People seem a bit lax in regards to suicidal behaviour here, I think. Mental disorders are used as excuses for the behaviour. I'd say they may be causal, but they don't excuse them. Suicidal thoughts and behaviour are still wrong - to those who have them and everyone else who have to suffer them. People who suffer from them owe it to themselves to do something about it, whether they want to or not. If they are not able deal with it because they don't have the sanity to do so, it's still wrong. Then they need medication or something else to make them sane enough to deal with it.

To use an extreme paralell, if this thread had been about whether or not having sex with children was right or wrong, people would be writing stuff like "yeah well, circumstances during my childhood made me a pedophile and it's kind of hard to be rational in the face of the urges I have, so I do it. Those who say it's wrong just don't understand!" ;) It seems silly, I know, and it is quite a bit (and a bit offensive I hope)! But like pedophilia and other crimes, suicide is antisocial and adds virtually nothing positive to society. Not to you and not the people who love you, so to me it's obviously not right.

Get those stupid thoughts and feelings out of your head.

Not to be rude but I dont think the two are in any way similar. Ones life is all he/she has in this world. If it is chosen to be ended for whatever reason I feel that choice should be respected.

Now if this person has young children or people physically dependent on them that is a diffrent story. In that case yes, it is a cowardly and cruel way out.

I agree that those two things should not be compared. That is just a stupid way to say what you think, but i think you would feel very differently if someone close to you were to commit suicide. I'm not saying you are wrong in all cause i do think that it brings nothing positive to society and is wrong, but have some compassion. Don't go comparing people committing suicide to people having sex with children.

The two can be more similar than you think. My GF told me how some siblings in her family had to grow up with a mother who had become suicidal after his father had died. Several times when they was young, they saved her life when she had tried to kill herself. One day when other members of the family were visiting, she told them she was just popping over to the neighbour. Instead, she went down in the basement and killed herself. Her kids were then 9 and 12 years old.

Like being molested as a child can leave scars, I'm sure this can too.

No case is entirely same-y. I'm sure there are cases where people really have no friends and noone who care very much and if they manage to kill themselves in a way that it doesn't scare the living **** out of some kid or affect anyone else in a major negative way, then I don't really care much. If it's wrong, at least you're only wronging yourself. As soon as people are involved, which is most of the time, it's plain and simple no-no.

edit :

You say have some compassion. I generally don't think of compassion as pampering people's wishes to kill themselves :p:

I think what your saying is that the effects of both are similar. But the actions are not. In that case I agree.

Regarding having compassion, it is certainly not pampering someones suicidal wishes, but is to a certain extent understanding that it is there choice when it comes down to it. But of coarse this is not to say you shouldn't do everything in your power to stop them.

I don't know .. As has been mentioned so many times here, dangerous suicidal thoughts and feelings can be the product of a sick mind that has very little capacity for rationality and understanding consequences. If such sickness makes someone I know want to kill themselves, I'm not just gonna respect their choice to do so. If they live a psychosis where their life is absolutely worthless, would you support those feelings? You should support the person, not the sickness. As a friend, partner or family, a choice to commit suicide would involve me too so I should have a say. No man is an island.

We can't always know if dangerous suicidal thoughts and feelings are the result of sick minds that hopefully can be treated, but I think it's usually best to use that as the basic assumption.

edit :

My reply may have been a bit vague. What I'm saying is that one should not respect a wish to commit suicide unless you know it's not made by some sickness. If someone suffers in a hospital bed with no chance of recovery, I can understand a death wish. However, a healthy teenager wanting to commit suicide is not a choice I think should be respected. It probably comes from a problem which should be fixed or dealt with, not ended.

I 100% agree with you. I guess the problem is distinguishing the two from each other.

I'm not trying to say that I support the idea that people should be able to kill themselves when they can obviously recover or be helped in any way. I'm just saying that as though it is a horrible things, we can't put everyone into one idea that they are just stupid people who deserve nothing. Everyone has defferent problems be it either actual illness or not. And i agree with you that we should not respect a wish for suicide, I just think we should respect them as people after suicide has occured and not put them off as totally incosiderate, though there of course is a large amount of selfishness.

That also varies from person to person. Someone like my self is not in a committed relationship and has no kids. Now take someone with a wife and 3 children there supporting. That must be taken into account when determining if its your decision or just selfish.

Suicide.. you kill yourself. After this happens, you're not alive anymore. I don't think there's anything wrong or right about it. The circumstances mean everything. If you have people depending on you, and you can't handle it, then that'd be screwed up. Now there's people who need you, that don't know where to go or what to do. If you're alone and don't really feel like being alive and decide "ah, **** it". I don't see any real problems with that. I really love the fact that it's illegal too. That makes me laugh.