Consequences of public suicide

Not entirely sure why you'd feel guilty or need therapy about something that you have no control over and that would have happened regardless of what your personal choices were as a driver. It doesn't make much logical sense.

Maybe if somehow you could have bent the laws of physics to stop the train in time but chose not to would you feel guilt. But as it stands don't see why you'd dwell on an event that you have no control over. It simply happened, and you move on. That person just joins the hundreds of thousands of other people who died in various ways that day.
 
Gammawolf said:
Not entirely sure why you'd feel guilty or need therapy about something that you have no control over and that would have happened regardless of what your personal choices were as a driver. It doesn't make much logical sense.

Maybe if somehow you could have bent the laws of physics to stop the train in time but chose not to would you feel guilt. But as it stands don't see why you'd dwell on an event that you have no control over. It simply happened, and you move on. That person just joins the hundreds of thousands of other people who died in various ways that day.
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Whilst it's easy for someone in a clear mind to say that, it's not easy for someone who's gone through it to see it that way. Look at it another way, when someone looses someone who was close to them, they'll always try and blame themself, you see it all the time, even if they really couldn't have done anything. It's human nature "I should have noticed it sooner", "I didn't have fast enough reactions" etc etc.
 
Gammawolf said:
Not entirely sure why you'd feel guilty or need therapy about something that you have no control over and that would have happened regardless of what your personal choices were as a driver. It doesn't make much logical sense.

Maybe if somehow you could have bent the laws of physics to stop the train in time but chose not to would you feel guilt. But as it stands don't see why you'd dwell on an event that you have no control over. It simply happened, and you move on. That person just joins the hundreds of thousands of other people who died in various ways that day.
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survivors guilt
 
bitslice said:
Really? No problem Theo, I'll reply to someone else.

There's a problem with the nuances of the terms being used, yes,
but I don't regard this as sympathy. For all I know he was a crackhead who'd just robbed his mum, I'm simply pointing out we appear to care more about the inconvenience than the loss of a human life. To be sympathetic implies empathy with their state of mind, but who really understands that?

I don't beleive you can apply the term selfish to an act that has very little recognition of other people, you have to actively want to deprive somebody of something to be selfish. Being suiciadal is often in the context of isolation, plus the feelings of others tend to be really downgraded in their heads - it's hard to suicide if you are fully aware of the pain you are about to put your family through.
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This is the misappropriation of terms that I was talking about. Selfish does not mean the want to take away something from someone.

This is the issue, people take great issue with the word selfish and read into its use more. A selfish act doesn't need to be read into, it can just be selfish and that's it.

Cooking your favourite meal for 2 when your partner is okay eating it, but would prefer something else, is selfish. It just is it doesn't have to be heinous to be selfish.

It's a simple as placing your wants or desires on a higher level of importance than that of others. That's it, which is what has happened here. A lot of people who commit suicide are putting their own concerns before that of others, or not even considering others. That's just how it is. There are reasons for why they've done that, but to pretend it's something other than selfishness seems to stem from it apparently being wrong to do anything but talk said person up using hyperbole buzzwords.
 
Gammawolf said:
Not entirely sure why you'd feel guilty or need therapy about something that you have no control over and that would have happened regardless of what your personal choices were as a driver. It doesn't make much logical sense.
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This isn't really how logic works, and is another word that has been misappropriated, in this case to be a synonym of right or correct.

Logic in itself is largely meaningless without appropriate context.

Maybe if somehow you could have bent the laws of physics to stop the train in time but chose not to would you feel guilt. But as it stands don't see why you'd dwell on an event that you have no control over. It simply happened, and you move on. That person just joins the hundreds of thousands of other people who died in various ways that day.
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This is actually an example of poor logical reasoning, simply because it's irrelevant. Regardless of whether the drive could have stopped the situation from happening, doesn't mean that they indirectly killed said person.

Break it down in to small chunks, if they weren't driving said train, said person wouldn't be smeared all over the front of their train's windscreen.

It's that simple, whether they could have changed a thing doesn't matter or change the fact that it did happen and it has affected said person.
 
ExRayTed said:
To the OP - Had to help clean all that up today at East Croydon. Walked past body parts to get to the train. Then watched people scoop the remains up into bags. Was fairly grim. The driver of the train was in a bad way.
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Sorry to hear that mate. Such a horrible thing to go through for all concerned...
 
Very selfish. If you're that depressed that you want to end it all, then there are other ways to do so without effecting others around you.

The mild inconvenience of delayed trains isn't much of an issue to me, it's what the driver must be feeling, thinking that they may be responsible for the death. It's something some people may never be able to live with and it could effect their own life. Completely unfair and disgraceful.
 
andi said:
I was first on scene after a member of the public found someone who had been reported missing and killed themselves by gassing in a car last year. It's absolutely nothing in comparison to what train drivers, and responding emergency services to suicide by train must experience, but it still stuck with me for a good while. Still think about it now sometimes to be honest, and I'll forever think about it when I pass his home, or the place where he died.

I don't think i could do the job of a BTP officer, in some areas its a regular call for them. Utterly tragic that it becomes a part of day to day life.
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I've worked alongside BTP officers in the past. The last incident being a 'one under' at an overground station.
Once the station was closed to the public and the traction current was confirmed powered down on the third rail - they simply hopped off the platform and started 'picking up the pieces' whilst laughing and joking about the weekend.

To be honest, it's like any other death you deal with in the police. You just get on with it and dark humour is a common coping mechanism.

That said though I could never be an undertaker.
 
mattyg said:
Walking in and finding someone hanging by their neck is not an easy sight.

Finding anyone dead either naturally or suicide is not easy.
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I'm not saying that. Obviously someone has to find your body, it'd just be nice if they didn't need to scoop it up with a shovel and stick it in a bin bag.
 
Gammawolf said:
Not entirely sure why you'd feel guilty or need therapy about something that you have no control over and that would have happened regardless of what your personal choices were as a driver. It doesn't make much logical sense.

Maybe if somehow you could have bent the laws of physics to stop the train in time but chose not to would you feel guilt. But as it stands don't see why you'd dwell on an event that you have no control over. It simply happened, and you move on. That person just joins the hundreds of thousands of other people who died in various ways that day.
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Of course you don't understand because it's never happened to you. Some drivers do move on, most in fact. Some can't. And don't forget, train driving is a solitary job with hours spent by yourself.

Suicides tend to be easier to get over and as I said, most do. The really messy suicides can take a bit longer to recover from. A good friend hit a woman at 90mph who stepped off the platform at Gatwick. The top half of her body hit the windscreen. It's a testament to modern manufacturing that the laminated windscreen stayed intact, but the mess was indescribable. A suicide that I attended had the body hit the fly-screen doors at the front and partially entering the train. The driver sat at the front and during the required emergency phone calls had to move his bag because there were bodily fluids coming under his internal door. Things like this make it harder. A suicide for a driver is a traumatic experience and in all likelihood he'll be sitting there for over an hour before we can walk anyone up the track to escort him off site.
 
spoffle said:
This is the misappropriation of terms that I was talking about. Selfish does not mean the want to take away something from someone.

Cooking your favourite meal for 2 when your partner is okay eating it, but would prefer something else, is selfish. It just is it doesn't have to be heinous to be selfish.
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You are taking away her preferred choice of meal or subverting the respect due by not offering that choice. I think we are just using the term in different ways?

Also, committing suicide doesn't automatically mean we should feel sympathy in the same way we may feel sympathy when someone dies, it was their choice even though their personal view of their situation may have been distorted.
It's a simple as placing your wants or desires on a higher level of importance than that of others. That's it, which is what has happened here. A lot of people who commit suicide are putting their own concerns before that of others, or not even considering others.
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That is completly ignoring their mental state. Not sure if you have ever felt suicidal but ime you stop thinking about other people in terms of emotional relationships, they have the same relevance to you as strangers. It boils down to you, your pain and the nearest solution to hand. Lots of people take paracetamol, even knowing that it may not work and they may wake up in pain - there is nothing logical going on here, no forward thinking.
We only ever call train suicides selfish because they inconvenience a lot of other people, as if suicidal people are split down the middle into selfish people and non selfish people which is absurd. It's a bit vain to think that your lives matter to this person any more than goldfish do, the only important thing in his life is that 100km/hr of moving steel is an instant death (unlike the other 101 ways of doing this). If there was a circular track for testing unmanned trains, people would still stand in front of them.
 
I've known people to go out of their way to make it easy for those attending the suicide by putting warnings up at the door or wearing a life vest before jumping off a bridge so they can be quickly found. Then there's the ones who want to literally make an impact and possibly include as many people as they can by driving their car into another vehicle.

I've personally had to walk along a train track over a considerable distance putting body parts into bags. Needless to say I didn't have much sympathy for the guy.
 
bitslice said:
You are taking away her preferred choice of meal or subverting the respect due by not offering that choice. I think we are just using the term in different ways?

Also, committing suicide doesn't automatically mean we should feel sympathy in the same way we may feel sympathy when someone dies, it was their choice even though their personal view of their situation may have been distorted.

That is completly ignoring their mental state. Not sure if you have ever felt suicidal but ime you stop thinking about other people in terms of emotional relationships, they have the same relevance to you as strangers. It boils down to you, your pain and the nearest solution to hand. Lots of people take paracetamol, even knowing that it may not work and they may wake up in pain - there is nothing logical going on here, no forward thinking.
We only ever call train suicides selfish because they inconvenience a lot of other people, as if suicidal people are split down the middle into selfish people and non selfish people which is absurd. It's a bit vain to think that your lives matter to this person any more than goldfish do, the only important thing in his life is that 100km/hr of moving steel is an instant death (unlike the other 101 ways of doing this). If there was a circular track for testing unmanned trains, people would still stand in front of them.
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Either way you look at it, it's selfish desires. Being consumed with the concerns of one's self. That's as simple as it is. It seems you can't help but read into it beyond that and assume that it also means bad and wrong.
 
wingnutta said:
Whilst it takes a LOT of courage i think to commit suicide, i cant help but feel when someone wants to use someone else to do it (train/bus/car drivers- you get the idea), that is somewhat selfish.
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Doing it privately, by hanging or overdosing for example probably isn't painless, actually for all I know overdosing might be extremely agonising.

Getting hit by a train is instant and for someone who wants to just end it instantly, is probably the best option. Not to mention someone pushed that far doesnt give a damn about other peoples slight inconveniences.
 
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