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Source: (consider it) Thread: Jennifer (from Hell)
Scot

Deck hand
# 2095

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quote:
Originally posted by Molopata The Rebel:
I mean, in the face of eternity, this life and all it entails is really a bit of trifle, innit?

The religious have a lot of gall to claim that it's the atheists who don't value life. You go right ahead and piss away your trifle of a life. Just try not to hurt anyone else in the process, okay?

This life is no trifle. Jen knew that, and I'm angry at her for acting as if it was just that - a thing to be thrown away.

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“Here, we are not afraid to follow truth wherever it may lead, nor tolerate any error so long as reason is left free to combat it.” - Thomas Jefferson

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Scot

Deck hand
# 2095

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quote:
Originally posted by Squibs:
quote:
Originally posted by Scot:
Evidence?

Evidence of what?

That there is an understanding that the NT speaks of God working toward the new heavens and the new earth? Or that there is a claim that God is actively involved in creation, specifically our lives?

Evidence that any such thing happens in reality. I know there are understandings and claims, but so what? People claim all sorts of silly shit.

I don't care if you don't want to engage with me, but you don't get to dismiss me by telling me that I have my answer, or by offering a reading list in lieu of an argument.

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“Here, we are not afraid to follow truth wherever it may lead, nor tolerate any error so long as reason is left free to combat it.” - Thomas Jefferson

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Dark Knight

Super Zero
# 9415

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I can't sleep. I have been thinking about this thread.

I don't understand, I don't empathise. I don't really even want to. I am confused, which I think is about all I can manage.

For the last three and a half years I have been slowly tortured by my ex-wife. Without going into details, if I think about this dispassionately, she probably deserves to die for what she has done. So I get that.

There are even times when I am so angry with her that it is not just an objective judgement. I kind of wish in a sort of childish way that I was involved in organised crime or something similar, so I could coerce her into not being such a vindictive bitch.

Plus, I do understand the desire to kill yourself. I have been there.

But to actually plan this out and go through with it? As I understand it, you kind of go into a depression tunnel, where what you are doing seems totally rational as the only way it can possibly be. If you were well, it would seem what it is - crazy and evil. But you can't see that from inside. I guess I can understand that on an objective level.

I just manifestly cannot understand how someone can actually go through with that. I can't. As bad as the last few years have been, I have never and I would never plan to kill or hurt my ex, or anyone else. I just do not get it.

And this time, I can't just shake my head and mutter 'Fuckin arsehole. Deserve to burn for that one.' Because I don't believe that about jlg.

So I am still bewildered, and really churned up about this one. comet, once again thankyou for this thread and your honesty on it.

--------------------
So don't ever call me lucky
You don't know what I done, what it was, who I lost, or what it cost me
- A B Original: I C U

----
Love is as strong as death (Song of Solomon 8:6).

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Schroedinger's cat

Ship's cool cat
# 64

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quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
I have to say that yes, I get where jlg may have been coming from. I have been suicidal in the depths of despair. And in my youth I had such a violent, black, deadly temper at the same time as the despair that I could imagine myself doing something similar--right down to the child. (Realizing that scared the shit out of me and I've clamped down on it so much that most people around me believe I have NO temper at all. Ha.)

It's human. I think it could happen to anyone. I know it could happen to me. God have mercy.

I relate to that rather too strongly. I have thumped people in anger, and it is a bad place to be.

There but for the grace of God go I. That grace is fucking brilliant.

--------------------
Blog
Music for your enjoyment
Lord may all my hard times be healing times
take out this broken heart and renew my mind.

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rolyn
Shipmate
# 16840

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Originally posted by lilBuddha:
"We do ourselves and each other no favour painting a prettier picture than reality suggests".

Point taken .
Given the copy-cat nature of grievance/random gun incidents it not easy to know how to handle them. Maybe Norway's approach to the actions of Anders Brevick is best, namely to STFU about the whole thing as quickly as possible.

Bigging up the nature of atrocities doesn't seem to prevent them happening in the future . As was the case with Derek Bird when he made strange comments about Dunblane before achieving similar notoriety for himself in Cumbria.

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Change is the only certainty of existence

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Loquacious beachcomber
Shipmate
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quote:
Originally posted by Scot:
quote:
Originally posted by Molopata The Rebel:
I mean, in the face of eternity, this life and all it entails is really a bit of trifle, innit?

The religious have a lot of gall to claim that it's the atheists who don't value life. You go right ahead and piss away your trifle of a life. Just try not to hurt anyone else in the process, okay?

This life is no trifle. Jen knew that, and I'm angry at her for acting as if it was just that - a thing to be thrown away.

Angry, with very good reason.
Yet, I suspect, not angry enough to drive to New England and piss on her grave.
And there, in your anger at a good friend now gone by her own hand, and your willingness to respect, honour and value the friendship once shared, you meet the rest of the Ship.
And probably, a good number of those who read what you have written will nod their heads and declare, "Damn straight."
I am listening; today, I have no right to preach here.
This is the Hell forum, you are in exactly the right place, and I will listen.
You, after all, knew Jennifer far better than I ever did.

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TODAY'S SPECIAL - AND SO ARE YOU (Sign on beachfront fish & chips shop)

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Squibs
Shipmate
# 14408

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quote:
Originally posted by Scot:
Evidence that any such thing happens in reality. I know there are understandings and claims, but so what? People claim all sorts of silly shit.

I don't care if you don't want to engage with me, but you don't get to dismiss me by telling me that I have my answer, or by offering a reading list in lieu of an argument.

You asked a vague question. I gave you two resources as by way of answer. If those resources don't suit then I'm not sure what else you want.

You are obviously salivating with the anticipation of a bit of back and forth. But I'm not getting into an argument with you for the sake of it.

Believe whatever the hell you want, Scot.

[ETA Code, again, T², Hellhost]

[ 30. December 2011, 18:44: Message edited by: Think² ]

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Loquacious beachcomber
Shipmate
# 8783

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One of the things Scot clearly believes, Squibs, is that it is worth the effort to get to know a Shipmate such as Jennifer as a human being with feelings and intellect, rather than as an array of pixels.
I, for one, could do with developing the humility to learn from his example.
I think one name for what he demonstrates would probably be 'common decency.'

--------------------
TODAY'S SPECIAL - AND SO ARE YOU (Sign on beachfront fish & chips shop)

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Squibs
Shipmate
# 14408

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Well that's great, Silver Faux. More power to him. But that doesn't, at least as far as I can see, have anything to do with our brief conversation about miracles.

But perhaps I've missed something?

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Scot

Deck hand
# 2095

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quote:
Originally posted by Squibs:
You are obviously salivating with the anticipation of a bit of back and forth. But I'm not getting into an argument with you for the sake of it.

Her I was, thinking that "back and forth" was what people did on discussion boards. My vague question was in reaponse to your vague assertion. Either explain your position or don't, but don't sent me to look somewhere else to find what you believe.

quote:
Believe whatever the hell you want
That was never in question.

--------------------
“Here, we are not afraid to follow truth wherever it may lead, nor tolerate any error so long as reason is left free to combat it.” - Thomas Jefferson

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Squibs
Shipmate
# 14408

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quote:
Originally posted by Scot:
Her I was, thinking that "back and forth" was what people did on discussion boards.

Depend what back and forth means. In my book I take it to mean an argument.

quote:
Originally posted by Scot:
My vague question was in reaponse to your vague assertion. Either explain your position or don't, but don't sent me to look somewhere else to find what you believe.

You laid out the possible options about what Christians can believe with respect to God when we are faced with suffering/ evil. I pointed out that there was at least one other possibility open to the Christian. Namely, that God is actively involved in creation now. I also suggested that this was the primary message of the NT when one considers what it says about what God is busying himself with. I didn't discus my personal opinion on any of this - though you could probably guess what it is.

Simply put - there exists at least one other option then what you presented. I gave it. That is all. Get it?

If you want to discuss the existence of miracles - something I never intended to do in my post - then perhaps purgatory is the place for it, not here.

[ 30. December 2011, 19:52: Message edited by: Squibs ]

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mousethief

Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953

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Silver Faux, thank you for all you've said here. I appreciate your candor and your concerns.

As well as everybody else who has expressed their feelings.

I myself really don't have much of a reaction because I just didn't know Jennifer well, and thus didn't know if she was "one of the sort" to do that. Maybe, given what happened, we have to say, "Well, I guess she was one of that sort." I dunno.

I really do appreciate this thread, though.

--------------------
This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...

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tessaB
Shipmate
# 8533

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quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
I just didn't know Jennifer well, and thus didn't know if she was "one of the sort" to do that. Maybe, given what happened, we have to say, "Well, I guess she was one of that sort." I dunno.

I really do appreciate this thread, though.

I did not know her well either (just appreciated a lot of her posts). I think what has surprised me is how we never seem to know who is 'one of that sort'.
Equally how circumstances can perhaps conspire to make many people (including people on here that I admire greatly) very, very close to being 'one of that sort'.
We seem to live a hairsbreadth away from being either saints or monsters. God help us all.

--------------------
tessaB
eating chocolate to the glory of God
Holiday cottage near Rye

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Deputy Verger
Shipmate
# 15876

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I have never killed myself, obviously. Or anyone else, fortunately. I like to think I couldn't, or wouldn't, but facts are, the right combination of heartbreak, frustration, anger and alcohol can really change a person. I know I could, given a gun. SF is right - don't keep one handy.

RIP Jennifer. And LIVE in peace, Comet. It is not your fault. She had all the theory - she showed you that. There came a point where it meant nothing. Usually, fortunately, such moments pass. Sadly, sometimes they don't.

[Votive] for jlg
[Votive] for Comet

I expect candles are frowned upon in Hell. So sue me.

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molopata

The Ship's jack
# 9933

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quote:
Originally posted by Golden Key:
No, it's not "a bit of trifle". [Mad]

Here, we love, and hate, and cry, and worry, and fall down, and learn, and help each other. Every one of us matters HERE. Every one of us has life HERE. Every one of us is precious HERE.

If God thinks this life is a bit of trifle, then why bother incarnating? Healing people? Comforting people? Telling them off? Laughing and partying with them?
[...]

No. Wait. I did not say life did not matter. My statement was in response to Apocalypso's ridiculing of the "big picture God". Most of us will remember failed pursuits of childhood and youth, such as that chocolate bar, the ride on the merry-go-round, the fat-salary job after graduation or the "dream house" later or, and how petty and futile some of them appear later in life. Yet this does not mean they did not matter. What we experienced, what we learnt in the process, and who stood with us at that time are vital and formative to whom we currently are.
Similarly, I would expect life itself to undergo a certain re-evaluation in the light of eternity. Some of the problems we faced here might suddenly appear, yes, trivial, but that does not mean they did not matter to us or to God.

--------------------
... The Respectable

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Doublethink.
Ship's Foolwise Unperson
# 1984

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I doubt it would be worth it, Deputy Verger, but the monumental stupidity of your first sentence is noted.

[ 30. December 2011, 21:36: Message edited by: Think² ]

--------------------
All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George Orwell

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Doublethink.
Ship's Foolwise Unperson
# 1984

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quote:
Originally posted by Molopata The Rebel:
quote:
Originally posted by Golden Key:
No, it's not "a bit of trifle". [Mad]

Here, we love, and hate, and cry, and worry, and fall down, and learn, and help each other. Every one of us matters HERE. Every one of us has life HERE. Every one of us is precious HERE.

If God thinks this life is a bit of trifle, then why bother incarnating? Healing people? Comforting people? Telling them off? Laughing and partying with them?
[...]

No. Wait. I did not say life did not matter. My statement was in response to Apocalypso's ridiculing of the "big picture God". Most of us will remember failed pursuits of childhood and youth, such as that chocolate bar, the ride on the merry-go-round, the fat-salary job after graduation or the "dream house" later or, and how petty and futile some of them appear later in life. Yet this does not mean they did not matter. What we experienced, what we learnt in the process, and who stood with us at that time are vital and formative to whom we currently are.
Similarly, I would expect life itself to undergo a certain re-evaluation in the light of eternity. Some of the problems we faced here might suddenly appear, yes, trivial, but that does not mean they did not matter to us or to God.

This theological discussion is probably more suited to the jlg despair and death thread in purgatory.

Think²
Hellhost

--------------------
All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George Orwell

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Moo

Ship's tough old bird
# 107

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quote:
Originally posted by Josephine:
It's like Eliab said on the Purg thread -- I want to go back to the world where people who get a gun and go to their ex's place and shoot up a bunch of people are evil monsters.

Please read my post in Purg.

Moo

--------------------
Kerygmania host
---------------------
See you later, alligator.

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ToujoursDan

Ship's prole
# 10578

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What the Mouse said...

--------------------
"Many people say I embarrass them with my humility" - Archbishop Peter Akinola
Facebook link: http://www.facebook.com/toujoursdan

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Timothy the Obscure

Mostly Friendly
# 292

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I don't have comet's personal involvement, but... suicide is often (if not always) a hostile act--as if someone who has come to feel utterly unlovable sets out to prove it by doing something so unforgivable that they will earn from everyone else the loathing they feel for themselves (like the husband, in a case I have direct knowledge of, who said to his wife "I'm going to totally fuck up your life" seconds before blowing his brains out). The rage felt by those left behind is normal and justified. Doesn't mean you can't feel other stuff too (that's what makes it so hard--compassion and rage don't cohabit easily). If suicides could break out of their tunnel vision and really see the effects on others, they might think again--but if they could do that, they probably wouldn't be in that blind tunnel to start with.

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When you think of the long and gloomy history of man, you will find more hideous crimes have been committed in the name of obedience than have ever been committed in the name of rebellion.
  - C. P. Snow

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Zappa
Ship's Wake
# 8433

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quote:
Originally posted by Dark Knight:

But to actually plan this out and go through with it? As I understand it, you kind of go into a depression tunnel, where what you are doing seems totally rational as the only way it can possibly be. If you were well, it would seem what it is - crazy and evil. But you can't see that from inside. I guess I can understand that on an objective level.

The closest I've approached to reaching that point the tunnel was a kind of vortex. I knew at that point that the world would be better off without me. I knew that my children would be better off without me. I knew that my ex-wife would be better off without me. I knew that my new girlfriend (kuruman) would be better off without me. Unlike Jen I just couldn't work out what to do about it - I couldn't even gas myself in my car because it had just been totalled in a fire. And suddenly I was on the beach in a storm howling and howling and howling. It was about fifteen years ago now. I don't want to go back there.

quote:
Originally posted by Dark Knight:

I have never and I would never plan to kill or hurt my ex, or anyone else. I just do not get it.

Not the kill or hurt bit. I smashed brick walls with a fist occasionally in the years that followed as I lost fight after fight over the custody of my children. But I never wanted to hurt anyone else. I even rescue worms from puddles.

Interestingly, though we'll never know, I suspect Jen didn't want to kill, either. I've used guns from time to time, and when you want them to be fatal, if the target is a decent size, they usually are. But we'll never know, I guess, where Jen was in that vortex. In a way I'm sorry I've even speculated, but Jen's actions have made space for us to do that and we will.

When I was at theological college a colleague wired himself to a timer, set to go off on the stroke of midnight on New Year's Eve. He wanted his young widow to remember his death (26 years ago tonight). She does, I suspect - I lost touch with her years ago. But last time I spoke to her she remembered not not with the wistful longing and regret, the 'embindment' that I suspect he wanted. She just thought he was a total prat, said 'fuck him', and moved on with life.

--------------------
shameless self promotion - because I think it's worth it
and mayhap this too: http://broken-moments.blogspot.co.nz/

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Golden Key
Shipmate
# 1468

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Just want to say to anyone feeling depressed, thinking about harming yourself or others, or Just.Can't.Take.The.Battle.One.More.Second:

Please get help.

--Call a crisis line. (Call your local Information number, or check the front of a phone book.)

--See a therapist. (I know money can be a barrier. Been there. Many therapists have sliding-scale fees, and can adjust to what you can afford. Also call an info/referral line--United Way, etc.--and tell them you need free or low-cost counseling.)

--Go to or call an emergency room, and tell them what's going on.

--Tell someone you're in trouble. If they don't get it or don't listen, tell someone else. Keep doing this.


I know personally how difficult this is. You may not be able to get out of bed; you may be drunk or high; you may not have anyone who'll listen to you; you may not have *anyone*, period; you may be afraid of being embarassed and of how people will look at you; you may think there's no possible way things can get better.

You may have done all the above suggestions, and then some, and things didn't get better--or even got worse.

Please listen: Try to get help one more time. Give yourself that chance. You matter. No matter who you are, what's happened to you, or what you've done. You matter.

--------------------
Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")

Posts: 18601 | From: Chilling out in an undisclosed, sincere pumpkin patch. | Registered: Oct 2001  |  IP: Logged
Golden Key
Shipmate
# 1468

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Timothy--

In my experience (both personally and with other people), often the person isn't trying to hurt anyone. They're facing something awful, and just can't do it anymore. Physical pain, emotional pain, chemical imbalances, fallout from something they've done, life collapsing around them...all sorts of things. They may have done everything they can to get help and/or to make things better, but it hasn't worked.

It's pain relief. It's like having a profound headache that no medicine can touch.

Unfortunately, it's permanent.


I'm not saying it's a good thing, just that it isn't necessarily selfish nor vindictive.

--------------------
Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")

Posts: 18601 | From: Chilling out in an undisclosed, sincere pumpkin patch. | Registered: Oct 2001  |  IP: Logged
Mamacita

Lakefront liberal
# 3659

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quote:
Originally posted by Zappa:
The closest I've approached to reaching that point the tunnel was a kind of vortex.... But we'll never know, I guess, where Jen was in that vortex. In a way I'm sorry I've even speculated, but Jen's actions have made space for us to do that and we will.

Speculation is probably natural -- God knows I've been doing plenty of it -- and ultimately pointless. But I think "vortex" is as useful a way to frame this horrible thing as any. In two of the newspaper articles I managed to dredge up, the police chief recalled being called to that address for a previous suicide attempt. So perhaps the horror of Jennifer's ending didn't come just in one event but in a sort of continuing state that she couldn't get out of. It is tearing me up inside to think of her in there.

Anyway, I'm glad you made it off that beach, Zappa. For one thing, your post about theodicy on the Purg thread is helping me patch back together something that has been pretty well shredded these last few days.

--------------------
Do not be daunted by the enormity of the world’s grief. Do justly, now. Love mercy, now. Walk humbly, now. You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to abandon it.

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la vie en rouge
Parisienne
# 10688

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Just one in my life I have been properly depressed and suicidal, largely due to a set of absolutely extraordinarily circumstances that I was under at the time. Compared to many, my depression was still quite mild, and I could usually snap myself out of wanting to kill myself by thinking about the effect it would have on my mother.

But what’s always scared me the most about it is this: just how much sense it made at the time. Ending it all seemed like the perfectly logical solution to the problem. That’s the thing about your brain being on the fritz, stuff makes perfect sense to you that never would if you were in your right mind. It scares me.

I can't imagine it making sense to want to shoot someone, but then when my own reason wasn't answering the phone my mind totally went to a place that frightens me now.

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Rent my holiday home in the South of France

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Duo Seraphim
Ubi caritas et amor
# 256

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quote:
Originally posted by Dark Knight:

And this time, I can't just shake my head and mutter 'Fuckin arsehole. Deserve to burn for that one.' Because I don't believe that about jlg.

So I am still bewildered, and really churned up about this one. comet, once again thankyou for this thread and your honesty on it.

Comet asked me on FB if I had heard about jlg and that I should check out All Saints. I did so with foreboding.

It was worse than I suspected - all suicides leave me wondering "why?" and "how could you?" and "why didn't you...?" and all sort of other hopeless attempts to assuage the real guilt: What could I have said or done to prevent it?

Now having read through this thread, it feels worse again.

Dark Knight has put his finger on how I feel about it: angry, confused, shocked. I can't believe it. I don't want to believe it. I can't project myself into that dark place where jlg went in the end.

I do believe that no life should be judged by the worst thing done in that life. Life is not a trifle. It is a terrible thing to cast it away. It's a terrible thing to shoot other people in your rage and despair. It's a terrible thing to feel such rage and despair that life is not worth living and must be ended. It's a terrible thing to act on that rage and despair to hurt others, even as your life spirals into annihilation.

No easy answers. No kindly things to say. Only confusion and a warning.

This was a broken life. We all lead broken lives. We need hope for something better - even it is for no more hope than get help and lock the guns away.

So I'll add my thanks to yours, DK.

--------------------
Embrace the serious whack. It's the Catholic thing to do. IngoB
The Messiah, Peace be upon him, said to his Apostles: 'Verily, this world is merely a bridge, so cross over it, and do not make it your abode.' (Bihar al-anwar xiv, 319)

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Moo

Ship's tough old bird
# 107

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quote:
Originally posted by Timothy the Obscure:
I don't have comet's personal involvement, but... suicide is often (if not always) a hostile act--as if someone who has come to feel utterly unlovable sets out to prove it by doing something so unforgivable that they will earn from everyone else the loathing they feel for themselves...

None of the suicidal people I listened to on the Samaritans hot line appeared to feel any hostility. They were hurting and couldn't take it any more. I don't think they had the energy to feel hostile.

Moo

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See you later, alligator.

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Robert Armin

All licens'd fool
# 182

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Zappa has described the experience I have had, but I likened it to blinkers, not a vortex. What I could see of the world made sense as a place that would really be better off without me. In a way, I would be helping others by ending it all. Even though I've tried to help those left after a suicide, and know that they suffer very terribly, I honestly thought those around me would be better if I just "slipped away". Which is why depression makes sense to me as an illness - but one that gives you emotional blindness, rather than physical.

--------------------
Keeping fit was an obsession with Fr Moity .... He did chin ups in the vestry, calisthenics in the pulpit, and had developed a series of Tai-Chi exercises to correspond with ritual movements of the Mass. The Antipope Robert Rankin

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Twilight

Puddleglum's sister
# 2832

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quote:
Originally posted by Moo:
None of the suicidal people I listened to on the Samaritans hot line appeared to feel any hostility. They were hurting and couldn't take it any more. I don't think they had the energy to feel hostile.


Right there is my problem understanding all this. I've been to the point of feeling like such an abject failure that I thought even family members would be better off without me and I've also experienced the sort of blinding rage where blood pressure rises to the point that I've literally "seen red," and sensible thought is impossible -- but the two things together? No way. It seems chemically impossible to me with the adrenaline from the anger wiping out the despair.

{Don't read this if you don't like conjecture.}

I can understand outrage. Oh, yes. I have no trouble at all imagining my booze kindled head on fire with angry thoughts of the one person I'd planned to grow old with, sitting cozily in the house I'd planned to make my retirement project, with some obliviously happy other person sitting next to him watching TV. Particularly when you're 60 years old and past believing any comforting thoughts about "other fish in the sea," or fascinating new careers. I can picture going over and making their evening unpleasant with a huge display of hurt and temper. But beyond that, I can't go. Did they laugh at her? Did they refuse to listen? People need to feel heard before they can begin to forgive, maybe that was being denied her in some way.

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Spiffy
Ship's WonderSheep
# 5267

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I think people may have it backwards. I'm wondering, having felt the rage myself a time or twenty thousand, if the anger took over and took up a gun. And then when faced with the overwhelming horror of the violence done flung over into depression.

Or maybe I should stop trying to get into other people's heads. It's terrifying enough inside my own skull and I have to get professional assistance in attempting to navigate its dark, jagged edges.

--------------------
Looking for a simple solution to all life's problems? We are proud to present obstinate denial. Accept no substitute. Accept nothing.
--Night Vale Radio Twitter Account

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Pants

Emergency underwear
# 999

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But isn't that just it. There is no answer. Each person has different experiences. Each person responds differently. No-one will ever know. And that's what makes it hard to accept.

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Many big thank yous to those who sponsored us.

I use £6m of military hardware to find hidden Tupperware in the woods.

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Laura
General nuisance
# 10

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quote:
Originally posted by Moo:
quote:
Originally posted by Timothy the Obscure:
I don't have comet's personal involvement, but... suicide is often (if not always) a hostile act--as if someone who has come to feel utterly unlovable sets out to prove it by doing something so unforgivable that they will earn from everyone else the loathing they feel for themselves...

None of the suicidal people I listened to on the Samaritans hot line appeared to feel any hostility. They were hurting and couldn't take it any more. I don't think they had the energy to feel hostile.

Moo

This tracks my experience of Samaritans. The pain is unendurable and only suicide will silence it. In some cases, my main concern was that the person didn't take anyome with them.

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Love is the only sane and satisfactory answer to the problem of human existence. - Erich Fromm

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Geneviève

Mother-Hatting Cat Lover
# 9098

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I don't think there's a "one size fits all" reason for suicide. CW seems to hold that it is a hostile act, and I'm sure that to those left behind, that is how suicide easily appears. Anger may be part of it for some people, and for others, it is just that the pit, the despair, and the pain are too much.

We don't know what was goin on in Jennifer's situation. Could have been that rage, drinking, and an accessible gun led to actions she couldn't face, and she then shot herself in shame and guilt.

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"Ineffable" defined: "I cannot and will not be effed with." (Courtesy of CCTooSweet in Running the Books)

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Bullfrog.

Prophetic Amphibian
# 11014

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quote:
Originally posted by Laura:
quote:
Originally posted by Moo:
quote:
Originally posted by Timothy the Obscure:
I don't have comet's personal involvement, but... suicide is often (if not always) a hostile act--as if someone who has come to feel utterly unlovable sets out to prove it by doing something so unforgivable that they will earn from everyone else the loathing they feel for themselves...

None of the suicidal people I listened to on the Samaritans hot line appeared to feel any hostility. They were hurting and couldn't take it any more. I don't think they had the energy to feel hostile.

Moo

This tracks my experience of Samaritans. The pain is unendurable and only suicide will silence it. In some cases, my main concern was that the person didn't take anyome with them.
There might be a selection bias there.

--------------------
Some say that man is the root of all evil
Others say God's a drunkard for pain
Me, I believe that the Garden of Eden
Was burned to make way for a train. --Josh Ritter, Harrisburg

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Geneviève

Mother-Hatting Cat Lover
# 9098

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Perhaps there is a selection bias, but that still shows there are different reasons besides an intentionally hostile act.

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"Ineffable" defined: "I cannot and will not be effed with." (Courtesy of CCTooSweet in Running the Books)

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Timothy the Obscure

Mostly Friendly
# 292

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quote:
Originally posted by Golden Key:
Timothy--

In my experience (both personally and with other people), often the person isn't trying to hurt anyone. They're facing something awful, and just can't do it anymore. Physical pain, emotional pain, chemical imbalances, fallout from something they've done, life collapsing around them...all sorts of things. They may have done everything they can to get help and/or to make things better, but it hasn't worked.

It's pain relief. It's like having a profound headache that no medicine can touch.

Unfortunately, it's permanent.


I'm not saying it's a good thing, just that it isn't necessarily selfish nor vindictive.

I've sat with many suicidal clients (haven't lost one yet), and I wouldn't use the words "selfish" or "vindictive." But angry, definitely (though there's often a good deal of confusion about where to direct the anger). And what I have heard, over and over again, is "everyone would be better off if I were gone." I think this reflects a kind of self-absorption that depression engenders (something I do know from intimate experience). All I can say to them is that I have also sat with many survivors of suicide, and have never heard a single one say "It's really for the best" (which I have often heard from those whose loved ones died of cancer, Alzheimers, etc.)

Hell's not the place to go into the nuances, but this isn't about judgment. It is about the right of those hurt by suicide to be angry about it.

--------------------
When you think of the long and gloomy history of man, you will find more hideous crimes have been committed in the name of obedience than have ever been committed in the name of rebellion.
  - C. P. Snow

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Janine

The Endless Simmer
# 3337

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quote:
Originally posted by Pyx_e:
The world is not full of pain and suffering.

AtB Pyx_e.

'Course not. There are a million beautiful things about this fallen world. But you've got to admit, there are times when it displays only a tarnished, ruined glory.

--------------------
I'm a Fundagelical Evangimentalist. What are you?
Take Me Home * My Heart * An hour with Rich Mullins *

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Sober Preacher's Kid

Presbymethegationalist
# 12699

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My many thanks to Silver Faux for his comments; they have been excellent and well-appreciated.

--------------------
NDP Federal Convention Ottawa 2018: A random assortment of Prots and Trots.

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Pyx_e

Quixotic Tilter
# 57

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quote:
Originally posted by Janine:
quote:
Originally posted by Pyx_e:
The world is not full of pain and suffering.

AtB Pyx_e.

'Course not. There are a million beautiful things about this fallen world. But you've got to admit, there are times when it displays only a tarnished, ruined glory.
And be it my life's work and desire to love and praise my God in those things too. For He is in them as much as the beautiful or He is no God at all.

Sometimes (to quote the man) love is a "cold and broken alleluia" but it is still an alleluia.

AtB, Pyx_e

--------------------
It is better to be Kind than right.

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Moo

Ship's tough old bird
# 107

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quote:
Originally posted by Timothy the Obscure:
...I have also sat with many survivors of suicide, and have never heard a single one say "It's really for the best" (which I have often heard from those whose loved ones died of cancer, Alzheimers, etc.)

Hell's not the place to go into the nuances, but this isn't about judgment. It is about the right of those hurt by suicide to be angry about it.

I think anger is a normal feeling when anyone dies, unless the anger has already been expressed while the person was alive. If someone you love has cancer or Alzheimser's you rage against the illness while the person is still alive. By the time the person dies, the response is frequently relief.

When people do something reckless and die as a result, the survivors know that if the person had behaved differently, he would still be alive. The anger which is normally felt about illness or death seems justified. When people commit suicide, the anger seems even more justified. They chose to do this! How could they? I think this is a specialized and intensified reaction to the death of someone you love.

Moo

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Kerygmania host
---------------------
See you later, alligator.

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Trudy Scrumptious

BBE Shieldmaiden
# 5647

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quote:
Originally posted by Timothy the Obscure:
All I can say to them is that I have also sat with many survivors of suicide, and have never heard a single one say "It's really for the best" (which I have often heard from those whose loved ones died of cancer, Alzheimers, etc.)

I actually HAVE heard this ... tragically, from the family of an eighteen-year-old boy whose short life had been such a hell of mental illness and repeated suicide attempts that there really was, along with the sorrow and anger, a strong sense of "at least he's at peace now" from the family. I think this grew out of the fact that they had made so many efforts to help him (and he had made some good and brave efforts to help himself) over the years, all to no avail ultimately, that they had finally come to believe he never would find any peace in this life. A terrible place to find yourself at that age. I do think that in some (by no means all) situations where a mentally ill person resorts to suicide, it can come to seem as much a relief as when a person who's been in pain with cancer for years finally dies.

--------------------
Books and things.

I lied. There are no things. Just books.

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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333

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quote:
Originally posted by Timothy the Obscure:
and I wouldn't use the words "selfish"

The very nature of suicide is selfish.* This is part of what generates the anger.
Please note this is not a condemnation or judgement, merely a statement.

*yes, there are exceptions.

--------------------
I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou

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Robert Armin

All licens'd fool
# 182

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Except that, as many of us have said, it is quite likely that the person committing suicide honestly feels that everyone would be better off without them. Is "selfish" the right word to describe an action taken for such reasons?

--------------------
Keeping fit was an obsession with Fr Moity .... He did chin ups in the vestry, calisthenics in the pulpit, and had developed a series of Tai-Chi exercises to correspond with ritual movements of the Mass. The Antipope Robert Rankin

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Geneviève

Mother-Hatting Cat Lover
# 9098

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Lil Buddha, if there are exceptions, then you can't state that "the very nature of suicide is selfish."

Nor do I think that the feelings of the person committing suicide and the survivors have to be in syncie, the suicide may feel the world will be better off without him/her and those left behind may be angry.

--------------------
"Ineffable" defined: "I cannot and will not be effed with." (Courtesy of CCTooSweet in Running the Books)

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Schroedinger's cat

Ship's cool cat
# 64

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quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
quote:
Originally posted by Timothy the Obscure:
and I wouldn't use the words "selfish"

The very nature of suicide is selfish.* This is part of what generates the anger.
Please note this is not a condemnation or judgement, merely a statement.

*yes, there are exceptions.

There are exceptions when it is, but most of the time it is not. Suicide may be very selfless - someone genuinely believes that the world would be better off/safer without them - or it may be just deperation - the person cannot cope with life any more. Very rarely is it selfish when someone is driven to it. Sometimes it is selfish if someone just wants to avoid responsibility, but this is not depression related suicide, and is rare.

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Blog
Music for your enjoyment
Lord may all my hard times be healing times
take out this broken heart and renew my mind.

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Suze

Ship's Barmaid
# 5639

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quote:
Originally posted by Pyx_e:
And be it my life's work and desire to love and praise my God in those things too. For He is in them as much as the beautiful or He is no God at all.

Sometimes (to quote the man) love is a "cold and broken alleluia" but it is still an alleluia.

AtB, Pyx_e

I find this really helpful, thanks.

--------------------
' You stay here and I'll go look for God, that won't be hard cos I know where he's not, and I will bring him back with me , then he'll listen , then he'll see' Richard Shindell

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Fineline
Shipmate
# 12143

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quote:
Originally posted by Trudy Scrumptious:
quote:
Originally posted by Timothy the Obscure:
All I can say to them is that I have also sat with many survivors of suicide, and have never heard a single one say "It's really for the best" (which I have often heard from those whose loved ones died of cancer, Alzheimers, etc.)

I actually HAVE heard this...
I have heard this too. From people who are mentally il themselves, about friends of theirs, also mentally ill, who ended their lives. They say it, even though they miss their friends and are devastated by their deaths, because they personally know what it's like to be in constant mental suffering, with terrifying thoughts that they can't control, and to know that this can't always be fixed - even with caring friends and with medication. And sometimes medication can have side effects where a person no longer feels alive or themselves - such as in the movie 'A Beautiful Mind', where the guy stops taking his medication because when he's on it he doesn't feel alive and doesn't feel love for his wife and children.

Suicide is rarely selfish - as others have said, generally when people are at that stage where they want to die, they believe the world and their loved ones would be better off without them. They feel worthless. Even though their loved ones may tell them otherwise, if they are mentally ill, their mind often sees things in a distorted way. Realistically, people who genuinely feel that they have worth and are having a positive impact on the world, and that people would be devastated if they died, are a lot less likely to want to end their life.

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Ariel
Shipmate
# 58

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quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
The very nature of suicide is selfish.

Would you like to explain what you mean by the term, and why you think this is so? It may be that you are using the term differently to some of us.
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Schroedinger's cat

Ship's cool cat
# 64

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quote:
Originally posted by Ariel:
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
The very nature of suicide is selfish.

Would you like to explain what you mean by the term, and why you think this is so? It may be that you are using the term differently to some of us.
Or, of course, it might be that lilBudda is a COMPLETE ASSHOLE. TBH, posting that sort of crap in hell makes me lean towards the COMPLETE ASSHOLE option.

--------------------
Blog
Music for your enjoyment
Lord may all my hard times be healing times
take out this broken heart and renew my mind.

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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333

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First, I am not making a value judgement when I say selfish. ISTM, some of you may be. This might be the disconnect.

Selfish is considering oneself before others. Being so wrapped in oneself, seeing no better way is selfish. Understandable, yes, selfless no.
The concept of the "noble" suicide is, I think, generally a conceit by the survivors. We have the need to make it better.

On a pedantic note; a statement is not false if there are exceptions, a statement is false if there are more exceptions than affirmations. This is not the case for my statement in my experience.

--------------------
I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou

Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008  |  IP: Logged



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