Suicide as Unfreedom and Vice Versa

34 Pages Posted: 20 Feb 2011 Last revised: 17 Jun 2014

Date Written: February 19, 2011

Abstract

In this paper, I problematize the suicides out of despair (hereafter sod) as statements of unfreedom. The paper is divided into six sections. The first section introduces the problem and situates it within the existing scholarship. The second section puts forward the first of the two arguments the paper engages: suicide as unfreedom. In this section, the situational and essential ontology of suicide is briefly discussed and then I proceed to classify two major forms of unfreedoms emergent from the historical ontology of human social life: slavery and bare life. The third section of the paper problematizes unfreedom as freedom corrupted both from the perspectives of Heideggerian essent’ial ontology and Badiouian situational ontology through set theoretical models of freedom/unfreedom. Subsequently three sets of unfreedom: heteronomy, atomy and bare life and one set of freedom vis-à-vis autonomy is logically derived and discussed. Freedom is presented as a directive idea helpful in doing away with unfreedoms. Then the second of the two problems – unfreedom as suicidal- is briefly discussed. The concluding section draws that despite the emergent historical reality having framed human social life as unfree, we could still be hopeful in recovering freedom as the essential ontology of the human species and the eventual (événementiel) potential of the situational ontology of life is not fundamentally unfree.

Keywords: Suicide, Unfreedom, Heteronomy, Autonomy, Atomy

Suggested Citation

Prabakaran, Madhu, Suicide as Unfreedom and Vice Versa (February 19, 2011). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1764389 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1764389

Madhu Prabakaran (Contact Author)

affiliation not provided to SSRN

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