altruistic suicide

If a person willingly ends his or her own life, it is not necessarily considered a tragic death by the society around them. Émile Durkheim notes that in some cultures there is a duty to intentionally commit ritual suicide.

A Japanese samurai intentionally ends life (seppuku) to preserve honor and to avoid disgrace. Indian, Japanese, and other widows have participated in an end-of-life ritual suicide after the death of a husband, although Westernized populations have abandoned this practice. The Indian practice of widow suicide is called sati, and often entails the widow lying down on her husband’s funeral pyre in an act of self-immolation. The elderly members of certain cultures intentionally ended their lives, in what is termed as senicide. In hunter-gatherer societies,{{cite book| title=Geronticide: Killing the Elderly

| url=https://archive.org/details/geronticidekilli00brog

| url-access=limited

|author=Brogden, Michael |location=London and Philadelphia |publisher=Jessica Kingsley Publishers Ltd.|year=2001|page=[https://archive.org/details/geronticidekilli00brog/page/n57 57]|isbn=978-1-85302-709-3}} death "was determined for the elderly ... normally characterized by a liminal period and ceremonies in which the old person was transferred from the present world to the next."

Durkheim also observes that altruistic suicide is unlikely to occur much in contemporary Western society where "individual personality is increasingly freed from the collective personality".{{citation|title=Lecture on Emile Durkheim|url=http://home.ku.edu.tr/~dyukseker/lecture-durkheim2-05.doc|author=Deniz Yükseker|access-date=2010-06-20|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110716065736/http://home.ku.edu.tr/~dyukseker/lecture-durkheim2-05.doc|archive-date=2011-07-16|url-status=dead}} Altruistic suicide has been described as an evolutionarily stable strategy.{{cite book|first=Steven |last=Mascaro |author2=Kevin B. Korb |author3=Ann E. Nicholson |title=Advances in Artificial Life |chapter=Suicide as an Evolutionarily Stable Strategy |series=Lecture Notes in Computer Science |volume=2159 |year=2001|pages=120–132 |doi=10.1007/3-540-44811-X_12|isbn=978-3-540-42567-0 }} Altruistic suicide has a long history in India, even being noted in the Dharmashastras.{{cite journal|title=Altruistic suicide in India|first= Lakshmi |last=Vijayakumar|journal=Archives of Suicide Research |date=January 2004 |issue=8| volume=1 |pages=73–80 |doi=10.1080/13811110490243804 |pmid= 16006390|s2cid= 41567060 }} Some perceive self-immolation as an altruistic or "worthy" suicide.{{cite book |last=Coleman |first=Loren |author-link=Loren Coleman |title=The Copycat Effect: How the Media and Popular Culture Trigger the Mayhem in Tomorrow's Headlines |title-link=The Copycat Effect|publisher=Paraview Pocket Books |year=2004 |isbn=978-0-7434-8223-3 |language=en |page=48}}

In contemporary Western society, this is seldom referred to as suicide, and most often referred to as an act of heroism. This only exists in times of emergency, and is always lauded, and is perceived as a tragic death.{{Citation needed|date=August 2022}}

Self-sacrificial acts of heroism, such as falling on a grenade, is one example.{{cite journal |title=Death by hand grenade: altruistic suicide in combat |first=JA |last=Blake |journal=Suicide and Life-Threatening Behavior |date=Spring 1978 |volume=8 |issue=1 |pages=46–59 |doi=10.1111/j.1943-278X.1978.tb01084.x |pmid=675772|s2cid=37732899 }} Intentionally remaining on the deck of a sinking ship to leave room in the life rafts, intentionally ending one's life to preserve the resources of a group in the face of deprivation, and the like are suicidal acts of heroism. Firefighters, law-enforcement individuals, undercover agents, sailors, and soldiers more often are at risk of opportunities for this form of unplanned self-sacrifice. These are all a result of tragic, life-threatening, emergencies. It is only an emergency measure, a voluntary but unwanted end to the person's life. It is never a result of long-term planned action, yet may involve some short-term planning. Examples of this include Vince Coleman, a telegraph operator who saved hundreds of lives by sending out a warning about an imminent explosion.

Bobby Sands, an officer of the Irish Republican Army, died after 66 days of hunger striking while imprisoned. The strike was part of a larger set of 1981 protests by Irish prisoners which centered on 5 demands: the right not to wear a prison uniform; the right not to do prison work, the right of free association with other prisoners, and to organise educational and recreational pursuits, the right to one visit, one letter, and one parcel per week, and full restoration of remission lost through the protest.{{cite news |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/july/18/newsid_2514000/2514727.stm |website=1981: Violence erupts at Irish hunger strike protest |publisher=BBC |title=1981: Violence erupts at Irish hunger strike protest |date=18 July 1981 }}

Nuamthong Praiwan, a taxi driver who attempted suicide, drove his taxi into a tank in protest after the military coup of 2006. He was later found hanging from a pedestrian footbridge. Officials found a suicide note and later ruled his death a suicide.[https://web.archive.org/web/20070121184910/http://www.nationmultimedia.com/2006/11/02/headlines/headlines_30017813.php Taxi driver 'sacrificed himself for democracy']

In 2020, Khanakorn Pianchana, a Thai judge, committed suicide to protest the Thai justice system. He made a suicide attempt in October 2019, when he shot himself in the chest with a pistol in the Yala province court, after he acquitted five men on murder and firearms charges due to lack of evidence and reading a short statement, in order to protest against interference in the justice system. He died in a second attempt in March 2020, after being subject to investigations following his actions.{{cite news |title=Senior judge dies in second suicide bid |url=https://www.bangkokpost.com/thailand/general/1873689/senior-judge-dies-in-second-suicide-bid |accessdate=7 March 2020 |work=Bangkok Post |date=7 March 2020}}

As of May 2022, 160 monks, nuns, and ordinary people have self-immolated in Tibet{{Cite news|last=Fadiman|first=Anne|date=2020-07-28|title=The Chinese Town That Became the Self-Immolation Capital of the World|language=en-US|work=The New York Times|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/28/books/review/eat-the-buddha-barbara-demick.html|access-date=2020-10-21|issn=0362-4331}}{{cite news|title=Tibetan Monk Dies After Self-Immolating In Eastern Tibet|work=Free Tibet|url=https://freetibet.org/news-media/na/tibetan-monk-dies-after-self-immolating-eastern-tibet|access-date=20 May 2017}}{{cite news|author=Wong|first=Edward|date=11 April 2015|title=Nun Sets Herself on Fire to Protest Chinese Rule in Tibet|work=The New York Times|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/12/world/asia/nun-sets-herself-on-fire-to-protest-chinese-rule-in-tibet.html|access-date=11 April 2015|quote=She was the second woman to set herself on fire this year and the 138th Tibetan to do so since 2009 in Tibetan regions ruled by China, according to the International Campaign for Tibet, an advocacy group based in Washington.}}{{Cite web |title=Self-immolations |url=https://savetibet.org/tibetan-self-immolations/ |access-date=2022-07-17 |website=International Campaign for Tibet |language=en-US}} as a form of protest against since 27 February 2009, when Tapey, a young monk from Kirti Monastery, set himself on fire in the marketplace in Ngawa City, Ngawa County, Sichuan.{{cite news|title=In Occupied Tibetan Monastery, a Reason for Fiery Deaths|url=http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/03/world/asia/wave-of-tibet-self-immolations-challenges-chinese-rule.html|accessdate=June 3, 2012|newspaper=The New York Times|date=June 2, 2012|author=Edward Wong|url-access=subscription}}{{verify source|date=December 2023|reason=Speculative fix for missing reference}} According to the International Campaign for Tibet (ICT),Self-immolation fact sheet, (2 December 2019), https://savetibet.org/tibetan-self-immolations/ "Chinese police have beaten, shot, isolated, and disappeared self-immolators who survived."{{Cite news|last=Ross|first=Tracy|date=24 September 2019|title=Tibet Is Still Burning|work=Outside|url=https://www.outsideonline.com/2402414/self-immolation-tibet|access-date=21 October 2020}}

Tarek el-Tayeb Mohamed Bouazizi was a Tunisian street vendor who set himself on fire on 17 December 2010 in Sidi Bouzid, Tunisia, an act which became a catalyst for the Tunisian Revolution and the wider Arab Spring against autocratic regimes. His self-immolation was in response to the confiscation of his wares and the harassment and humiliation inflicted on him by a municipal official and her aides.

Norman Morrison was an American anti-war activist. On November 2, 1965, Morrison doused himself in kerosene and set himself on fire below the office of Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara at the Pentagon[https://web.archive.org/web/20080422072951/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,834576,00.html "The Pacifists"], Time Magazine, November 12, 1965; accessed July 23, 2007. to protest United States involvement in the Vietnam War. North Vietnam named a Hanoi street after him, and issued a postage stamp in his honor.BBC (21 december, 2010).[https://web.archive.org/web/20110107115749/http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/programmes/2010/12/101221_outlook_vietnam_self_immolation.shtml A life in flames: Anne Morrison Welch] Instead of increasing anti-war sentiment, much of the attention this act received in the West focused on speculating why Morrison brought his infant daughter along.{{cite journal |last1=Abraham |first1=Margaret |date=2015|title=The Intersections of Protest Suicides, Oppression and Social Justice |url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/302555171 |journal=Journal of the Brazilian Sociological Society |volume=1 |issue=1 |pages=17–31 |access-date=7 December 2023}} This may be because public suicides in the West tend to be viewed through the same lens as other forms of suicide attributed to causes such as psychiatric disorder, instead of as a form of protest, perhaps due to Christian values historically associated with these cultures.

On April 22, 2022, climate activist Wynn Alan Bruce set himself on fire in the plaza of the United States Supreme Court Building in Washington, D.C. The fatal self-immolation, which took place on Earth Day, was characterized by Bruce's friends and his father as a protest against the climate crisis.

On February 25, 2024, American serviceman Aaron Bushnell died after lighting himself on fire outside the Israeli embassy in Washington, D.C., to protest the Israeli government's conduct in the Gaza war and his own government's support of Israel.

In 1963, Vietnamese monk Thich Quang Duc committed altruistic suicide through the means of self-immolation. He did this to protest the treatment of Buddhist practicing peoples by the South Vietnamese government.{{Cite web |last=Oliver |first=Mark |date=2017-10-03 |title=The Full Story Of The Burning Monk Who Changed The World |url=https://allthatsinteresting.com/thich-quang-duc-burning-monk |access-date=2022-10-16 |website=All That's Interesting |language=en-US}}{{Cite web |last=VBC |date=2021-06-10 |title=Thich Quang Duc, the Buddhist Monk Who Lit a Match and Sparked a Revolt in 1963 |url=https://veteransbreakfastclub.org/thich-quang-duc-the-buddhist-monk-who-lit-a-match-and-sparked-a-revolt-in-1963/ |access-date=2022-10-16 |website=Veterans Breakfast Club |language=en-US}}

• Advocacy of suicide
• Altruism
• Autothysis
• Cadmean victory
• Half a Life (Star Trek: The Next Generation)
• HMS Birkenhead (1845)
• Human shield
• Martyr
• Pyrrhic victory
• Revolutionary Suicide
• Self-denial
• Self-sacrifice in Jewish law
• Utilitarianism

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Category:Concepts in ethics