Losing Aaron: Bob Swartz on MIT's role in his son's death

Re:Losing Aaron: Bob Swartz on MIT's role in his son's death by epipsychidion on Friday January 03, 2014 @10:37AM (#7005890)

Suicide is a choice. I fully agree that MIT acted abominably and in an ethically, if not legally, questionable manner with regards to giving evidence and support to the prosecution but not defense. But you can't blame them for his decision to take his life. It was an incredibly selfish act given the intense pain it caused his family.

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Re:Losing Aaron: Bob Swartz on MIT's role in his son's death by Moocat87 on Saturday January 04, 2014 @12:32PM (#7011906)

Another word-for-word echo of the top comment in this thread.

Seriously? I'm not blaming MIT. What did I say that indicated this? I'm arguing about "suicide is a choice." It's not. Choice has something to do with it, but to say it is choice is asinine. To say that is to never have been depressed or truly known another person who was depressed or suffering from another mental illness.

Also, is it not selfish of a family to expect a person with mental illness (or other serious problems) to suffer for the rest of his/her life just so they can delay the loss?

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Re:Losing Aaron: Bob Swartz on MIT's role in his son's death by andreasvc on Friday January 03, 2014 @05:19PM (#7008635)

You must have some pretty radical libertarian free will convictions if you don't even grant that mental illness can impair free will--a concept that even in the absence of illness is philosophically highly debatable.

The concept of selfishness is not applicable here, since the individual does not gain anything by suicide, nor does it have anything to do with excessive self love. Suicide is simply an act deemed pathological by society, any other value judgment is bound to be derived from philosophically arbitrary and subjective ethical convictions.

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