Vylo

I think a potential reason for it being illegal, is so that people do not remove themselves from society, along with their potential resources. Those resources (such as a skill you possess) can be used by others. It is almost like society having a type of claim on you.

Nowhere357

Should the state's claim on our $$ trump personal freedom?

Vylo

In our opinion no, but sometimes we don't practice what we preach. I don't think many of us would approve of suicide, outside of medical reasons, especially if was family or friend.

winstonjen

That's crazy. Would anyone want employees who didn't want to work for the company? They'd try to bring the company down and sabotage things if they could. It'd be better for soldiers to enrol of their own free will.

Harumi

Isn't that the truth?

But unfortunately it's an ideal, and this is reality. As much as it makes sense, I doubt that the current government under Bush, Ashcroft, and even Rumsfeld would take to the idea.

Harumi

Unfortunately, many laws were made to send a message. I can think of one or two of them: *cough*Sodomy laws*cough*

Many times society makes laws based purely on the fact that they disapprove of the behavior and wish it to stop. I suppose they think that if suicide was legal, then there'd be people killing themselves left and right.

It's kind of like the death penalty argument, that the death penalty serves as a deterrent, and if it wasn't one of the punishments, then there will be a lot more criminals.

Of course, there is not a single proof that either of them is true.

Vandrare

it seems there's two different problems being brought up here: the problem of suicide, and then euthanasia.

considering that people who want to commit suicide are often depressed, or are not of sound mind when they try to do it, it doesn't really seem possible to make it a crime. and people are begining to recognise now that depression is in fact a serious medical issue, not just someone trying to get attention or whinging about their situation.

on the other hand, euthanasia is a decision made when of sound mind, which could therefore be made illegal. this is where i believe the issue of the state having power over a persons choice to die comes in.

anyway, that could open a whole new round of debate so i might leave it there

:-D Anna

garraty

I'll never forget the story from "The Lonliness of the Long Distance Runner" where a small boy helps a man hang himself from a light fitting, unfortunately it fails and he is hauled off to a mental hospital screaming "It's my life!".

They put him on the third floor and he leaps out of the window! :notworthy

It is your life and for all the talk about hurting loved ones, wouldn't they be hurting you by "guilting" you into staying alive?

winstonjen

Exactly. Too bad that this form of reverse selfishness is rarely considered.

Tom Sawyer

garraty,

By "guilting" you into staying alive, your loved ones are giving you the opportunity to get over whatever it is that caused you to want to commit suicide and have a happy, productive life.

By killing yourself, you are letting them know that their love for you wasn't enough to be worth living for and that their love and caring for you was worthless. That demeans their feelings to an intense degree and causes them intense harm.

So, although they may cause you some harm by "guilting" you into staying alive, they are causing you that harm for your own benefit with the hope that the good that it will eventually do will outweight the harm they are causing you now. When you kill yourself, you are doing harm to them which brings no benefit whatsoever, so the two cannot really be compared.