Suicide

Should society ever support the decision of someone who wants to commit suicide?

Argument for it being illegal:

• From an evolutionary standpoint, it seems that societies that disallow suicide might have an advantage, in the same way that a society that encourages births would have an advantage.

Argument for it being legal:

• Many societies say they respect the right of a person to deal with their own body as they please.
  • Example: this is the reasoning given for allowing abortion.
• It seems a significant number of murders may be committed by people who are suicidal.
  • Example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suicide_by_cop
  • Example: Wikipedia - Murder-Suicide

What's the best way to commit suicide?

• Combinations of methods:
  • I got started thinking about this while reading "The Bell Jar". Sylvia Plath was actually pretty smart about it. The trick is to do it in a two-stage process: first knock yourself unconscious, and then have some second thing that actually kills you after you're unconscious. In her case she took sleeping pills with her head in the oven with the gas running.
  • The other benefit of her method is that she was able to work up to it. She had already been taking sleeping pills to fall asleep, so she was accustomed to the process of taking pills and then losing consciousness.
• Guns don't seem like the best option.
  • Plath mentioned in "The Bell Jar" that suicide attempts with guns often go horribly wrong.
  • On the other hand, I remember reading that men are typically more likely to succeed in their suicide attempts because they use guns, while women typically cut themselves or use pills.
• Handcuffs don't seem like the best option.
  • I remember reading about someone who went into the woods and handcuffed his arms around the trunk of a tree. The police said that it looked like he had changed his mind at one point before he starved to death.