Taking People With You When You Go

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Was thinking about that road crash with the train yesterday - as a witness apparently saw the car park on the level crossing before the barrier cycle started, it seems to have been suicide. A strangely nasty suicide, though - if you jump in front of a train, you just fuck up one other person apart from yourself. If you park your car in front of a train, you can kill several other people too.

When you kill yourself, is there anyone else you want to take with you? Is there anyone else you want to make sure dies before you do?

― caitlin (caitlin), Sunday, 7 November 2004 20:24 (twenty-one years ago)

I have no intention of ever killing myself. But ppl who are contemplating suicide aren't thinking rationally enough to care whether they take anyone with them or not. At least that would be my guess.

― MarkH (MarkH), Sunday, 7 November 2004 20:32 (twenty-one years ago)

I have tried to kill myself a fair number of times, when I was quite seriously unwell. The idea of taking anyone with me was never anything I would contemplate (crazy or not, I'm still a pacifist). However, when I got put in the psychiatric hospital I was interviewed, and they were quite concerned about a small fire in my flat the week before (I forgot to turn the grill off), and they were suggesting I had done it on purpose to kill myself and my flatmates - which of course would be both horrific, and a terrible way to kill yourself.

― Kevin Gilchrist (Mr Fusion), Sunday, 7 November 2004 20:35 (twenty-one years ago)

I love the certainty of the question "When you kill yourself...." as if everyone who answers has a definite plan in this direction.

― Orbit (Orbit), Sunday, 7 November 2004 20:36 (twenty-one years ago)

The films usually involve the train just ploughing through and carrying on, so perhaps said person didn't even consider that they'd be taking people with them.

― Markelby (Mark C), Sunday, 7 November 2004 20:37 (twenty-one years ago)

it's true, they do tend to do that in films...I've never thought about it before. I don't suppose that this would ever happen under any circumstances...if there is an object on the track which is as wide as the track or wider then there will always be a derailment I would've thought.

― MarkH (MarkH), Sunday, 7 November 2004 20:41 (twenty-one years ago)

I did wonder if maybe they were even trying to be nice, because the driver wouldn't see *them* - he'd just see a car, rather than seeing a specific person he was about to kill. If that was the case, it's kind of ironic that the driver was killed too.

(Not really ironic - just Alanis Morrisette ironic)

I love the certainty of the question "When you kill yourself...." as if everyone who answers has a definite plan in this direction.

Every sensible person nowadays *will* kill themselves when there's no point carrying on with their life any more; and for most people that'll be a long time before their natural death. If I was sensible myself, I'd have killed myself when I first had the urge to, when I was about 20.

― caitlin (caitlin), Sunday, 7 November 2004 20:43 (twenty-one years ago)

I must not be very sensible, then.

― Orbit (Orbit), Sunday, 7 November 2004 20:45 (twenty-one years ago)

Caitlin, that's one hell of an assumption. Also, if that's your reasoning, I'm glad you aren't your own definition of sensible.

― ailsa (ailsa), Sunday, 7 November 2004 20:45 (twenty-one years ago)

MarkH: it depends what the object is, and how the train hits it. If a train hits a cow, say, then 99 times out of 100 the cow will be killed without derailing a train. However, about 20 years ago an Edinburgh-Glasgow train hit a cow at about 100mph, and its hip-bone became wedged under one of the wheels; it completely flipped that carriage over, and killed several people.

(after that, new rules were brought in - there's now a minimum weight for the leading vehicle in a train that goes at 100mph or above, to try to prevent that happening again)

― caitlin (caitlin), Sunday, 7 November 2004 20:46 (twenty-one years ago)

I keep starting detailed posts about my brother-in-law's suicide and then deleting them again coz it's too upsetting. But suffice to say there was no chance of him taking anyone with him coz he was on his own in his car on a verge in the middle of nowhere, gun to the head.

no every sensible person will SEEK HELP in that situation.

― MarkH (MarkH), Sunday, 7 November 2004 20:48 (twenty-one years ago)

Caitlin, I know you have your own issues on the subject but unless your intention is to get angry again can you not use phrases like "Every sensible person nowadays *will* kill themselves when there's no point carrying on with their life any more" because you're going to make *other* people angry and upset.

― Markelby (Mark C), Sunday, 7 November 2004 20:51 (twenty-one years ago)

Mark, I'm sorry if I've upset you by starting this thread. I didn't mean to, of course.

― caitlin (caitlin), Sunday, 7 November 2004 20:52 (twenty-one years ago)

(that was to Mark H, but it applies equally to Mark C too. And anybody else, in fact)

― caitlin (caitlin), Sunday, 7 November 2004 20:52 (twenty-one years ago)

The thread is idiotic, offering a choice of sensibility=offing yourself--what, is offing yourself required, like some kind of suicidal indie cred--we must have authenticity?

Sorry to sound harsh, but "sensibility" is something that people generally strive for, and you have required suicide to achieve it.

― Orbit (Orbit), Sunday, 7 November 2004 20:55 (twenty-one years ago)

The original question is a good one, I think. I have often thought, if I were to end in suicide, whether the suicide may be put to good use and involve others. There are people I would feel proud to kill, I think. Historical figures mostly, which is a hindrance. But also people still alive yet. But still, suicide is a very strong attack. Hence suicide bombers. You could probably kill anyone if you were prepared to kill yourself. I wonder how may suicide bombers were suicidal anyway. Not many I bet. Is it a pity? It is odd when these bombers in Israel then have their homes bulldozed. How many just did it to get back at their landlady? Nothing to do with the intifada, just an assured tenancy dispute. Not many, I bet, but still.

― Eyeball Kicks (Eyeball Kicks), Sunday, 7 November 2004 21:01 (twenty-one years ago)

Well, thanks for that Orbit. It wasn't the point of the thread, but anyway. What's the point of staying alive until you can't even look after yourself?

― caitlin (caitlin), Sunday, 7 November 2004 21:03 (twenty-one years ago)

there's every point if there are other ppl around who can look after you.

― MarkH (MarkH), Sunday, 7 November 2004 21:05 (twenty-one years ago)

What if there aren't, though? My family, for example, would prefer me to kill myself rather than do some of the things I want to do with my life.

(yes, they *have* specifically said this)

― caitlin (caitlin), Sunday, 7 November 2004 21:09 (twenty-one years ago)

sounds like you have a rather nasty family.

― MarkH (MarkH), Sunday, 7 November 2004 21:11 (twenty-one years ago)

They don't mean to be; they just have a very fixed image of what they want me to be, I think.

― caitlin (caitlin), Sunday, 7 November 2004 21:17 (twenty-one years ago)

do any of the things you want to do stand any chance of harming them in any way?

― MarkH (MarkH), Sunday, 7 November 2004 22:29 (twenty-one years ago)

Not to my mind; but I think they are worried about their reputation locally. They're socially-conservative people.

― caitlin (caitlin), Sunday, 7 November 2004 22:31 (twenty-one years ago)

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