Suicide = Illegal

[Paranitis]

I was wondering..I guess suicide is illegal..but it's impossible to catch people doing it unless it is in a public place or where there are cameras.

What happens after a suicide takes place since it is illegal..do they toss the corpse behind bars for 15 years to life or something? lol

Just makes no sense at all to me.

It's like the ONLY purely unenforcable law that exists.

[Brynn]

Or what if someone is jailed for a crime he hasn't committed? I guess there was a movie about this, that a man got imprisoned b/c of killing his wife, but in fact he was innocent. After spending about 40 years in prison, he got free and found his wife very much alive, and for some reason, he killed her So can he be punished twice for the same crime?

[Xandax]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Brynn Or what if someone is jailed for a crime he hasn't committed? I guess there was a movie about this, that a man got imprisoned b/c of killing his wife, but in fact he was innocent. After spending about 40 years in prison, he got free and found his wife very much alive, and for some reason, he killed her So can he be punished twice for the same crime?

Was a movie called Double Jepoardy where infact it was a woman that was framed for the murder on her husband - if I dont' recall terrible wrong. She then got free and killed him, because american law states you can only be convicted for a crime once.
Don't know if the law is real and if it exsists in other nations as well - haven't heard of it in Denmark, although there is something similar.
Anyways - has little to do with the original post....

I don't know if suicides are considered illegal or not - by any nations laws (remember - each nation have different laws), but I do know that assisted sucicide (has some fancy pansy term I can't remember) is illegal in most countries (Holland allows this, I think, in some form?)
I've never heard of anybody in Denmark being punished for trying to comit suicide in terms of a criminal charge.

[Vicsun]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Xandax ...but I do know that assisted sucicide (has some fancy pansy term I can't remember)...

Euthanasia

[Chanak]

Ummm....suicide itself isn't illegal. One cannot be prosecuted posthumously for the murder of one's own self. It's impossible to murder one's own self anyway, because technically suicide is not murder (the one who dies consents to it). The controversy arises when euthanasia is considered...or doctor-assisted suicide. It's more of an ethical issue, since physicians truly have the power of life and death in their hands...who better than a doctor would know how to most efficiently terminate life? Many doctors insist that they are life-preservers, not takers, and so to the best of my knowledge, euthanasia is against the law here in the US. I'm not sure if it's considered on the same ground as murder, however.

[frogus23]

Suicide (or attempted suicide) certainly isn't illegal in the UK, and AFAIK it isn't illegal in any US states either - where are you from Paranitis?

This is very wise egislation IMO, as it is equally possible to commit suicide in jail as outside (no matter how hard officials try to prevent it), and being punished for attempting to take one's own life would almost certainly force one to make sure one succeded next time.

Does anyone know any countries where suicide is illegal?

[frogus23]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chanak Ummm....suicide itself isn't illegal. One cannot be prosecuted posthumously for the murder of one's own self. It's impossible to murder one's own self anyway, because technically suicide is not murder (the one who dies consents to it). The controversy arises when euthanasia is considered...or doctor-assisted suicide. It's more of an ethical issue, since physicians truly have the power of life and death in their hands...who better than a doctor would know how to most efficiently terminate life? Many doctors insist that they are life-preservers, not takers, and so to the best of my knowledge, euthanasia is against the law here in the US. I'm not sure if it's considered on the same ground as murder, however.

Assisting suicide is not a crime in itself I don't think: for performing it one can be convicted of murder, manslaughter, gross negligence etc, depending on the circumstances.
Also almost always doctors are not allowed to continue practicing after committing euthanasia, in this country, although the cases get more and more controversial, with doctors making ever more popular ethical appeals every time...The problem is that murderous doctors often plead 'assisted suicide' rather than murder for terminating patients...

[Rob-hin]

Suiside may (or may not) be illegal, but jumping from a building and stuff like that is.
It's what you do to kill yourself, and how it affects other people that make it illegal I think.

[Brynn]

Obviously you can't punish anybody who's already dead. It would make more sense to proclaim an unsuccessful attempt of suicide indictable.

[fable]

Suicide is considered a moral crime. Traditionally, suicides during the height of the Roman Catholic Church's power were buried in unhallowed ground reserved for the likes of murderers who had not confessed and sought absolution before they were executed in a town square. This applies to Protestant, Jewish, Islamic and many Hindu religions, as well. Suicides were viewed as cursed in many of these cultures, and their spirits were doomed to walk the Earth forever. Frequently, they were doomed to drag other humans to their death.

I suspect all this derives from the way suicide in effect shouts "no!" at a culture, at life itself. It is a crime of ultimate negation against a society. It says that all social norms are worth nothing. Of course, many societies in the past have felt it was perfectly alright for the unattended elderly to commit suicide, since they had no one to look after them; at such times, it's thought the records were deliberately fudged to allow them the full death services of the local religion. But when someone in their prime did this, it was, and probably always be, viewed with horror at some fundamental level.

[frogus23]

Quote:

Originally Posted by fable I suspect all this derives from the way suicide in effect shouts "no!" at a culture, at life itself. It is a crime of ultimate negation against a society. It says that all social norms are worth nothing. Of course, many societies in the past have felt it was perfectly alright for the unattended elderly to commit suicide, since they had no one to look after them; at such times, it's thought the records were deliberately fudged to allow them the full death services of the local religion. But when someone in their prime did this, it was, and probably always be, viewed with horror at some fundamental level.

I think that the reality of suicide is very different from the accounts of suicide in Camus and Dostoyevsky - Suicide is not a philosophical or political protest, nor is it a general rejection of the norms of any particular society or culture - it is the rejection of life which has become poisoned by a specific grievance. People do not commit suicide out of general hatred for the ways of the world, and I believe could mostly put up with the ways of the world were it not for their intimate personal sorrow, which is different in every suicide's case.

I think the disgust of suicide, rather than it being incomprehension of the suicide's rejection of the world you (the living) might like, it is incomprehension of the something that can force them to sacrifice a world which even they might have liked to alleviate the pain of that something.

My point is just that people have reasons to kill themselves, and these reasons are rarely connected with society or culture.

[Coot]

Quote:

Originally Posted by frogus23 Does anyone know any countries where suicide is illegal?

IIRC it was illegal in the UK. You could get a hefty jail sentence if your attempt failed and you were caught.

[C Elegans]

Quote:

Originally Posted by frogus23 People do not commit suicide out of general hatred for the ways of the world, and I believe could mostly put up with the ways of the world were it not for their intimate personal sorrow, which is different in every suicide's case.

I think you and Fable are discussing two differenct aspects of suicide here; one is the subjective experiences and events that influence an individual to commit suicide, the other is why most societies view this as negative and immoral.

In most christian countries it has previously been against the law to commit suicide, not because it is expected that you can punish a person afterwards, but because it was viewed as a sin to commit violence upon your life, which is a gift from god. Laws in a society do no only fill the function of leading to punishment of individuals - on the contrary, laws are formalised norms and thus reflect what moral system a society has. So apart from what Fable points out about rejection of society, it is also important to note that according to traditional christian belief, when you kill yourself you take a life that does not only belong to you but also to god, thus it is sinful and immoral.

[Morril]

Quote:

Originally Posted by frogus23 My point is just that people have reasons to kill themselves, and these reasons are rarely connected with society or culture.

I agree that most people who kill themselves have a reson to do it (of course some people have a psychiatric disesa)
But I am not sure it is correct that it is not connected with society or culture. It is a fact that some countries (fx Denmark) have a remarkable high numbers of suicides. So culture/society seems to play a role also

[fable]

Quote:

Originally Posted by frogus23 My point is just that people have reasons to kill themselves, and these reasons are rarely connected with society or culture.

No argument there, Frogus. My point is that cultures perceive suicides not in personal terms relating to a single individual, but as a cultural threat. Just as, in most cultures, homosexuality is perceived as a threat to the culture, though its actual effect in reality occurs on a very personal and localized level.

In some ways, this dates back to Salic Law, or at least the mindset that created and followed Salic Law. The idea that any crime of a citizen is a crime, not against another individual, but against the State, encourages the view that all actions by citizens may be viewed in relationship to the State--or in this instance, its subconscious, the culture that motivates it.