For me, “suicide” is a term full of desperation and misery, and it is an issue which stimulates debates around the society for causing too many negative effects.
Sometimes, people bring themselves to the margin of lives and suicide because they could not sustain to live any longer, both physically and mentally. Therefore, from my points of view, suicide is not necessarily unethical. At first glance, It is not difficult to think about several reasons that lead people to commit suicide: mental distress, physical illness and even religious belief. On the one hand, suicide could be considered merely “self-killing”, an action which is completely personal. For some people whose illnesses deprive life of its meaning, they do not see the point to continue to live for that their lives have been faded away as they lost the ability to enjoy the living moments. In such case, suicide serves a means for people to free themselves from torments and limitations; for others, like Adolf Hitler who killed himself in order to avoid the humiliation of execution, suicide is a behavior that impulses people to offset the mistakes they have been made at great cost. On the other hand, however, suicide could also be distinguished as “self-sacrificing”, an action which is based on the lives of others. In certain circumstances, take world war and civil war as examples, people who hold strong belief and motivation have to sacrifice their lives to strive for what they value. In such case, people ended their lives voluntarily for their communities in a moral way. Overall, although mostly believed as the representative of pessimistic, suicide sometimes could be ethical or even necessary when people think it could bring them the best results.
This is such a heavy topic and you did a great job addressing it. I found it really interesting how you categorized suicide into self-killing and sacrificial killing. I believe that there is a lot of grey area. With suicide, I believe that someone is always hurt because there is always someone out their who loves you. In instances such as suicide bombings, I believe that it is usually unethical because one is killing others and because suicide bombers could have been brainwashed into believing that this is always the only way to support their movement. I believe that when a person has suicidal thoughts, they should seek help from a friend, family member, therapist...as they might realize that life has so much in store for them. On the other hand, I believe that someone who is suffering from an illness that will significantly deteriorate their quality of life and is terminal they deserve the option of euthanasia.
ReplyDeleteDawn, this is often a taboo topic but one that impacts many people. The existentialist writer, Albert Camus, said, "There is one only really serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide." Deciding whether or not life is really worth living is of paramount importance to everyone. You did a good job of outline the general contours of this important issue.
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