Suicide: An Ethical Delimna

[Ryantology]

People are not obliged to behave ethically. But I think having received help from others, but not to be willing to stick around and at least do as much good as one has received, is unethical in my view.

That sounds like an obligation to me, though.

No it's not. If you've made a conscious decision to die, your life is disposable. There are a great many things that you could do in that state, including a less-than-zero impact lifestyle.

We're all going to die. Is it less immoral to commit suicide and not make these changes, than it is to live 90 years and not make these changes?

Who said I'm offended? I'm making the argument that suicide is intrinsically selfish, and that intrinsically selfish actions, when they negatively affect the greater good, are unethical.

But, you're not demonstrating that there is a negative effect on the greater good. The basis of your argument is completely hypothetical, and it seems like it's the impact of person's living behavior that's much more of a sticking point with you than the suicide.

Now, if someone no longer CAN contribute to the greater good (say they are lying in bed with terminal cancer), that's a very different issue. Then you're just talking about unnecessary suffering.

That's a weird analogy on at least two levels: first of all I didn't say I hate people who want to kill themselves, or that my reason for taking a position against suicide was because I don't like it. Second, what the hell does homosexuality have to do with a behavior which is intrinsically selfish?

1. I explicitly did not accuse you of formulating your opinion on a basis of hatred. But, it's clear that you have a distaste for acts of suicide outside of the realm of euthanasia. I do, too. But, I can't judge anybody else for what they do, because you don't know what's running through their heads and you don't know what they are thinking. If you can't even motivate yourself to wake up tomorrow, how do you possibly motivate yourself to make a radical change to your lifestyle and keep going? How do you care about the rest of the world when you can't even care about your own?
2. It is a behavior a lot of people hate, even though it has virtually zero impact on anybody other than those directly involved in its practice, and it's not our place to tell them they are wrong, or bad, for wanting to do it.