Comment by theptip | Hacker News Reader

Comment by theptip | Hacker News Reader

> It is widely recognized that there is an epidemic of suicides among current and former military personnel, especially those who have been on active duty in a combat theater... There were 3,481 combat deaths in Operation Iraqi Freedom. Since 9/11, there have been over 30,000 military suicides. Over 20 soldiers a day take their own lives.

Pet peeve: while I really like the general point of the article, I wish the author had actually provided statistics that support the claim they are making here. 30k suicides sounds like a lot, but what's the base rate in the general population? The numbers provided don't actually tell you whether the rate of military suicides is higher than civilian ones, and that kind of undermines the point. To be concrete I'm looking for something like "the base rate of suicide is X% chance per year, whereas amongst soldiers it's Y% chance per year, suggesting a risk factor of (Y-X)% caused by military service."

A quick search finds some research (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_military_veteran....) that suggests the rate of suicide among veterans is 1.5x the base rate, which is substantial. Using those numbers suggests that 10k of those suicides quoted above were specifically attributable to military service (and 20k would be "baseline civilian risk of suicide").

Another pet peeve: The effect of gun ownership on suicide rates goes totally ignored. Suicide accounts for 21k out of 33k annual gun deaths in the US[1]. If we're outraged by school shootings, we should be apoplectic about facilitating suicide.

[1] https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/gun-deaths/

Nobody needs a gun to commit suicide. In countries where guns are less available, they use hanging or poison.

Putting that aside, it’s not our role to forcibly limit the choices of healthy, responsible people just because some unhealthy, unresponsible people might make the wrong choices when given the freedom to do so.

It’s not a societal-level tragedy if someone chooses to eliminate themselves. While it’s abhorrent to even consider, the fact is, there’s very likely a net economic/social gain.

We don’t need to be protected from our own choices. We need to be protected from the authoritarian impulses of people who don’t think we’re equipped to make choices in the first place.

> there’s very likely a net economic/social gain.

I see your point, but I strongly disagree. Providing a suicidal person with the right resources to help them avoid suicide will (imo) yield a net gain over the rest of that persons life, as opposed to the gain from selling a gun and a bullet and giving him a quick out.

One example that comes to might right away is Alan Turing. Whose contributions to modern society can hardly be overstated. And I know he didn't use a gun, I'm making a point about helping people out of depression, to oppose your opinion about it being beneficial to let them kill themselves.

Turing didn’t need help out of depression. He needed to NOT be persecuted, tortured, and mutilated by the state, furthering the point that people in power should not interfere with the rights of free people to go about their lives as they see fit as long as they aren’t hurting anyone else.

I agree, I didnt question the reason behind the suicide, I just wanted to point out that not all suicidal people can be labeled as burdens to society.

> Live as they see fit

So in your opinion that includes killing oneself, even in cases that could be avoided if access to appropriate help could be provided? (Not enforced, provided as an alternative option to suicide)

We can provide resources for people who want help without taking away rights from other people who aren’t doing anything wrong. The original comment was about banning guns for everyone to prevent people from committing suicide.

Following that logic, should we lock everyone in a cell under 24/7 suicide watch because it would prevent some people from committing suicide?

No, that's a strawman. You have to draw the line somewhere, and most of the civilized world agrees that not giving general public access to devices that can kill by twitching ones finger, is not above that line. Same as requiring people to wear seatbelts.

Your fallacious argument aside though, you are correct, you can provide support resources without taking rights of others away, and in the US that is the case. Congrats. I will stay in a country where, if I am ever depressed, the support structures have a higher chance of saving me, because it will take more than moving my finger by 2mm to literally explode my head.

Restricting access to guns is not part of a support structure, it is a control structure. Maybe you appreciate the government controlling you in that way, most Americans are more independent minded.

If you didn't want to be around guns, you can simply ... not own one. Many Americans don't, it's not like it's required.

Where I live, I can own a gun if I want to, provided I pass rigorous psychological examination, and repeat it every few years. But because there is practically no guns on the streets, I dont feel the need to. Admittedly, it would be difficult to reconsile my opinions on gun ownership with the need for personal safety if I lived in the US.

But yes, I absolutely do appreciate there being a control structure that prevents psychopaths from going to walmarts artillery section and shooting up a school every other week.

Following the same fallacy you used previously, should we abolish all laws because everyone should be able to excercise their free will completely unrestricted?

Bringing up Turing to support the idea that the state should prevent people from taking their lives is beyond tone deaf. People asking the state to enforce their moral compass (which is basically what you're doing now) is what lead to the situation that Turing killed himself over.

> Providing a suicidal person with the right resources to help them avoid suicide

Where in this sentence do you read anything about enforcing anything?

> it’s not our role to forcibly limit the choices of healthy, responsible people just because some unhealthy, unresponsible people might make the wrong choices when given the freedom to do so.

I think your statement is missing the impact that the actions of the "unhealthy" have in others. Otherwise, there would be no reason to stop anyone from driving drunk, buying a couple kgs of uranium, or procuring flasks of Ebola.

> Using those numbers suggests that 10k of those suicides quoted above were specifically attributable to military service (and 20k would be "baseline civilian risk of suicide").

This would be the case if probability of joining the military was independent of the risk factors for suicide, which I seriously doubt.

Not disagreeing with the point at large, just that the statistical analysis would be even more complicated, at least finding similar demographics between the two populations

Suicide is one of the leading causes of death for young men, and who makes up a lot of military veterans?

The same for gun ownership.

The same for people facing major changes in lifestyle and income.

The same for people suddenly removed from their social circles.

It's sort of amazing it isn't MUCH MUCH Higher among veterans...

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