Acceptable Suicide?

[FictionJunction]

Originally Posted by rzr

No. Sacrificing yourself is the same as suicide. Sacrificing others for yourself is murder. But sacrificing yourself to save others is also a form of suicide. You know what you're doing. You can control it. You can stop it. But you continue to do it.

don't argue against set definitions. The act of commiting suicide isn't solely bound to ending one's life. A person can kill himself to save others. The desire to die is replaced by a desire to save someone else; fear is present but it doesn't outweigh the desire to save. A person committing suicide may be afraid of death but his desire to die is far greater than his fear. Sacrifice and suicide aren't the same as the motives are different.

[rzr]

Fj, it depends on what you're sacrificing. If you sacrifice your own life in any way, it's suicide. Yes, it's sacrifice, but it's also suicide. If you sacrifice an animal to appease the gods, that's sacrifice without suicide.

[devonin]

Now you're just using sacrifice ambiguously. I think we can agree on some definitions here:

Suicide: The act of taking one's own life
Sacrifice: The act of giving something up for someone else

Yes, the thing you can give up can be your life, but there is a very large connotative difference there. Me killing myself because I no longer wish to live is not nearly the same thing as ensuring someone else's life continues by giving up my own.

My motive is the end of my life, I kill myself, Suicide.
My motive is the continuation of your life, I sacrifice myself, Sacrifice.

You see the key difference there?

In both cases your life ends, but in one case you did it because you wanted you to die, and in another you did it because you wanted them to live. That you had to give your life was coinicidental, you'd also have given up your wallet, your left arm, or a 1956 ford mustang convertible to satisfy the same desire.

[rzr]

But my point is you are in good-mind and know you are killing yourself to spare anothers. Yes, sacrifice yourself to save another is one thing. But you're still intentionally forfeiting your life. It's not murder. It's not natural-causes. And those are the only other two forms of death (excluding paranormal). But when you kill yourself with the only motive to kill yourself, that's full fledged suicide. Sacrificing yourself is still suicide because nobody is killing you directly and it's not natural causes.

[Shenlon]

The way I see it, I reckon if you're willing to sacrifice yourself to save a loved one and somehow fail or are prevented from doing so, a part of you dies regardless. And Rzr I feel you can't get past that little step in suicide and can't accept the difference between the two.

I think in most cases where someone steps in to save someone else's life at the cost of their own, the decision is quick. And what about hired body guards? Where it's a job. I'm not sure what the legal status of suicide is in the states at the moment but I know part of the job description is to take bullets for the president if at all possible. Does money negate the suicidal qualities of taking a potentially fatal bullet? I doubt it. It's the sacrifice part. Sacrifice your life for the leader of your country, or for a loved one. Essentially something equal to or greater than your own life, in your own opinion. To someone in that position /not/ sacrificing their life is probably worse.

And also another key difference: suicide is the deliberate ending of your own life. I'm fairly certain you have to kill yourself for that to happen. I can't think of an example where you'd have to sacrifice your own life to save someone else's by physically ending your own life. Pushing someone out of harms way from an incoming mac truck, for instance, wouldn't constitute as suicide at all because of the short response time a saver would require. In that case at best you can only speculate if the person was at all conscience of the fact they were going to die by pushing the other person out the way.

Anyways, I could go on. The bottom line is I shouldn't say things like that

Edit: Egads! I was being tongue in cheek.

[rzr]

Again, they most certaitly are the same. The ends don't justify the means with suicide, as they do with sacrifice. But [again] in both cases your intentionally ending your own life knowing that knowing the outcome will be your demise. Simply because one is more admirable doesn't make it any different.

[FictionJunction]

Suicide implies killing yourself.
Sacrificing yourself implies killing yourself.

Suicide implies the desire of killing yourself.
Sacrificing yourself implies the desire to save someone/something despite your desire to live/need to sacrifice/forced circumstances/fear of death/etc

difference

just because one word's definition includes the other doesn't make them the same thing.
it's not that difficult. Suicide =! Sacrifice

[rzr]

I took the liberty of looking some of there words up:

Suicide - The act of or instance of intentionally killing oneself.

Sacrifice - 1. The offering of something to a deity. 2a. Forfeiture of something highly valued for the sale of one that is said to have a greater value or claim. 2b. Something forfeited. 3. Relinquishment of something less than hour presumed value.

sacrificed - past tense of sacrifice

sacrificing - 1. To offer as a sacrifice. 2. To forfeit one thing for another thing considered of greater value. 3. To sell or give away at a loss.

Life - 1. The quality the distinguishes living organisms from dead and inanimate matter.2. Living organisms collectively. 3. a living being. 4. The interval between birth and death. 5. biography. 6. human existance, relationships, activities. 7. a manner of living. 8. liveliness; animation.


Live - 1. to be alive; existist. 2. to continue to be alive. 3. to subsist. 4. to reside. 5. To conduct one's life in a particular manner. 6. to remain in memory or usage

Based on these definitions I can only conclude that [as I've stated multiple times] the two instances of suicide and sacrifice of one's life are the same for these reasons:

1) When commiting suicide you are sacrificing your life, giving it up earlier than you would upon a death not inflicted by yourself. When commiting suicide you know that you are doing it and can stop it. You also know that the ending result will be your death.
2) Who sacrificing anything life you know you are giving it up for something of greater value (another definition I looked up). You know that what you give up will better the outcome of the situation in some way.
3) When sacrificing your life you are giving it up for something of presumed greater value. You know the outcome will be a better scenario than the assumed one in which you live.

That is to say that when you commit suicide you kill yourself for no reason that would henceforth benefit the greater good. When you sacrifice your life you pull kill yourself and know what you're doing, this time you are doing it to better influince the outcome of the entire scenario.

Note: I'm sorry for the double post, devonin, I'm going to put qualities of my previous post in this one and delete the last one.

EDIT: Never mind, fj posted right before I did and I didn't see it.

[FictionJunction]

now you're playing with perspective and twisting your argument.

[atalkingcow]

Edit:

Originally Posted by rzr

Protective custody is a joke with the mass of undiscovered police brutality.

Wow...At least here in wisconsin...protective custody=you're arrested, transfered to the county medical center, and put in a nice little room for 3 days. (after that they have to release you if you're over 18 and certain criteria are met.)

So here's where your thought fails- The police are involved for all of an hour at best. After that you're in the hands of medical proffessionals and security guards.




Original post:
Okaaaay...So i read about the first 3 pages of this....it seems to be going in circles...fun!

Personally, I'm at a point in my life where suicide is looking incredibly appealing, and to be honest, there's only one thing stopping me.
If I commit suicide, at least 3 of my closest friends will as well.

Now...does this make me selfless for thinking only of them and with-holdling (sp?) from my own desires to protect them, or does this make THEM selfish for causing the mental battle that I have to deal with every day?

To accent my point a bit...I'm currently facing eviction from my house when I turn 18, along with being disowned (because I am a non-christian homosexual -.-):a court date on thursday for...stuff, with a possible sentence of 1 year jail time, and I'm being tried as an adult.

Basically, my reasons for wanting to commit suicide are purely out of fear.
Fear of Jail
Fear of being homeless.
Fear of having no future.

Am I selfish now for wanting to end it? (and start over-reincarnation ftw!)
Are my reasons not satisfactory?


(I would like to point out that many of the issues I have are due to my own decisions, made when I was younger, and now irreversible.)

[devonin]

(and start over-reincarnation ftw!)

Hopefully sarcasm? If not, I think perhaps you should consider that reincarnation is an individually meaningless belief.

[rzr]

How the heak is reincarnation an individually meaningless belief!?!?

[devonin]

Hypothesis: People are reincarnated when they die

Premise: Either you remember your past life or you don't

Premise: I have never met any person in my entire life with memories of a past life

Premise: Either I've coincidentally only met brand new souls, or you do not remember your past life

Conclusion 1: It seems far more likely that you do not remember your past life, than that I have never once met a single person who wasn't a newly created soul

Conclusion 2: You don't remember your past life

Implication: If you don't remember your past lives, the fact that you had them is individually meaningless, because you cannot prove that you did, have no memory of them, and they have no visible impact on your life.

[Zythus]

One needs to be absolute to be resolute. So please stop rewriting the dictionary and twisting arguments to the point where even if it had a point, it is no longer there. I think this topic is now concluded, seeing the previous pages of "circles" as Cow kindly notices.
Reincarnation is unrealistic, hence it does not possess enough physical nor scientific evidence to be used as an argument.

Originally Posted by rzr

How the heak is reincarnation an individually meaningless belief!?!?

If you are willing to make a new thread about such beliefs based on religion or whatnot, please do so, but it does not have any coherence with this topic because we started from "Acceptable Suicide" to "Let's ponder and contrast definitions of the dictionary", knocked off course pages back. A little idealism about reincarnation certainly isn't benefiting this thread.

[atalkingcow]

Originally Posted by devonin

Hypothesis: People are reincarnated when they die

Premise: Either you remember your past life or you don't

Premise: I have never met any person in my entire life with memories of a past life

Premise: Either I've coincidentally only met brand new souls, or you do not remember your past life

Conclusion 1: It seems far more likely that you do not remember your past life, than that I have never once met a single person who wasn't a newly created soul

Conclusion 2: You don't remember your past life

Implication: If you don't remember your past lives, the fact that you had them is individually meaningless, because you cannot prove that you did, have no memory of them, and they have no visible impact on your life.

My religious beliefs are my own and I feel no need to defend them and steer this discussion off topic any further thanks. ^_^

I do however agree with zythus, this topic doesn't seem to be going anywhere productive.

[Zythus]

Sorry Cow if my statement has discriminated against your religious beliefs in any matter. But I think if there was a topic about reincarnation, it would be a new topic with new arguments.

[devonin]

I made a statement, rzr asked for a clarification, I provided one.

If you take issue with anything I said, yes a new thread would be a great place to do so.

[atalkingcow]

I am not offended by anything anyone said. ^_^

(Shall we get back on topic now?)

[rzr]

Ok, give me some time to collect some thoughts and put them into a good thread.

[Rad3n]

What is going wrong with you're life now will probably be no issue in 10-15 years. If this will still be an issue in 15 years (eg. locked in solitary confinement) then I can understand suicide. If they are small things that feel signifigant at the time which lead to suicide, despite being small things. Then the people responsible are close family and friends. Why? They failed to help the suicide victim see things in a perspective which is rational.

So suicide is unacceptable in most instances. Suicide is for when there really is "no options left". And that, is a very rare thing.