You could tell him that if he proceeds he'd inflict the same pain he's in now to his friends & relatives. Maybe that would work?
Watch the video on this page: https://www.kent.gov.uk/social-care-and-health/health/releas...
People already feel huge amounts of shame about the pain that they're inflicting upon other people. Calling them selfish just re-affirms what they're already feeling, makes them feel worse, and increases the risk that they'll die.
However, whose "burden of proof" is it? Should "OP" provide evidence to their claim or you to yours? If no claims are provided, what should the "default action" be?
I argue that, in face of the extreme consequences of the proposed action ("burdening" instead of "no burdening"), "no burdening" should be the default action, unless there's evidence that "burdening" works (which none of us in the conversation have so far provided).
You're wholeheartedly endorsing the idea I was using to mock you:
>> Every strategy has its successes and its failures. If that were a reason not to do something, you'd never do anything.
The consequences of, in your terminology, "no burdening" are just as extreme as the consequences of "burdening". That's obvious, because they are exactly the same consequences.
And the evidence that people will avoid doing things they might otherwise do, even at significant cost to themselves, for the sake of their family and close friends, is abundant.
Rational people, maybe. People on the verge of suicide are not acting rationally.
Where's the citable evidence for the claim that "shaming/guilting/burdening suicidal people makes them less likely to commit suicide"?
https://www.popehat.com/2016/04/21/what-empathy-looks-like-t...
With that level of public openmindedness, the citable evidence (of which this is a part) is guaranteed to dramatically understate the actual effectiveness of the approach.
My interpretation from your link is that "watching videos of someone playing games helped a viewer not commit suicide".
How's this evidence for advocating berating people while (not after) they are suicidal?
The streamer was also suicidal, and responded to the viewer's note with his personal viewpoint on committing suicide. ("People who do it are selfish and weak" -- pretty much the same viewpoint we're discussing here.) Note that, since the streamer was alive, that viewpoint successfully prevented him, the streamer, from committing suicide.
For sharing his successful views, he was made a pariah.
Even if it did, the suicidal person themselves thinking suicide is selfish is a totally different thing than someone else saying it to them, especially in a moment of crisis.
Here's a transcript: https://www.kent.gov.uk/social-care-and-health/health/releas...
They already feel immense amounts of shame. Adding to that shame just re-affirms what they already think, it confirms their distorted thinking that everyone would be better off without them.
The distorted thinking runs something like: "Only an arsehole would kill themselves and leave their family to deal with it, and I'm thinking of killing myself, therefore I am an arsehole. And I'm so terrible that they would in fact be better off without me."
"If he feels like shit, maybe making him feel worse will help?"