i fell over. my parents still dont know.

4. and my best friend attempted, but stopped herself intentionally. after this, her parents put her in therapy and she ended up spending two weeks in a mental institution. it really helped her.

alright, that was hard. ok, maybe thisll affect some views, who knows...

[Ampy]

I think that people have a right to commit suicide because it's their life and they have control over it, and really if suicide was illegal, what are they gonna do to someone that's already dead? Assisted suicide should be illegal, because for me it falls on the lines of murder.... but that's my opinion...

[Mrs. Lovett]

I think that people have a right to commit suicide because it's their life and they have control over it, and really if suicide was illegal, what are they gonna do to someone that's already dead?

Good point. But they would probably punish the family or someone close to the person for not 'stopping them in time' I guess.

Assisted suicide should be illegal, because for me it falls on the lines of murder.... but that's my opinion...

But what if it was a friend who was sick with an incurable illness, and as her last wish she wanted you to end her suffering? As long as the suicide victim gives permission for someone else to assist them, the non-suicidal person should be free of charges.

[Ampy]

Originally Posted by Mrs. Lovett

But what if it was a friend who was sick with an incurable illness, and as her last wish she wanted you to end her suffering? As long as the suicide victim gives permission for someone else to assist them, the non-suicidal person should be free of charges.

^Yeah I see what you're getting at, that's a good point

[Yellow Torterra]

The way I see it, suicide is an act of cowardice.

[swalot=yes]

Ok, when you think of suicide, your thinking "Oh, that poor poor person is so depressed. Let them kill themselves." No. What if the suicidal person is a mother? She is not only affecting her life, but her childrens as well. By the way, it doesn't really matter, if a person commits suicide, they can't get penalized for it, because their dead. It wouldn't really matter if suicide was legal or not.

[ThePokéman09]

Suicide is a real touchy matter.

On one hand, it could count as self-murder at worst and disturbing the peace at least.

On the other, a person's life is in his own hands and only he can control what he does. It wouldn't be right for the law to prevent killing yourself.

[Yellow Torterra]

Originally Posted by ThePokéman09

It wouldn't be right for the law to prevent killing yourself.

Like if it was possible to send to jail someone who's already dead for breaking a law.

[Sprintking]

If a person doesn't have control over their body, then what freedom do they really have? In no way am I saying I support people who commit suicide, but who am I to tell someone how to live their life and what to do with it? Ultimately it is the individual's own decision, and they must decide what is right. As far as being illegal, as previously stated, how do you punish a dead person? If they survive the attempt, as long as no one else was harmed, the last thing they need is to be punished. They need emotional support and help fixing whatever pushed them to that extreme. Is incarcerating someone who attempted suicide going to discourage a second attempt? Assisted suicide, however, should carry some penalty for the person who helped. In most cases, the suicidee only tells that one person about their wish, and if the helper is found to be linked to that person's death, how can they prove that the person actually wanted to die? Making it legal could result in homicides being incorrectly ruled as suicides, with the murderer simply stating that the person told them they wanted to die.

You can do almost anything with any object that is legally yours, but your life isn't. God gave it to you as a gift and that would look horrible in his eyes. If your an atheist think of it as a gift from your parents.
In any way you look your life isn't yours, heck maybe even the goverment owns a little of it.
Anyway, people shouldn't have the right to suicide since your life isn't technically yours, and it would be like flushing away a non-refundable ticket to life...

Umm, if you don't own your own life, then what do you really own? And by your logic, parents of athiests would have the right to kill their children because they are technically theirs.

[Grei]

Originally Posted by Yellow Torterra

The way I see it, suicide is an act of cowardice.

The way I see it, thinking suicide is cowardly is a sign of ignorance.

: |

I mean, quite honestly, you need to be damn brave to actually go through with suicide.
Or, you have to care so little about your safety that you really don't feel much at all.

Neither of which depicts one being too cowardly to live.

[ThePokéman09]

Originally Posted by Yellow Torterra

Like if it was possible to send to jail someone who's already dead for breaking a law.

No, I meant if you attempted but survived.

[ImJessieTR]

I personally liked Scott Adams' idea: Make suicidal ideation a capital offense (say you wanna die and the state kills you -- problem solved). LOL.

People have the right to commit suicide. I don't believe God punishes the severely disturbed. If they were rational they wouldn't be doing that ... or they are suffering some tortuous disease and they don't want to fool with it anymore. There's also the possibility that they are on anti-depressants, some of which have massive warnings about it increasing suicidal ideation.

I don't feel too much for the "the family will be sad" argument. If the family was that dang loving, the person would feel safe and comfortable airing out their feelings so they could be worked out. I realize sometimes you just can't stop it, but I've seen enough people IRL and on things like Intervention to know that a lot of these so-called sad people did hardly squat, acting like out of sight = out of mind.

[Farmermon]

Originally Posted by Yellow Torterra

The way I see it, suicide is an act of cowardice.

Cowardice... HA! Not everyone has life easy... some have it so hard they can barely walk at the end of the day or even think.... Some try so hard to do what they want and keep their parents and family happy at the same time... some even have a reputation to keep up to in their family... it takes a lot of bravery to be willing to kill yourself

Yes anyone has the right to kill themself... Technically everyone has the right to do anything they want, there is no magical force stopping them.

[Kit Kat]

Obviously. You can't fricken tell someone not to kill themselves (well you can, but you can't make them not.)
Everyone has every right to take their own life, if they choose.

And to whoever says suicide is cowardly. SHUT UP. Just because you guys have the perfect life, when you get anything you want ..doesn't mean everybody else has it that easy. Most of the world is suffering. And when you're in that much pain/depression ..you just don't feel the reason for being alive.
People aren't cowards for killing themselves. They're just sick of the pain.

[celebitrainer]

I've always wonderred how you can punish someone for attempting suicide. What're you going to do? Give them the death sentence?
Anything else would only make them feel worse and become more likely to try again.