Fun-Sized Advice

On fun-sized advice

I don’t want to find enlightenment I just want to find happiness.
Okay, but they’re both in the same place.

My mom keeps texting me to call me a “whore.” What do I do?
Block her.

Would it be irreversibly creepy if I had a threesome with my sister and her husband?
Yes. Irreversible and creepy. You picked the two perfect words.

Immediately after my best friend passed away I fucked my boyfriend’s best friend. I can’t tell if or how the two are correlated.
Your grief crystalized in the form of shitty behavior. It’s a pretty specific thing to have done, so I’m guessing there’s an angry, fucked-up part of you that figured if you have to lose your best friend, then your boyfriend does as well. That’s probably how the two are correlated.

Do you have to put selling your panties and egg donations on your IRS shit?
If your donor clinic issued you a 1099 (and they probably did) then you should definitely report that income. If it’s only an occasional thing and you’re not using PayPal, then I wouldn’t worry so much about the panty money.

Why do people even bother with an exclusive monogamous relationship if they’re just going to spend the entire three years cheating without any remorse? What’s the appeal in that?
It was never an exclusive monogamous relationship. It was merely the primary relationship that provided some measure of security and the foundation from which your ex could experience the thrill of cheating. You can’t see the appeal in that because you’re not a sociopath. Consider that a good thing.

My father died from cancer about three and a half years ago. I’m getting married next summer, and I’m nervous that I’m going to fall apart on my wedding day because he won’t be there. Any ideas on how to make it suck a little less?
Include him in your plans. Talk with him about all of it, and make sure everyone else does too. You’ll fall apart a few times beforehand, but that’s okay. The only way you’ll fall apart on the actual day is if you continue to believe that he’s not deeply a part of it. He is, and he’ll be there, so save a place for him.

I’ve thought about it a lot, and I think the reason I’ve avoided going to a therapist isn’t self-loathing or contempt for therapy, but the knowledge that I’d make the therapist deeply uncomfortable. My life is awful and unfixable.
Oh, please. You’re not that interesting. Go ahead and try to make a therapist uncomfortable. I dare you.

My mind hasn’t been this clear for years. It’s very soothing, and yet there’s this little hum of something in the back of my head that just won’t go away.
Yes. I’ve mentioned this before, but that’s what I call cosmic background anxiety. It’s a low-level existential angst that’s always there, and you only feel it when all the other noise and static is gone.

Is suicide selfish?
Um, yeah. By definition.

Do I really need my soul?
If you believe you have one, then yeah.

Are you watching fucking Westworld!?
Holy shit, yes. It’s beyond amazing.

Are you happier now than 5 years ago?
Yes, much. Thanks for asking.

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130 thoughts on “On fun-sized advice

    • VeryIrritable says:

      http://imgur.com/NAxKJKp – I superimposed it by lining up the circle with the exact circle border of the map from the site.

      The man in black did all that recent killing to find the maze at “Las Mudas” if I am correct. And i could be totally wrong.

      And also. I believe that the maze lies in the vitruvian mans brain. So when that girl says “the maze is not for you” she’s basically saying brains are not for you. (In my probably crazy interpretation.) So I believe the MiB is actually a host. Remember he said, “you could say I was born here.” Which makes me think he’s Arnolds last creation.

        • VeryIrritable says:

          I think the guest wife is going to die…maybe even next episode.

          The hosts are “things” but we see more of them than the guests…so in a way, they’re already more human.

          What if dr. Ford is the snake and his eggs are Easter eggs?

      • IPR says:

        If you buy into the theory that MiB is William, he could have said he was born there figuratively, as it’s hinted that Westworld is where William finds out who he really is.

        • VeryIrritable says:

          For a moment I thought MiB was Arnold.
          Now I just think MiB was somehow linked to Arnold’s death…or is his son.

          But to steer it back towards the topics at hand…did Arnold commit suicide in the park by asking a host to kill him?

  1. Lin says:

    The threesome-with-my-sister-question made my fucking toes curl. Congrats, OP. It’s not every day I have such a visercal reaction.

    • Jessica Sen says:

      That question put me off even masturbation. I think I might be asexual now after reading that question. Good fucking job, creepy.

    • definitely not batman says:

      And yet the male fantasy of getting it on with twin sisters is so acceptable that it appears semi-regularly in films and sitcoms and shit.

    • Qwerty Bob says:

      Have y’all missed me? … Often, Coke’s OPs have direct ties to the next OP , especialy in the fun-sized-advice sections, in this reader’s mind. Coke may be trying to get us to react (imagine) in certain ways – and if so, brilliant. ANYwho… I read the OP about the mom calling her a whore and my (in my head) response before my eyes even started to read the next post was, “invite your mom to a threesome!” And, bizinga, the next OPs question to Coke was about threesomes. That made me smile

  2. Anna says:

    OMG, I think this is the best stuff you’ve written in a while CQ. Either that or my antidepressants are kicking in.
    So many things to react to !! Here’s the beginning :
    1. I don’t think enlightenment and happiness come from the same place. Joy and enlightenment maybe, but happiness is a fabricated if not entirely invalid experience. My point being that happiness is more of a disposable commodity, whereas the pursuit of light is something linked to the very fabric of what we call a human being.
    2. Your mother is a dick.
    3. Creepy but kinda hot (as long as it’s not my family, I’m fine with the idea).
    4. I am so fucking sorry for your loss. Take care.
    5. Ummm ?
    6. People are fucking stupid right? I think they’re also bad at calculating risk/benefit ratios and it’s linked to prefrontal cortex development till about 25. Also, I’m scared I might have been a sociopath or very depressed.
    7. Write a letter. It will be heard. Remember we’re rooting for you.
    8. Hell yessss, try to make a psychotherapist uncomfortable. Try to make a doctor uncomfortable, or anyone who works in healthcare for that matter. We see an incredible amount of crazy shit, and most of us are rigorously trained to deal with the shit we haven’t seen.

    No comment for the rest except the last question. I am extremely frustrated with a lot of aspects of my life right now, but this is a brutal reminder that I am so much better, my life is so much more rich and beautiful and joyous, than I could ever have imagined 5 years ago. It’s a precious reminder of the fact that even when I am tired and anxious and sad, this life is so much better than it was predicted to be.

  3. Chris says:

    IRS stuff – I’d claim the sales business, too, but for 2 reasons.

    1) you’re probably using PayPal, so it’s traceable, and the IRS is finally getting around to that sort of thing. In fact, they put it on their Dirty Dozen list a few years back, meaning you are at a higher risk of audit.

    2) you can claim a loss by deducting expenses. Have a car payment? Insurance? Run the business from your home? Buy lattes on company time while doing business?

    Not only should you claim this business, but you can operate at a huge loss 2 out of 5 years while just claiming a tiny profit the other years.

      • Chris says:

        I’ve sold my plasma and never claimed it. Also, you’re paid in cash – in my experience – so it’s not traceable to you. Even though there’s electronic trails leading to you being there, there’s no proof you took the money.

        Please note I haven’t sold my plasma since 2007.

        On another note, I donate blood through my job, and when I do, they give me the day off. This could be counted as a form of income, but seeing as I work at the IRS, and they are the ones sponsoring the drive, it seems okay.

        • Chris says:

          Ha! Watch this spurs on some investigation that Treasury employees aren’t paying their fair share. Fucking one percenters that we are.

          Given that there’s 116,000 of us, figure that maybe 10,000 are donating blood twice a year, and it’s maybe $1MM in income. Then let some bonehead use the 25% rate that’s so popular (though not an actual bracket in 2016), and we’re scamming the government out of $250,000.

          Think of all the good that could be done with that money. We’re talking 5 or 6 toilet seats here. Maybe a ride for Paul Ryan and his staff of someone’s private jet while he tells stories about having completed a marathon at a faster time than was recorded…right before he caught a fish that was THIS BIG!

  4. Nina says:

    You’re not going to make the therapist uncomfortable. That’s just an excuse to keep yourself from seeking help. Whatever has happened to you, they’ve already heard it many times before.

    • Ungie says:

      As a therapist I can say for certain that, not only are we unshockable, we don’t tend to think of people in terms of fixable or unfixable. A good therapist we help you understand it’s about the client setting goals and working on a collaborative intervention to meet goals. Client fixes themselves, therapist guides the way.

  5. Strangely Rational says:

    I’ve never liked the idea that suicide is selfish. Suicide is generally* what happens when a person experiences too much psychological trauma to survive. When the physical body experiences too much trauma, it dies and we do not call the person “selfish.” Why should it be any different with the mind, which is not only a physical body part, but the body part that’s specifically responsible for clear decision making? When it’s damaged, decisions are not clear or even necessarily decisions in the sense of making them consciously.

    People don’t generally think of mental illness as potentially being terminal, but that’s basically what suicide is. As with physical trauma, it can happen without warning (for example, someone who receives a devastating emotional blow). As with physical trauma, whether you survive depends on your inherent strengths and weaknesses, your experiences in life, how serious the damage is, how much ability you have to call for help, and whether appropriate assistance is available in time.

    Some people who commit suicide are fully psychotic at the moment and experiencing command voices telling them to do it. They are not in touch with reality at that point. It’s like putting a gun into an unconscious person’s hand, pointing it at their head, and squeezing their finger against the trigger. It’s not a conscious choice, so how could it be selfish?

    Many who commit suicide are in touch with reality, but their illness causes so much pain over such a long period of time that, even with help, life literally becomes torture. There is a certain degree of physical pain that would cause a person to kill themselves if they could see no way out. The same can be true of emotional pain. If it becomes intolerable and someone desperately does the only thing they can to end it, is that selfish?

    If we’re going to call that selfish, then what do we call the belief that another human being should remain tied to this existence no matter how much they’re suffering just so we don’t have to live without that person in our lives? That seems closer to the definition of selfish considering that it involves something that belongs to someone else. But I’m not saying it should be considered that! Because it’s understandable that we can’t face the devastating pain of losing a loved one. If that’s true, though, we need to understand that a person who committed or attempted suicide couldn’t face whatever devastating pain they were in.

    By the way, I’ve been on both sides of the coin there, so I understand that they’re both horrific.

    Lest anyone think I’m encouraging suicide, I am absolutely not doing that. If anything, I think that calling a suicidal person selfish is counterproductive, because trying to guilt someone into remaining alive is not likely to make them feel any better about themselves, and getting the person to feel better is the key to survival. That’s more likely to happen with empathy.

    *Note: I’m not saying that suicide can never be selfish, because people kill themselves for different reasons, and there may be reasons other than trauma.

    • Nat says:

      I’m on board with not your first few paragraphs but I’m calling bullshit on the idea that it’s selfish to keep people alive when they’re feeling suicidal. I’m talking about when feeling suicidal is a result of mental illness, rather than euthanasia for something that is demonstrably untreatable/unresponsive/forever, which I am on board with in some circumstances.

      From my personal experience, suicidal people are generally not thinking straight whatsoever, including the ones that are experiencing their current lives as awful torture. They are panicked, desperate and having an awful time with mental illness and that mental illness has been causing them to think things that aren’t true, e.g. to believe that they will never feel happy again. Their experiences were absolutely real, and they were in touch with that reality, but they (understandably) couldn’t think beyond that pain, and their decision making skills were completely out of kilter and driven by their current emotions.

      One guy I know committed suicide this year, he was experiencing psychosis and I don’t think anyone (including his two brothers, who I’m friends with) feels any anger at him or thought his decision was selfish, because he was really not thinking straight. It’s just a really awful tragic situation.

      The other person I know who has experienced feeling suicidal is my boyfriend. He’s had two really intense bouts of depression, the most recent of which we were living within spitting distance of a suicide hotspot. I had to police him 24/7 for weeks – taking him to work with me, etc. It was so scary and awful, but thankfully after a few months with medication and therapy he was well enough to start working again, and after another year or two, he’s off the anti-depressants and doing absolutely fine. It’s such a relief to remember these times and remember that they’re not my life any more!

      If he’d killed himself while in the midst of all that, would it have been selfish? Well, it would have been all about him and his feelings. He would have thought that he’d be doing everyone a favour, but those are his feelings again because he knew that his family/friends/me want him around a lot because we all love him so much. He knew that, but he thought we were not seeing it clearly.

      I don’t think it would have been “selfish”, though. To me, that implies prioritising yourself above others, just because it’s you. I think in the case of feeling suicidal, the prioritising is happening because of the intensive shittiness of what’s happening. I don’t think he could comprehend at that time that anyone could feel worse than how he was currently feeling (maybe that was true).

      I made him promise not to commit suicide and he hated that idea so much, I can’t tell you. He really wanted that relief, he wouldn’t do it at first, but I really forced the issue. Selfish of me? He saw it like I was making him live this torture-life forever, but I really thought (correctly it turned out, thank fuck!) that this couldn’t last forever, and that I was just dragging him through the torture-months(/weeks/years, I didn’t know) until we were back in the sun. In the end, he promised he wouldn’t, he cried non-stop for weeks (as I dragged him to work with me, and on the weekend to stuff he would usually enjoy – crying the whole time it was awful). It was truly horrible seeing him like that, but I don’t fucking regret it one bit!

      And it was a fucking slog for me, too, and yeah I was doing it for myself, but of course I was also doing it for him. I can be selfish, but I don’t think this qualifies.

      • Strangely Rational says:

        “I’m on board with not your first few paragraphs but I’m calling bullshit on the idea that it’s selfish to keep people alive when they’re feeling suicidal.”

        Uh . . . yeah. I call bullshit on that too. That’s why I said this: “That seems closer to the definition of selfish considering that it involves something that belongs to someone else. But I’m not saying it should be considered that!”

        This is about relating to each other. I see you reacted strongly to the (mistaken) thought that I was suggesting it was selfish. Think about that feeling. Now consider for a second that this is what suicidal people feel like when they’re told THEY are selfish. That’s what I’m getting at.

        Relevant next couple of lines: “Because it’s understandable that we can’t face the devastating pain of losing a loved one. If that’s true, though, we need to understand that a person who committed or attempted suicide couldn’t face whatever devastating pain they were in.”

        I’m not saying don’t HELP them. I’m saying don’t use the word selfish; it’s not productive, as I discussed further down.

        • Nat says:

          I didn’t express myself clearly, so I’m going to try again.

          I don’t think it’s helpful/productive at all to tell suicidal people that suicide is selfish. We agree on that much.

          I also don’t think that suicide is selfish in the full context of the word because they’re not prioritising themselves just because they think they’re more important than others (the larger implication of how we use selfish), but because their problems (at least from their point of view) have bigger magnitude than others. They are still prioritising themselves above others, and that’s by definition selfish. Euthanasia is also selfish to the same extent.

          Keeping someone with a mental illness who is suicidal alive long enough for them to come to stop feeling suicidal is not a selfish act because it’s mostly about helping them and they are, at that point, making irrational decisions, which you have to protect them from. This isn’t selfish even in the minimum “about yourself” sense of the word because you’re trying to help them for them. Additionally, you don’t want to lose them for yourself, so you have a partly selfish motive but it’s not mostly about that. Depending on the situation, it could not even come into it.

          Keeping someone with a physical illness alive when they want to kill themselves (euthanasia) is different to me because they are capable of having a clear perspective, which they are not going to deviate from. Keeping that person alive is selfish in the full context of the word in my opinion, because yes, you’ll miss that person, but you are no longer helping them by keeping them alive.

          Comparing physical and mental illnesses doesn’t make sense to me when you get to keeping people alive… I think this is the main thing I disagree with and was reacting to, even though I couldn’t express it well since I was so worked up about it.

          I can see where your mental illness/physical illness comparison came from (even though I don’t like it)… probably a lot of the “suicide is selfish” talk that you hear (particularly older people say) does stem from a place of not acknowledging that their pain is real/valid. After all, if you don’t think their pain is real/valid, then it’s selfish in the full context of the word and the suicidal person is prioritising themselves just because they think they’re more important than others/callously to others feelings.

          I hope I got more to the heart of things this time.

        • Coco Chanel says:

          Something smells fishy about your logic. Let’s just say it’s a stranger to me. I’m a very irrational person. I love to play dress up and all that jazz, but to be honest, math and science is just a boy’s domain.

    • WhoAmI says:

      Please stop comparing suicide and terminal diseases that’s just gross.
      Suicide IS selfish. Get over it. It’s just, who said being selfish was inherently bad ?

        • Jessica Sen says:

          The difference between suicide and terminal illness is that terminal illness is the final word. You are definitely going to die in tremendous pain so you make a rational choice to end the pain earlier. Suicide results from suffering that is not final and can be ended – and that should be our goal here.

      • KittyNinja says:

        I agree with you, and you can see how people are missing the argument of “why do we shame selfishness,” right? It took me a lonnnnnggg time to get that I was collapsing the two, and I still have issues surrounding guilt for selfishness.

      • Strangely Rational says:

        You do realize that people who have terminal illnesses commit suicide all the time, right? We just have a less connotatively blame-y word for it: euthanasia.

        Do you think they are selfish?

        What I think is gross is all the people out there who cannot understand that pure emotional anguish can be just as bad as pure physical anguish. In fact, mental illnesses can have quite a number of physical symptoms associated with them. For example, ever have a panic attack or know someone who has? That’s not just some little nervous feeling. That can feel like you desperately need to crawl out of your skin. It can feel like you’re physically dying. It’s dreadful.

        As a society, we’re still clinging to this damaging idea that mental illness isn’t really legit. We see someone’s finger on the trigger and think, well, they could have chosen not to do that. Chosen with what? Minds make choices, and when minds have diseases, they don’t function properly. They cause pain, muddy the waters, and often result in desperation.

        I’m not going to “get over it” because I care about people who are going through this, I’m sick of the social stigma, and it’s clear that the more we discuss these things, the more that empathy and understanding spread. That’s what leads to better resources for suffering people. So I’m not going to fucking shut up about it.

        • WhoAmI says:

          This conversation was never about how legitimate mental illness is, or the higher than average suicide rates in mentally ill people.
          Because guess what ? Mental illness is but a minor reason for suicide. Lots of people kill themselves, lots of them mostly fine in their brain chemistry. Of course you have to think your life really sucks to take that non-option. If you think you need to have mental disorders for that, you have a really privileged life.
          (Also dude, you trying to explain to me what a panic attack is like I’m some wide-eyed teenager isn’t going to help you prove anything but that you’re condescending.)

          And yes, again, suicide is selfish. Yes, the cancer patient wanting to end it all because he has but a long agony in front of him, even thought his loving family is heartbroken at the mere idea, is selfish.
          So is his loving family who wants him to stick around as long as possible, even thought he only have a long agony to look forward to.

          We are selfish everyday, all the time, with everyone. And that’s okay. That’s human. Get over it.

        • Jessica Sen says:

          “I’m sick of the social stigma…” -SR

          What about the social stigma of being selfish? Is it selfish to want to allow people to be selfish? Are libertarian children selfish?

    • VeryIrritable says:

      I think that what Cq is saying is that if you apply the phrase selfish as “acting in the interest of one’s own goals over others” within any framework, it is still valid.

      So a person hearing voice?
      Person terminating their life due to suffering?
      Killing themself because the toast is too dark and they don’t ever want that to happen ever again?
      All are actuating towards their own goals without regard of outside input; all of which has varying degrees of relevance or validity.

      The one single thing that is held constant is that they are doing what they believe is in their self interest above others, and is therefore “selfish by nature.”

      • Strangely Rational says:

        That’s ignoring the connotations of that word, which are in many ways more important than denotations, because they reflect what people in the real world interpret it to mean. One has to be aware of this, as the primary burden of communication is on the speaker. In this case, most people believe “selfish” to mean some degree of callous disregard for others.

        That’s not what we have here.

        Consider someone who is in a terrible accident that crushes their legs. In the moment, 100% of this person’s attention is on themselves. They scream and cry for help. Do they care if any of the bystanders are upset by the sight of their injured body? Not a bit. Such a thing isn’t even on their radar.

        But by your definition, that would qualify as “selfish.” Have you ever heard anyone apply that word to someone in that situation, though? Why not?

        Maybe because we understand that when someone is in serious pain, that’s not the time to be using a word that implies some deficit in their character, whether we mean it in that sense or not.

        • VeryIrritable says:

          First, let me say I am so glad we are back to nuance. Thank you for that.

          I see your point about how justified the self actuation is. But it doesn’t matter whether it’s justified or not. And that’s why it’s still selfish. The most valuable asset we have as human beings is the ability to make decisions for our self. We, at least the intellectually honest ones here, believe that consciousness is the most valued thing each of us have and, to one degree or another, control.

          So if you believe that others should intervene in the ultimate decision, then it’s a matter of nuance to you. But if you don’t, then that act remains within the boundary of absolute selfishness.

        • WhoAmI says:

          Ever heard about, say, egoism in ethics ? I mean, it’s seen as even worse in widepsread oral language than selfishness, and yet it’s still a totally neutral word at its core (i’m not condoning this school of idea tho).

          It’s not because people only call muslim bombers terrorists that they know better about the english language, or that the word actually mean that. Terrorism is a fairly neutral philosophical idea, it’s only seen as bad in politics because duh, terrorism is all about public expression which doesn’t follow the ways the ruling political system condones. Graffiti is terrorism. Wearing a mask in public is terrorism. A white guy shooting people at school is terrorism.

          In the same way, selfish is only a bad word in the mouth of the people who are so self-centered they think nobody should be selfish with them.

      • Coco Chanel says:

        Haven’t you never heard of formatting?

        I mean, I’m open to people writing like fucking children in kindergarten, but it would be SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO much easier to read.

        Amateur hour.

  6. coskel says:

    When the physical body experiences too much trauma, it dies and we do not call the person “selfish.” Why should it be any different with the mind, which is not only a physical body part, but the body part that’s specifically responsible for clear decision making? When it’s damaged, decisions are not clear or even necessarily decisions in the sense of making them consciously.

    You just validated your username and gave me a LOT to think about.

    • Strangely Rational says:

      Whenever someone says I’ve given them something to think about – whether they agree or disagree – that is the best compliment someone can give me! Thank you!

  7. Elsie says:

    If you believe you have a choice then suicide is selfish.

    If you don’t believe you have a choice then you probably are mentally ill.

    The two categories blur into each other.

    • Jessica Sen says:

      None of us have free will. So let’s dispense with the confusion here.

      What Coke is saying is that transcending the idea of free will, our actions can be judged as selfish. Definition of selfish being putting one’s welfare above others. Suicidal people reach a breaking point and then do it. They make a choice that their pain is worth stopping despite causing others pain. It’s a choice that by definition prioritizes your own welfare.

      She is not making a value judgment, saying this person is a bad person for choosing so. She’s making a definitive conclusion about the nature of the person’s choice.

      That being said, don’t do it. It’s irreversible. You cannot feel relief from pain if you are dead.

      • Strangely Rational says:

        “They make a choice that their pain is worth stopping despite causing others pain.”

        The thing a lot of people don’t get is that in many cases, people commit suicide with the idea that they’re doing everyone a favor.

        I have bipolar disorder. My inner life is somewhat of a chaotic mess, although I try my best to keep it together for my kids. Still, the house is often a disaster, and I often feel like I’m a bad mother because I can’t work, and I’m often lying in bed not interacting with them. (Not neglect, mind you, because they’re 10 and 12 and don’t need close supervision.)

        The reality of the situation, if I’m in a moment I can think about it clearly, is that I do my best and there are many, many things I’ve done and taught my kids to enrich their lives. I feel good about my parenting style (guide, not dictator), and my kids are happy and healthy. But when the depression hits, that’s not how I see it. I think about their dad’s museum-clean house, his salary that means they never want for anything, and how much he plays with them.

        If it gets bad enough, I genuinely believe that they would be better off with him and I’m just a pathetic wreck who can’t do anything right.

        Some people believe that they’ve done bad enough things that they deserve to die. They think it’ll be a relief for their loved ones to be rid of them. This describes my husband, who cannot forgive himself for his substance abuse issues. People with mental illness often believe things that are untrue. It’s part of the illness, and it’s why you can’t assume that there’s logic to their “choices” or that they can even see anything outside their head.

        For the record, I don’t think Coquette is using the word as a value judgment against someone’s character. I’m saying that this is how it’s generally interpreted. The word is too strongly connected to character deficits, and that can interfere with helping people who are already emotionally/mentally unstable. Why is it even necessary to point it out?

      • Strangely Rational says:

        “You cannot feel relief from pain if you are dead.”

        This is absolutely true, and it can be a really effective thing to say to someone who isn’t right on the brink, so it bears repeating!

        Problem is, from an actively suicidal person’s standpoint, you cannot feel pain if you are dead. Sometimes oblivion itself feels like it would be a relief. That’s the first reaction I had to it in thinking about times I’ve felt suicidal, and I just asked my husband (who also is sometimes), and he responded by saying, “Death is relief from pain.”

        I’m not saying that to be argumentative. It’s just best if people who are trying to help understand the skewed thought process. Logic, no matter how sound, probably won’t register at a certain point. Promises of comfort in the future probably won’t register because the future doesn’t exist, and a permanent solution may feel like a good thing in the moment. What an actively suicidal person needs to hear is, “Let’s figure out how to get you at least some relief right now.”

        Another good one when someone is thinking about committing suicide is to say that at this point they have nothing to lose by just waiting another day. Sometimes the knowledge that you can always do it if things get too bad helps you get through each day. In fact, the “nothing to lose” aspect can inspire you to take greater risks with your life that may wind up genuinely improving things. Pretty sure I read that here at some point, and it made a big difference to me.

        • Jessica Sen says:

          “What an actively suicidal person needs to hear is, “Let’s figure out how to get you at least some relief right now.” ” -SR

          I agree. Compassion in the face of unbearable pain is the only way to be heard. Not even in the slightest joking – have you tried pot cookies? Marijuana is the safest, mildest, most compassionate medicine I can think of to alleviate pain while finding long-term solutions. The reason I suggest cookies over smoking is edibles are less likely to produce anxiety.

      • rainbowpony says:

        Umm, no. Free will is an idea for philosophers and PhD psychologists; you need to think more practically. We never have 100% control over our lives, at times we have the only the slimmest margin of control. But it’s all we have. If you go through life saying you have no free will – if you never recognize your actions as choices – its going to be a rough one.

        I absolutely am not saying that I think that you can just change your thinking and snap out our mental illness. I’ve had terrible anxiety issues in my life and I know that isn’t how it works. But I wouldn’t be here today if I hadn’t exercised the slim margin of control I had in some of my worst moments. I had to choose to ask for help. I had to choose to show up for appointments. I had to choose to listen to a therapist. When I wound up at square one again, I had to choose to recognize that I was at square one. It sounds reductive to put it into words and I’m not a writer like Coq is; I don’t think its easy at all, these choices spanned years, and there are lots of things I can’t control. That doesn’t mean you don’t work with what you have.

        I’ve also known people that have stubbornly refused to seek help for serious conditions for long periods of time. I’m not talking about an acute manifestation of mental illness like suicide attempts, I’m talking about long slogs of depression or anxiety or personality disorders. And after a decade or so its gets very hard to say, “people have no free will.”

        • WhoAmI says:

          You don’t need free will to be held responsible for your actions, especially by yourself.
          Free will is just as much of a delusion as determinism. We are all little chaotic messes made up of our never ending education, ever changing environment and body. The final results are all mind-boggingly nuanced and different from each other and yet all of them fall not so far from each other and are predictable from afar.

          On a side note, people making bad decisions regarding their low mental health is, often, a direct result of that same low mental health. Free will my ass. But again, you don’t need free will to be held responsible for your actions, especially by yourself.

          • Rainbowpony says:

            How can you not have free will and yet hold yourself accountable for your actions? Whatever. I don’t actually care.

            Honestly, that’s why I think the idea of free will is besides the point, it’s to philosophical and high level for the more practical decision we are having here. The more practical point being that any one that looks at a series of choices and says they have no free will is probably a bit if a psycopath. Free will may have many levels of meaning, but in everyday practice it sounds like an excuse.

          • WhoAmI says:

            “How can you not have free will and yet hold yourself accountable for your actions?” It’s called having a conscience, honey.

          • Jessica Sen says:

            I see the entire world – all there is – as one chemical experiment. Just molecules interacting in what must be determined paths.

            The idea of free will comes from the illusion of separate selves – I think this, and you think that.

            Babel, even when everyone speaks English like a motherfucker.

          • Rainbowpony says:

            Yeah we know jessica. You have no free will to stop spamming this comments section. The illusion of separate selves? Ok, I don’t even know what that is.

            Whoami, Ok, but I think conscience and free will are incompatible ideas. But yeah, I guess you can just throw that out there like it’s so obvious. You realize you believe the human mind can be reduced to behaviourism, right? I guess on some physical level that’s true, but unless youre just having fun thinking about it, it’s not a helpful idea to get you through life.

          • WhoAmI says:

            I didn’t throw the word chaotic around just for giggles ; behaviorism try to (and to a certain level, with a lot of approximations and what not, can) predict human behavior from a chosen few fundamental rules. A laudable effort, but basically useless because an human mind is complex. And from complexity emerges chaotic behavior.
            That is, as I said, most people fall on a certain, determinable spectrum, but where on the spectrum they end up is unpredictable. And since the general population is so big and we are born and dead so quickly, the few percents right out of that spectrum actully make up a population of hundreds and thousands.
            Here. Everything solved with Chaos theory 101 and the quasi-chaotic movement of celestial bodies for ya. You’re welcome.

            We don’t have free will because we aren’t, as minds, pure entities of energy standing in the center of a supervoid only adressing each other unilaterally through the movement of intricated particles (yet !)
            Indeed, we have an environment. What do you do with an environment ? Evolve in it, interact with it, have it permeate you. That’s what an evnironment is.
            Part of our environment is our self, from which we are inseparable most of the time (read : we are never truly alone, but always in the presence of our self). It follows that we judge our self and our self judge us always. That is what will slowly build our conscience. It follows that you can have morals and ethics and choice without having free will at all.
            I feel like I just explained to you some junior year of highschool level philosophy and it was a pain in the ass to write, so be fucking thankful girl. That’s some cogito ergo sum level bs here girl.

            And that’s not just some totally ideal paradigm we’re discussing without any practical effect on how to think our actions in everyday life, read some Pascal or some Socrate (or Socrates or whatever, bloody brittons) or some Plato or some Arendt. Open one damn book in your damn life and read it.
            Man, and now I’m pissed.

            (About jessica sen’s comment ; i think she means that basically the idea of a hivemind is just a caricatural extreme of what happens with every social species out there, us included. But it’s just my interpretation, you never know with abstract art amirite ?)

          • Rainbowpony says:

            I might be in the numbers business now, but my original training was in Cognitive Science. I’ve opened quite a few books in my life time, and while I didn’t specialize in decision making and this “free will” nonsense, I did run into those topics from time to time, as one must.

            Here’s one you might like, although its pretty academic:
            Decisions, Uncertainty and the Brain by Paul Glimcher

            Chaos theory. Are we two characters in Jurassic Park or what?)? We are talking biological systems so Complexity is more relevant. And Complexity is a way out of materialist determinism and a lack of free will, Complexity does not confirm a lack of free will. So saying there is no free will and then telling me things are complex is like… what?

            You’re not pissed because I don’t read the right books, your pissed because I’m poking around your world view. Take a deep breath; you don’t have to change anything because of some asshole commenter on the interwebs.

            While I’m throwing shit out there, you know what else is an illusion? Morality. Its a fiction humans write, and have been writing for thousands of years. But if I wandered around with that as a basis of my worldview, saying that in every day conversation, explaining that to my therapist to understand my behavior, I’d be a total psychopath.

          • Coco Chanel says:

            Everyone’s a little psycho, so let’s go be psychos together.

            As long as we’re responsible about it, I don’t see why teacher should scold us for sneaking off to the playground to chain-smoke weed cigarettes.

            Right? Wait, there’s no right or wrong. Only religious nonsense makes it so.

  8. VeryIrritable says:

    “You cannot feel relief from pain if you are dead.”

    I would however like to point out the obvious prophylactic qualities of suicide.

    • Jessica Sen says:

      Obviously. You are still choosing an action that prevents future pain at the cost of literally everything. It’s a Pyrrhic victory.

  9. The Coquette says:

    Since y’all are starting to put words in my mouth, allow me to clarify. The act of suicide is inherently selfish. It is literally the act of killing one’s self. There’s no value judgement attached to the fact that it is selfish, but the fact that it is selfish is definitionally unavoidable.

    • JC says:

      That is how I read it. By definition, suicide = self murder.

      As to all the other comments, I do not personally owe anyone else my presence on this planet. How come people always think that one should “never live for others” except when it’s literal?

      Granted, I probably won’t off myself, but I’ve come close. For sure, the fact that it would hurt other people was a factor in not doing it. However, some people have pain that is overwhelming, and all the “you are self-absorbed” pile-on doesn’t help.

      • Coco Chanel says:

        Everyone says I’m so self-absorbed. I’m so sick of it! I’d donate my pony’s kidney to get them to shut the fuck up. Oh, hell.

      • JC says:

        Yeah, it’s not a two-way street. Coquette is god, and you are a mere mortal. She doesn’t need your words in her mouth.

        *bows down at the oracle

          • JC says:

            Really, because she refers to herself as an “accidental guru.” Of course, maybe I’m wrong and she’d much rather be called a bitch and essentially told to sit down and be quiet while you misconstrue her words.

            I wish Coquette would ban you from posting here. Occasionally you say something worthwhile, but most of your posts are childish, off-topic and/or condescending. You seem to enjoy annoying people, which makes you look insecure and petty.

          • Jessica Sen says:

            Guru means spiritual teacher. Jesus and Buddha didn’t refer to themselves as gods but as messengers or teachers.

            I wasn’t telling the bitch to sit down and shut up. My message was actually the equivalent of a virtual nod of respect, without being a kissass like some.

            Feel free to email Coke and put in a request to ban me from the forums. I’m a happy subject of her jurisdiction.

  10. J Lynn says:

    Because politics has been a frequent topic on Coquette lately (tho not in this post), here’s a little Elections info. [[Coquette — if this is inappropriate here, or you would prefer it elsewhere, my apologies, and feel free to cut or move as you see fit.]]

    Here are some ways to make voting easier:
    1 Early voting before Election Day at the local county office or designated sites.
    2 Mail-in or absentee ballot
    3 On Election Day, show up early. The lines are longer after 5pm.

    The 1st two options have requirements that vary by state — ID, deadlines, etc. Some states’ deadlines for registration and/or mail-ins have passed, but many have not. If you google it + [your state] it’s usually not too hard to find, but here some useful nonpartisan web sites for further info:

    Election Protection Coalition (national nonpartisan org) 1-866-OUR-VOTE hotline
    US Vote Foundation (national nonprofit nonpartisan org)
    Ballotpedia (neutral elections and political information website)

    Also — because I’m obsessed with the election right now, I hereby offer to do any voting/candidate research you want for you, even local stuff. Just reply here (if it gets too involved we can take it to email).

    • Maria says:

      I’ve been missing you and your comments! This is great information and a great offer. I don’t have any need to take you up on it, myself, but did want to say I appreciate it!

    • Coco Chanel says:

      Hey what’s going on with Hillary, Bernie and Trump? I’ve been in hospital for months and the only website they don’t ban is CokeTalk.

  11. Teal says:

    As an only child I can only take it for granted that incest is creepy, but why exactly is it creepy? If it’s between parent and child I can understand the roles and power dynamics that make it unhealthy, but wouldn’t that stuff be more equal with siblings? Do filial relationships become inherently unhealthy when mixed up with romantic/sexual notions (similar to how it would complicate platonic relationships), and is it that unnatural to happen?

    • grouch says:

      There’s an awful lot of woo and pseudoscience on the subject, and the causal relationship is fairly ambiguous, but if you read the wiki article on the Westermarck effect, it’ll tell you what is thought to be, if not why. Mostly it doesn’t happen. Most people are disgusted by it. I mean, consenting adults can do what they like, but it’s just weird.

      • Jessica Sen says:

        Disgust is not necessarily an indicator of the morality of a thing, though.

        Disgust is a instinctive response wired through millions of years of evolution – the rate of childhood defect in offspring created by incest couples is higher, those that have defects are less likely to survive, those who are disgusted by it and don’t do it more likely to pass their genes on – all that means nothing about morality and everything about biological happenstance.

        To give an example, I am disgusted by lizards but there’s nothing wrong with them. In fact, we evolved from giant lizards brave enough to forsake eyesight for new lands.

  12. Jessica Sen says:

    I projected Ben Hur today at my family barbecue and boy, it was good.

    – – –

    “Now listen to me, all of you. You are all condemned men. We keep you alive to serve this ship. So row well, and live.”

  13. Soooooooooooooooo says:

    Jessica was making sense in here. It was a good convo until…I can’t actually pin point when Jessica was provoked. But she was provoked.

  14. wrkrb says:

    JC is probably most upset about being schooled on the god comment which quite frankly smacked me with a big ick factor as well. If Cq held that attitude why would she have a comments section? In an era of echo effects it’s even more important to form creative responses to differences of opinion and expression rather than resorting to censorship and aggression.

    • Jessica Sen says:

      Wow. You just succinctly and perfectly summarized what I spent years incoherently raging against: my old-fashioned household and the ‘benevolent’ dictatorship I was brought up in.

      What do you think CQ actually censors here? What types of people do you think she would ban? What is the secret ingredient of her mad madeleines?

      She hasn’t banned JC or myself, so obviously bitches and retards are OK.

      • Coco Chanel says:

        Hey guys? How do I change my avatar? I’m so bad at this computer stuff. I have to get my boyfriend to do it. That stuff’s too boring to learn.

      • Coco Chanel says:

        The Nig Prince suggested it but I still haven’t figured it out!

        Nevermind, all good.

        A cool dude’s sitting next to me in a café and I can simply use him!

  15. wrkrb says:

    All of us can observe that we are able to make unlimited aliases as we respond and therefore can’t be banned. I’ve never moderated a comment section so I don’t know what might need to be removed but considering our feedback doesn’t get approved before appearing in the thread I doubt it’s an issue.

    I keep coming back to Coquette because she’s aggressive about peeling the veneer off of realities, pulling the curtains open so the false narratives shrink back into the nothing where they belong.

    The only time I ever felt like she was totally off was in the beginning of this election when my pathetic idealism still thought the third parties could amount to more than a votesplitting bellyache but hey! Donald Trump showed up and I immediately agreed with her point of view because the stakes were suddenly frightening.

    • WhoAmI says:

      I’ve only seen her delete things like long conversations going nowhere and turning violent, or just mean and meaningless and unfunny stuff.
      You can extrapolate that she doesn’t think of jessica’s rants as any of those things. Or that she doesn’t have the fucking time to sort them out.

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