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Comment by RupertEisenhart | Hacker News Reader

I feel the need to point a finger at the gun death rate, and also point out that many suicides are probably gun deaths too [0] (not in the trivial sense of suicide by firearm, but that many of those suicides would not have happened without the availability of guns).

[0] httpss://www.hsph.harvard.edu/means-matter/means-matter/risk/

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If guns truly facilitate suicide then it's good that they are available to those who want them. But it would be more compassionate if we had a less gruesome method we could make available to people.

And it would be even more compassionate if we created society that didn't induce people to kill themselves in the first place.

Is that viable in reality though?

Your body is a society of cells, each one prepared to kill itself upon malfunction. If a cell fails to suicide, it will be killed by other cells specifically patrolling for malfunctioning cells to kill. If that fails, we call it cancer, and the whole body dies of it.

Apparently societies must retain the ability to induce parts of them to kill themselves, or risk total annihilation.

Sorry that's a utopian dream and we are cursed to instead live in the real world. Sometimes suicide is the most humane decision someone can make for themselves. And true compassion comes by actually supporting someone in that situation, not condemning them or "society".

This is an easy story to tell, but is not always supported by evidence. People who would not otherwise kill themselves are more likely to given available means. Many studies around golden gate jumpers, the oven suicide wave in London, and other easy means which increase rates refute the idea that a person plans to die and then seeks the means. (Good discussion in Talking to Strangers). If the availablility of guns causes people to become suicidal is it still ethical to allow them to carry out the act?

I guess I just do not believe guns cause people to become suicidal. I knew two people who committed suicide with the help of doctors. Both were considered and practical decisions given the pain and suffering they were enduring with no hope of reprieve. Both were very grateful to not have to resort to a gun.

It was very hard to accept and I wanted them to stay in this world for longer, but it was their choice and ultimately not my place to enforce my choice on them. I think they were just more brave than me.

There are definitely cases of people who lived healthy long lives after failed suicide attempts, but all such statistics embody the literal definition of survivorship bias.

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