Discussion Playing the devil's advocate. What do you think are the strongest arguments that pro life people have made?

[FutureHanger]

your future self may change your mind

 

[Katdogg]

I do think it sucks that there are often minors who find their way to this forum and I personally believe that people younger than 20 still have so much time to turn their life around even if they really don't want to but I know that's a very unpopular take on here and I'm aware it's not the most empathetic one either.

I wish there was more that could be done to block minors from using this site mainly because I know that foolish adults are just going to use them as scapegoats to make things more difficult for all the legal age people to have access to these necessary resources. Unfortunately mandatory ID checks raise huge privacy questions and kids can be resourceful enough to just make fake ones anyway.

Minors, if you are here watching this then stop ruining it for everyone else. You probably hate the world or living for how selfish it is and that's correct but think about how selfish it is that your death will probably be used to make countless other lives more miserable by causing people to lobby for the end of this site. You don't want to be like the people who made you feel this way right? Wait til you're old enough just like the rest of us had to. I don't care how desperate to die you are, if you want to be where the adults are then act like one and leave us in peace until you're actually legally old enough. Every byte of data your device of choice spends on this domain is another pile of shit bricks that prolifers can throw at us as ammo to shut it down entirely. If you really think you've experienced enough life already and that you're "totally more mature than the other kids" then show that by gritting your teeth and holding out until you can be sure people aren't going to use your peaceful death as an excuse to block others from having peaceful deaths of their own.

That said, some or rather many parents should really just invest in better firewall protections or parental blocks instead of making it other peoples' problems. Imagine if this site was instead filled with all sorts of filthy kinds of porn the kind that warps a young mind into thinking all kinds of wrongful things about sex that can leave them permanently scarred. How is it the porn site's fault that your kid found their way there? That's on you as the parent and legal guardian to protect your offspring from, not everyone else's.

Or maybe here's an idea, if your minor is going through it maybe try to actually listen to them and work to remedy what's bothering them instead of trying to go after the place that helps actual adults find the peace they need? Too much effort for you? Too bad.

I agree with what you are saying. People get a little older and sometimes their attitudes change. They experience something in life that sparks that new outlook. I have seen it from personal experience. My nephew was an isolated angry young man, he checked himself into a psyche ward for suicidal ideation ( he admitted to me that was a useless place for help). He changed his life around after changing his environment.

 

[BlessedBeTheFlame]

The strongest argument is when they tell me I should kill myself for being a worthless, disgusting fucking parasite. Or at least they should tell me that, instead of telling me anything short of it and then pussying out. So I guess the strongest argument they have made is telling me how much of a worthless, disgusting parasite I am. I wish one of them had the fucking courage to take matters into their own hands and just shoot anyone like me with a shotgun, if they hate me so much.

 

[noname223]

According to studies, many who fail their attempt say they regretted it the moment they swallowed the pills, took the step off the ledge etc. and were grateful for being saved (or "saved", in our lingui). Of course these studies could be biased to some degree because we live in a "pro-life" society, but I think it's reasonable to assume that many broad-daylight suicides are impulsive and should be intercepted whenever possible.

For me this is the strongest argument.
However suicide is so complex that in my opinion all scratches the surface. As others point out survivorship bias. And maybe correlation is no causuality. Probably the people who were not determined to go through with it chose less lethal methods. And there are so many people who attempt with methods that barely work like generic antidepressants or stuff like that.

For me there comes something different to mind for my own specific case. I honestly feel for the sake of myself I should kill myself when my time has come. My dignity is far far behind me. I was humiliated and tortured like a million times. Still I am alive. For two reasons. SI can be extremely strong and I had no secure and lethal method to the time of my severest torment.

Someone in this forum recently described God saved them from committing suicide. And that he is so glad he finally realized that. I am glad for him. I would hope anyone could find relief in such a notion which keeps them alive.

However for me my personal life. I don't want that. I know what is ahead of me and no matter how I frame it this won't change the fact that my daily life quality is nightmarish with a many decades of torture ahead of me if I don't ctb.

Suicide is such an existential moment. Things like spiritual awakenings can happen. However I think they mostly stem from extreme anxiety that comes along with dying. Looking death inside its eyes.

When I was acute suicidal some years ago I was at the balcony of a 7 th floor building and looked down for quite a while. I swore to myself to try anything that is possible to avoid my suicide when i was there.

I think if I survived a suicide attempt my fear about death could increase a lot. SI could become even stronger while the pain itself does not transform. Maybe my mindset could change. But the pain was still there. And I don't want to endure this insane pain that haunts me for more than a decade for even more decades.

I could imagine such a spiritual awakening could also happen to me. And I don't want that. If I decide to attempt I will be determined enough to end it once and for all.

 

[sserafim]

I think that pro-lifers are deluded by false hope and optimism. They believe that feeling suicidal is just a temporary, transient phase and that you should hold on because "things will get better". That could be the case with some people, but not for everyone. Things could get much worse. Another common pro-life argument is "you have your whole life/future ahead of you".

 

[Deleted member 65988]

Things could get much worse. Another common pro-life argument is "you have your whole life/future ahead of you".

Got a response for this one though

"You don't have a crystal ball, you can't predict the future, you can't make decisions based on on "maybe". Aliens MIGHT invade earth in the future, a bomb MIGHT explode in Paris in the future, does this mean I should plan my life according to that? No. We can only make rational decisions based on past and present experiences, we can only trust what's definite and not what "might" happen. If we've had it bad so far, it's our choice to leave the theater before the bad movie ends. "

 

[Bianka]

It's an irreversable decision. You don't know what would have happened, things can go right. You're just in a bad situation and headspace. You can't decide that with a sound mind. Only desperation is talking from you

 

[sserafim]

Got a response for this one though

"You don't have a crystal ball, you can't predict the future, you can't make decisions based on on "maybe". Aliens MIGHT invade earth in the future, a bomb MIGHT explode in Paris in the future, does this mean I should plan my life according to that? No. We can only make rational decisions based on past and present experiences, we can only trust what's definite and not what "might" happen. If we've had it bad so far, it's our choice to leave the theater before the bad movie ends. "

True. I think they're mainly sad about your unfulfilled potential though, and what could have been. A lot of people think that dying young is tragic because they didn't live out their full lives. Instead, it was cut short. I think that in this world, there's an expectation to live until old age and natural death. Anyone who tries to leave the simulation early is seen as tragic and mentally ill. Personally, I never want to get old, and I wish that we had the freedom to decide death on our own terms and have safe, peaceful, guaranteed options. I would have been gone by now if MAiD was legal in my country.

 

[Deleted member 65988]

A lot of people think that dying young is tragic because they didn't live out their full lives. Instead, it was cut short. I think that in this world, there's an expectation to live until old age and natural death. Anyone who tries to leave the simulation early is seen as tragic and mentally ill.

Yeap, that is the notion attached to it, death at a young age means that person didn't get to live out their life fully especially if their life is taken by their own hand. It's expected of us to fulfill that, to live till we're old and die naturally because anything before that is seen as terrible but what's so terrible about making an early exit out of something I didn't give consent to being part of and now I'm supposed to do all the things that I'm supposed before I die.

True. I think they're mainly sad about your unfulfilled potential though, and what could have been.

I get that but that doesn't mean I'll live for 30 more years and be absolutely glad that I didn't ctb because I would've missed out on X or Y when if I died anyway, not living to see X or Y wouldn't have been something to regret once I'm dead. Plus not everyone gets to live out a life they'll be happy with.

 

[LetMeBeSad]

I think it depends on whether the pro life individual has strong reasons for them to be alive, or force others to be alive.

If they have strong reasons for their own life then so be it. Let them live. But if they are arguing that I should be prevented from dying then, they are not strong reasons. My bodily autonomy is not trumped by someone's feelings of discomfort around death.