People in the social services field are focusing attention and spending taxpayer money on “suicide prevention.”

Pardon my Libertarian contrariness, but … Why?

If a rational adult chooses to end his/her life via a well thought-out decision, why should government or government-funded agencies interfere?

I am not talking about the drunk/drugged zombie whose “I’m gonna kill myself!” screams and actions cause frantic responses by family, friends, police, ambulance crews, etc., out of all proportion to the screamer’s real motive: “Hey, look at me! I need help!” or “Hey, look at me! I’m using this to try to control you!”

I won’t say, “Here, borrow my handgun” to a suicide threatener. But my inclination might be, “If that is your rational decision, have at it. Just, please, if you intend to use a gun or other messy device, go outside. Don’t leave some poor souls the task of cleaning icky stuff off walls and floors.”

I was not always so inclined.

I rushed a family member with slit wrists to a hospital when I was a younger man. The wrist slitting appeared to be a suicide attempt, but it was instead a cry for help. Across the years, I have collaborated with, mourned and consoled in other suicide situations.

My perspective is changing.

I am approaching the inevitable end of my own life after 77 years. I now buy into the proposition that if I choose to die, and do so in a rational, unhurried manner, government ought to butt out.

I see no dignity in “death with dignity.” I am not among those who attempt to soften death by saying the person “passed,” or other euphemisms, though I do not object when others do so. To me, the person died. Death surrounded by tubes, wires, machines, speech-stopping breathing tubes and other mechanisms upsets me. But even the person who slips silently away does, in the end, die, as we all must do at some time.

I understand the desires of the people who are embracing programs to talk people out of ending their lives.

But I think the time, resources and money would be better spent in providing programs that encourage people to go on living by staying in touch with reality.

People who get drunk or drugged up lose the ability for rational decision-making. Then, suicides, homicide, all sorts of things seem to make sense. They don’t. So to prevent suicide, we might focus on how to lessen the use of those escapes from reality, since those “under the influence” of substances are already in circumstances that resist rationality.

Depression has much the same end result, though it arises from different causes. Money dries up. Affections of others turn cold. Physical and emotional health deteriorate. Hope ebbs.

Governmental and non-governmental programs are available to help with all of these circumstances, and others; torn-apart families, post-traumatic stress, etc.

But we can’t do much to help each other if the person(s) needing help resist getting that help.

Most suicides anger me. I think many suicides are a cop-out, a usually ineffective attempt to punish others by depriving them of someone. In a few sets of circumstances, e.g., hopelessly terminal illness, I keep silent. Unless I am in those circumstances, I have difficulty in judging the victim’s actions.

I see news stories these days promoting programs to prevent suicide. Do they work? I have not seen much in the way of meaningful statistics, which might be impossible to truly balance. People who succeed at suicide cannot be interviewed.

I am all for programs that offer help to people who need help and want it, or are so stressed that they cannot think clearly.

But we say we live in a free country. That makes me reluctant to use government or community agencies to try to change someone’s rational, deliberate intent to end one’s life. I think Pennsylvania ought to emulate some other states in changing current laws in this regard.

If someone feels forced by circumstances into suicide, that does not strike me as a rational, deliberate decision. I give credit to the people who try to change those circumstances and keep our parents, children, siblings, friends and neighbors living in our communal efforts to find satisfaction and meaning in life.

But I stop short of thinking that every attempt at suicide should be prevented by any means possible.

We live in a free country, don’t we?

¯¯¯

Denny Bonavita is a former editor at newspapers in DuBois and Warren. He lives near Brookville. Email: denny2319@windstream.net.