Suicide is not only about proximate causes.
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The reasons someone commits suicide at a particular moment aren’t all the reasons they commit suicide. Often those aren’t even the most important reasons. No one likes this part of the explanation. It makes an event that’s already as awful as it can be more awful, because it renders it inexplicable. Most of us, even with our occasional desires for the ground to swallow us up, can sympathize but never really empathize.
Poignant piece by Clay Shirky on the complexities of suicide in light of Aaron Swartz’s heartbreaking death.
