MovieChat Forums > The Bridge (2007) Discussion > Are you obligated to stop somone?

Are you obligated to stop somone?

posted 12 years ago by strangebeautifulworld
20 replies | jump to latest

If someone chooses to kill themselves, is it your duty as a fellow human being to stop them, or is it their right as a human being to control their own fate? I was really curious about the woman they stopped and escorted off the bridge, and I wonder where she is now. Was it fair for them to make the decision for her? If someone wants to kill themselves, they will do it anyway. If it's not fair to tell people how to live, it's not fair to tell them how to die.

[–] leesmith1988 12 years ago

If somebody wants to kill themselves then surely they will just go and do it. They won't be stopped. As you say a person controls their own fate and if they didn't want to be saved then they wouldn't be.

[–] fast_fierce_and_funny 12 years ago

If someone chooses to kill themselves, is it your duty as a fellow human being to stop them,

Not that you asked or anything, but I have a tough time with the word "duty." If you and I have a duty to each other, who gets to decide what that duty is? I don't think I have any more right to decide what your duty is to other people any more than you get to decide what mine should be. Does that make sense?

I like this quote from Montaigne:

I can stand hard work, but only when it is voluntary, and for so long as my desire prompts me.

(From "On Presumption" - Michel de Montaigne [1580])

When it comes to people helping each other out, I don't want to see anyone doing anything that they don't want to do. If someone is standing on the chord (the thirty-two-inch-wide beam that suicides find themselves on once they clamber over the safety rail that forms the outermost part of the Golden Gate Bridge), and someone walking by thinks it's a good idea to yell "Jump!" at them, then that's what I want them to do: whatever they think is best (including yelling "Jump!" at people).

This isn't the same thing as saying I approve of folks who go around yelling "Jump!" to people perched on the edges of bridges. Only that I don't want people to do anything that they don't feel like doing. Help is something that should be given freely or not at all, I think. You might have a different take on how help should work and that's okay, too.

or is it their right as a human being to control their own fate?

There's a quote from Frank Zappa that, the older I get, the more meaning I find in it. Here it is:

The most important thing to do in your life is to not interfere with somebody else's life.

I wouldn't like a world made up of people who think it's a good idea to run around and tell other people what to do. Probably because most people, in my own experience, haven't a clue how to run their own lives. Which is okay, except that if you can't run your own life, you're not really qualifed to try to run anyone else's life, are you? I think that you and I can make suggestions to other people, but that any advice, no matter how well-meant, has to end there, and the final decision about what to do rests with the other person.

But here's the thing: when someone is thinking about suicide, there is, usually, a relatively short period of time that suicide is an attractive idea. I believe (but am not 100% certain) the timeframe is approximately 90 days (give or take) based on this: Suicide often occurs when the patient seems to be recovering from an emotional crisis; approximately half occur within 90 days of such a crisis. You can find that quote here: http://www.ideaconnection.com/solutions/5764-Suicide.html

(Attention you, the person reading this: if I have the critical timeframe wrong, please do not be shy about setting me straight; I am just as often wrong as I am right and this could be one of those times.)

So....a person thinking about suicide is, usually, going through an emotional crisis and has to get through the next 90 days or so. How do you, the person seeking to help the potential suicide, get them through the next 90 days? I haven't a clue, so don't ask me.

All I can say for sure is that if I saw someone perched on the edge of the Golden Gate Bridge, I would try to talk with them. And what I would say, given the chance, is something like this:

"Are you sure you want to do this? Are you sure that what you're going through right now, whatever it is, however bad it is, can't be gotten through with a little more time and some patience with yourself and the world?

Please think all this over carefully before you take that last step into space. I don't want to see you do this thing, but I'm not you, so only you know what the deal is and what will work best for you. All I'm asking you to do is to consider what you're about to do, and what it will mean. If you walk away, right now, you get a second chance at life. Everyone deserves a second chance....you, too.

Is that the wrong thing to say? I don't know. All I know is that I would try to talk to the jumper and....my efforts would have to end there.

I'm not going to grab anyone, try to restrain anyone, or make anyone do anything against their own will. Call me weak, lazy, cowardly, or whatever you like (you'll probably be right, too). It's just not my thing to go around forcing people to do stuff.

Your own plan of action if faced with a jumper might differ sharply from mine and that's okay. I'm only telling you what I would do, not what you should do; only you know what you should do.

I was really curious about the woman they stopped and escorted off the bridge, and I wonder where she is now.

There's an older thread concerning her that hasn't been updated in a while:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0799954/board/thread/128926571

...but the gist of it seems to be that, as of a year or so ago, she was doing okay. Not great, but okay.

Was it fair for them to make the decision for her?

I don't know. I think you would have to ask the woman herself how she feels about still being here. I suspect that she's glad to still be around so she can see her daughter grow up, but I can't speak for her, and that is only a guess on my part.

If it's not fair to tell people how to live, it's not fair to tell them how to die.

I agree with you, but as I say, if I were faced with someone who wanted to jump from the bridge, I would at least try to talk with them and see if there might be some way for them to get through their problems without their having to die.

Would my trying to talk to them work? I don't know, and maybe after talking to someone like me their will to live would really be gone, but that's what I would do.

Okay, your turn: what would you do?

[–] cthulhulurks 12 years ago

Not a duty, just a personal decision. No one has any moral obligation to any fellow human to do anything whatsoever. There may be a civil obligation but as far as I know those whose civil responsibility is larger than everyone else's do not fulfill it, in fact they mostly ignore it pursuing personal profit. I'm talking about clerks, civil cervants of all stature and kind.

my vote history:
http://www.imdb.com/user/ur13767631/ratings

[–] sugarteacream 11 years ago

if they are pacing up and down for a lot of time of getting themselves ready to actually dare then I'd say YES you are obligated. Maybe it would restore their faith in humanity and they'd stop feeling the need to think they want to die, the only reason they go to GG is because it's like this romantic notion, maybe someone if would show them they actually care. If they just wanted to go they'd overdose quickly or straight up jump. The buildup shows they probably would be able to be helped if someone was even willing but it seems no one is. Disgusting really.

[–] cthulhulurks 11 years ago

Apparently there's not a single philanthropic grassroots or other group or association that does suicide watch at the most popular suicide locations. No one wants to deal with this sh!t.

my vote history:
http://www.imdb.com/user/ur13767631/ratings

[–] 11 years ago

[deleted]

[–] CoSMiGoNoN 10 years ago

If you're an adult and want to kill yourself, who am I to decide that you should live instead? Everybody is free to do with their lives what they may, and I'm not gonna stop you.

[–] Villings 10 years ago

Are you obligated to stop somone?

I'd say you're obligated to mind your *beep* business. Trying to stop someone from killing themselves it's just something people to for their own, because they're there and want to have an answer in case anyone asks "well did you try and stop them?" -- pure selfishness.

So...yeah, I agree with you -- just quoted because I like to do that

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[–] EibhlinnSavage 10 years ago

I'm horrified that not a single person here thinks they should intervene.
The only time you are NOT morally (and in many places legally) obligated to help a person in danger is when helping would put your own safety in danger.

"They'll do it anyway"? Says who? A lot of these people are going through depression and other mental illnesses that means they are not in a position to make that kind of decision. Many more could change their minds later (an hour, a month, a year later) when whatever they're going through gets easier or they find new hope. Others are only doing it because they feel nobody cares and you saying "stop. what's wrong? Talk to me, I'll listen." is the one thing they needed to stop feeling so alone.

Yes, some of them will just try it again later. But if your intervention saves one life, isn't that enough? But you can't know if that person is the one person who might be saved unless you try.

And even if it is not them. Even if they kill themselves the next day when you are not around to stop them, wouldn't it haunt you to know you just stood by and watched?

[–] fast_fierce_and_funny 10 years ago

"They'll do it anyway"? Says who? A lot of these people are going through depression and other mental illnesses that means they are not in a position to make that kind of decision.

I have to ask: when did being depressed become some sort of crime that made it okay to take other peoples' choices away from them? Could it be possible that depressed people might have the right idea after all? Read the below and see if it makes any sense to you.

Suppose you are depressed. You may be mildly or seriously depressed, clinically depressed, or suicidal. What do you usually do? Or what does one do with you? Do nothing or something. If something, what is done is always based on the premise that something is wrong with you and therefore it should be remedied. You are treated. You apply to friend, counselor, physician, minister, group. You take a trip, take anti-depressant drugs, change jobs, change wife or husband or “sexual partner.”

Now, call into question the unspoken assumption: something is wrong with you. Like Copernicus and Einstein, turn the universe upside down and begin with a new assumption.

Assume that you are quite right. You are depressed because you have every reason to be depressed. No member of the other two million species which inhabit the earth—and who are luckily exempt from depression—would fail to be depressed if it lived the life you lead. You live in a deranged age—more deranged than usual, because despite great scientific and technological advances, man has not the faintest idea of who he is or what he is doing.

Begin with the reverse hypothesis, like Copernicus and Einstein. You are depressed because you should be. You are entitled to your depression. In fact, you’d be deranged if you were not depressed. Consider the only adults who are never depressed: chuckleheads, California surfers, and fundamentalist Christians who believe they have had a personal encounter with Jesus and are saved for once and all. Would you trade your depression to become any of these?

Now consider, not the usual therapeutic approach, but a more ancient and honorable alternative, the Roman option. I do not care for life in this deranged world, it is not an honorable way to live; therefore, like Cato, I take my leave. Or, as Ivan said to God in The Brothers Karamazov: if you exist, I respectfully return my ticket.

Now notice that as soon as suicide is taken as a serious alternative, a curious thing happens. To be or not to be becomes a true choice, where before you were stuck with to be. Your only choice was how to be less painfully, either by counseling, narcotizing, boozing, groupizing, womanizing, man-hopping, or changing your sexual preference.

If you are serious about the choice, certain consequences follow. Consider the alternatives. Suppose you elect suicide. Very well. You exit. Then what? What happens after you exit? Nothing much. Very little, indeed. After a ripple or two, the water closes over your head as if you had never existed. You are not indispensable, after all. You are not even a black hole in the Cosmos. All that stress and anxiety was for nothing. Your fellow townsmen will have something to talk about for a few days. Your neighbors will profess shock and enjoy it. One or two might miss you, perhaps your family, who will also resent the disgrace. Your creditors will resent the inconvenience. Your lawyers will be pleased. Your psychiatrist will be displeased. The priest or minister or rabbi will say a few words over you and down you go on the green tapes and that’s the end of you. In a surprisingly short time, everyone is back in the rut of his own self as if you had never existed.

Now, in the light of this alternative, consider the other alternative. You can elect suicide, but you decide not to. What happens? All at once, you are dispensed. Why not live, instead of dying? You are like a prisoner released from the cell of his life. You notice that the cell door is ajar and that the sun is shining outside. Why not take a walk down the street? Where you might have been dead, you are alive. The sun is shining.

Suddenly you feel like a castaway on an island. You can’t believe your good fortune. You feel for broken bones. You are in one piece, sole survivor of a foundered ship whose captain and crew had worried themselves into a fatal funk. And here you are, cast up on a beach and taken in by islanders who, it turns out, are themselves worried sick—over what? Over status, saving face, self-esteem, national rivalries, boredom, anxiety, depression from which they seek relief mainly in wars and the natural catastrophes which regularly overtake their neighbors.

And you, an ex-suicide, lying on the beach? In what way have you been freed by the serious entertainment of your hypothetical suicide? Are you not free for the first time in your life to consider the folly of man, the most absurd of all the species, and to contemplate the cosmic mystery of your own existence? And even to consider which is the more absurd state of affairs, the manifest absurdity of your predicament: lost in the Cosmos and no news of how you got into such a fix or how to get out — or the even more preposterous eventuality that news did come from the God of the Cosmos, who took pity on your ridiculous plight and entered the space and time of your insignificant planet to tell you something.

The difference between a non-suicide and an ex-suicide leaving the house for work, at eight o’clock on an ordinary morning:

The non-suicide is a little traveling suck of care, sucking care with him from the past and being sucked toward care in the future. His breath is high in his chest.

The ex-suicide opens his front door, sits down on the steps, and laughs. Since he has the option of being dead, he has nothing to lose by being alive. It is good to be alive. He goes to work because he doesn’t have to.

--Walker Percy

Do you see what I'm trying to get at here? As counter-intuitive as it may seem, the option of committing suicide could well be what keeps some people going because they know that, if things get too bad, if they just can't take it anymore, there is always a way out.

You said in your post:

I'm horrified that not a single person here thinks they should intervene.

Fair enough. As for me, I'm aghast whenever I run into people who seem to mistake this world for a penitentiary...and themselves as jailers. I mean, is informing everyone that, no matter what, they're stuck with life really the route to greater human happiness?

Deciding whether to continue or end your own life is, I would think, as basic a human right as it gets. If a man is going to deprive another man of the right to make such a basic decision for himself, I would hope that the fella looking to run that other guy's life has a far more rock-solid basis for doing it than simply declaring, "I know what's best for you."

If you'll pardon my saying so, the assumption here seems to be that you know more about what's better for people than people do. Well, when it comes to your own life, then yes, I agree entirely: you're the expert there.

But how can one human being know when and under what circumstances another human being should or shouldn't end their life? Isn't that a choice that's best left with them?

Many more could change their minds later (an hour, a month, a year later) when whatever they're going through gets easier or they find new hope.

What happens if what it is they're going through doesn't get any easier for them? Don't you think it's possible that your saving people against their will might be a source of anger and resentment?

The unspoken assumption here seems to be that people are capable of tolerating any amount of psychic torment for any amount of time. I think it's reasonable to ask: how can one person know what another person can and can't tolerate in the way of mental anguish?

And before anyone says anything about what a terrible person I am (an assertion I am in complete agreement with, by the way): I am not, for the record, pro-suicide.

Rather, if I want freedom for myself, it seems to me that I must first be willing to grant that same freedom to others, and, yes, that extends to allowing them to make decisions that I may not agree with, up to and including ending their own life.

Perhaps I'm missing something here (it wouldn't be the first time, certainly), but it seems to me that you don't truly own your own life if someone else gets to decide whether you can commit suicide or not. Maybe it's just me, but I would find that state of affairs intolerable, even if I have no intention whatever of committing suicide myself, and even if the thought of others doing so makes me want to weep for the pain they must be in to make suicide seem like the best thing to do.

[–] catonryewithmayo 10 years ago

Great post; I agree. I also think that it's ridiculous that suicide is considered against the law.

[–] Samuraibro 8 years ago

I think you two are missing something, suicide is only illegal so first responders and/or the state can intervene and assess the mental state of the person who did so, and if there is some medical issue, force them into treatment so that perhaps they won't try again.

[–] MissKateRabbit 10 years ago

I agree. I work for the Samaritans and I have to say how shocked I am to see all of the nos.

Would you call 911/999 if you saw someone having a heart attack in the street? you HOPEFULLY would because that would be the right thing to do. When they got to the hospital they could have decided to be dnr but that's not for a passerby to decide. You do what you can to help.

I mean if you find someone dead they tell you to perform CPR until the paramedics arrive.

[–] fast_fierce_and_funny 10 years ago

Would you call 911/999 if you saw someone having a heart attack in the street? you HOPEFULLY would because that would be the right thing to do.

Hang on a second: you're comparing an involuntary action (having a heart attack) to a voluntary one (committing suicide).

Well, don't you think that's a bit of a false analogy? I mean, few (if any) people wake up in the morning and decide for themselves that today would be a good day to have a heart attack (as opposed to someone waking up in the morning and deciding that they've simply had enough of life).

When they got to the hospital they could have decided to be dnr but that's not for a passerby to decide.

How would you feel if you had a DNR order on file, but an attending physician decided that he knew better than you did whether or not you should stick around?
Wouldn't you be both annoyed and frustrated that a stranger had taken it upon himself to make such a decision for you rather than you being able to make it for yourself?

You do what you can to help.

Believe it or not, I think the Samaritans are a great group of people. However, there's a distinction that needs to be made between the Samaritans and the "I know what's best for you better than you do" crowd.

The difference is this: people seek out the Samaritans and ask them for their help; the Samaritans do not go around inflicting themselves on people. Even more importantly, the Samaritans are not supposed to either judge the people who seek help from them, nor are they supposed to tell people what to do.

The idea behind the Samaritans seems to be to give people the opportunity to talk through their feelings by lending them a sympathetic ear. And, seeing as how the Samaritans are all about lending assistance to people who seek them out, I am all for them.

What I am dead set against is folks giving themselves carte blanche to go around interfering in the lives of other people when they haven't been asked. Hell always seems to take on the form of "concerned citizens" and "caring professionals" who are confident that they know what's best for you better than you do.

A world filled with concerned citizens and caring professionals frantically scurrying around protecting people from themselves would not, it would seem to me, be one worth living in.

[–] MissKateRabbit 10 years ago

I'm not.

What I was trying to say (for some reason I wasn't very descriptive in my first post, probably lack of sleep) is that suicide or the contemplation of, is comparable to a heart attack.

it is a crisis.

Don't get me wrong, I am completely, 100%, not against anyone killing themselves, like at all. It is a completely personal choice.

"if you're going to do it then you are going to do it."

Granted. Most people who are going to kill themselves aren't going to be visibly distressed, they are determined and the majority of the time they succeed in their plan (like the first gentleman that you see in this film.) But sometimes people ARE!!! That is what I have taken offence to.
The idea that someone,anyone could see and continue to walk past adesperate person and just carry on with their day.

I personally couldnt and wouldn't, that's just me, and not because I want to get up in someone's face because I just love hearing how much *beep* goes on in this world or how dark someone's life is but because I cant imagine them (the person contemplating suicide)not having someone to at very least, talk to about their feelings.

Sometimes people can be talked around (and the vast majority of the time they appreciate it) and that is what makes it worthwhile for me. judge me all you like for caring.

Do the *beep* snow angel, Dude!, Do the *beep* snow angel!

[–] fast_fierce_and_funny 10 years ago

That is what I have taken offence to.
The idea that someone,anyone could see and continue to walk past a desperate person and just carry on with their day.

Okay, sure, I can see why someone might take offence at the people who are walking past, oblivious.

But...what about all the people who are doing the walking past? Could it be possible that a fair number of them are just as desperate as the person perched on the side of the Golden Gate Bridge, but the passers-by are just more quiet and less attention-getting about it? How do you know what problems the people who are "just carrying on with their day" are up against?

What I mean is: you seem to take it for granted that everyone has your capacity for taking on the problems of other people (if only in a "please tell me what's wrong"-sense).

As for myself, I'm not so sure. By my own way of thinking (and to be clear: I'm not claiming to be right here; I'm just trying to tell you what I make of all this), being willing to put down your own problems (if only momentarily) in order to temporarily shoulder the problems of others is an extraordinary feat.

(Perhaps I suffer from having appallingly low standards for acts of kindness?)

Somehow, this puts me in mind of a story told about a Golden Gate Bridge jumper from the seventies:

When I visited him there, we spent three hours talking about the bridge. Motto had a patient who committed suicide from the Golden Gate in 1963, but the jump that affected him most occurred in the seventies.

“I went to this guy’s apartment afterward with the assistant medical examiner,” he told me. “The guy was in his thirties, lived alone, pretty bare apartment. He’d written a note and left it on his bureau. It said, ‘I’m going to walk to the bridge. If one person smiles at me on the way, I will not jump.’ ”

Now, you might say to yourself, "What a shame that nobody smiled at that man and, by doing so, kept him from jumping." But here's the thing: can you really blame people for being so wrapped up in their problems and concerns that they didn't smile at a total stranger?

Me, I can't.

For me, someone putting down their own problems for a while in order to help someone else out is a noteworthy event. Sure, someone can proclaim that we have some sort of "duty" to help others, but for me, making a "duty" out of helping others turns it into something that is no longer any good.

To my mind, help should be freely and gladly given, or given not at all. Again, I'm not claiming to be right here, I'm only trying to make it clear that, whatever it is that people do, I would like to see them to do it with a glad heart and, yes, that includes rendering assistance to potential suicides as well.

(I suppose this means that I value Free Will above everything else [with the exception that your act of Free Will doesn't interfere with someone else's life, of course].)

So, yes, I think (or, at least, I'd like to think) I understand where it is you are coming from. It's just that, for me, I can't bring myself to "expect" people to act a certain way; I can only expect them to act like people, for all the good (and all the ill) that their doing so brings into the world.

I personally couldnt and wouldn't, that's just me, and not because I want to get up in someone's face because I just love hearing how much *beep* goes on in this world

Can you please explain a bit further what you mean by "getting up in someone's face"? What I mean is: if you saw someone standing on the Golden Gate Bridge waiting to jump, would you, just to give an example, walk up to them and say something like "Hi, I'm here if you'd like to talk about what's going on in your life"?

Or would you, say, grab them and try to physically restrain them from jumping?

(Perhaps neither? Both? I'm trying very hard not to put words into your mouth, here.)

I am curious as to whether you would actively interfere in someone's plan to jump, or whether you would simply try to talk to them, not necessarily in the interests of steering them around to some sort of pre-determined conclusion (e.g. suicide is wrong), but in the interests of simply letting them know that someone cares about their well-being?

or how dark someone's life is but because I cant imagine them (the person contemplating suicide)not having someone to at very least, talk to about their feelings.

Perhaps I'm off the mark here, but it sounds to me as though your concern might have a lot less to do with suicide itself and a lot more to do with your being upset at the idea that there are people in the world who might not have anyone to talk to about their problems, someone who actually cares enough about their problems to want to sit down and talk with them.

(Er, does that sound right? Again, this is my own interpretation of what you're saying and I don't want to do your talking for you.)

Sometimes people can be talked around (and the vast majority of the time they appreciate it) and that is what makes it worthwhile for me. judge me all you like for caring.

Speaking for myself, I don't necessarily see people who aren't willing to take on other people's problems as uncaring. I see them, instead, as unable to look beyond their own problems and concerns and acknowledge that there are other people in the world with problems and concerns that are just as real, just as important, to them as their own are.

I don't see that as some sort of "bad" thing. I see it, instead, as a very human quality. Perhaps it's simply my own warped perspective of the world, but it appears to me that there are so many people are walking around in their own personal hells...that I just can't bring myself to make things even worse for them by thinking of them as "uncaring."

[–] MissKateRabbit 10 years ago

Absolutely not. why do you feel the need to over analyse what everyone is saying. I do the job I do to help. I have no agenda.

That is all.

[–] CaramelSquares 10 years ago

As a human being you have an obligation to offer that person assistance. Some only think they want to end their lives and they are on the lookout for any sign of compassion to help see if their worthless (in their eyes) lives are worth living.

If they really want to end it, then no amount of talking will stop them. There really is nothing that can stop someone whom deliberately wants to end their life. And sometimes people are so broken, that ending it is the only peace they are guaranteed. Peace from that nagging voice that tells them they've got this life all figured out. That the rest of us have become desensitized, self absorbing, hypocritical creatures that put importance into the most ridiculous, materialistic things.

...or that their mistakes are unforgivable.

Dr. Kervorkian (sp?) had it right. Because we all have to make our decisions and live by them or die by them. Someone doomed to an end an extraordinary life wearing diapers, tied to bed forgetting whom their loved ones are may prefer to die on their terms. Their illness was not by choice but how they go out could be.

So is the case with mental illness. Much like the example of dementia the person born with depression does not have the disease by choice. Society hears depression and automatically thinks of when Suzie says she is depressed because Biff didn't ask her to the prom. "Come on, snap of it!" is the attitude more than likely most are likely to hear.

There is a pain. A real life threatening debilitating pain, that no amount of drugs or "Happy" songs can cure. Sometimes these people are so broken that they want to end it and can only hope that those who love them understand.

I would be crushed if someone close to me ended their life. My reasons would be selfish because they'd be gone and left me with out a very special part of my life. So I listen now more intently and I try not to take anyone for granted.

Terrible things Lawrence. You've done terrible things.