Military suicides are not done out of selfishness

When will I stop reading idiotic statements like this? Ranger Up Talks Suicide: Suicide is Selfish starts out with this,

"If you’ve been keeping count, The Rhino Den has posted 17 articles on suicide this week with all sorts of facts, theories, and personal stories about how and why it happens so much in our military these days. Most of them are uplifting and/or take a soft approach to the issue. If you want one of those stories, stop reading here. My stance is different. Some people respond to coddling and handholding. Some respond to being kicked in the ass. For those people I say suicide is a decision, not a disease and those who commit it are being selfish.

Now let me clarify something; there is a difference between suicide committed by a rational person and suicide committed by a mentally ill person. I’m not talking about those lost in the grips of psychoses who cannot discern between right and wrong or those with a diagnosed chemical imbalance that they cannot control. I’m referring to sane people who take their lives because an event significantly affected them or they were unable to deal with a pressing issue. One day, years ago, that was me."

If that makes this person an authority on why people commit suicide, then I must have a PHD I didn't know about.

Wow where do I start on this? Why would I even bother? Because people will read it and get the wrong idea reenforced.

Aside from the book I wrote on military suicides there are 1,365 posts on military suicides here on Wounded Times, plus 4,115 on combat PTSD and 5,658 on Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. The article sounds more like the same bullshit coming out of Fort Bliss Major General Dana Pittard when he called soldiers who committed suicide "selfish" but did not seem to be thinking about the vast majority of them that did think of their comrades first.

I never tried to commit suicide but I sure do know what it is like to want to die instead of live. That is in another book and another part of my life but what makes this all too unbearable to read the above is the simple fact I have talked to too many veterans after they were standing in the ledge yet again after 2, 3 or 4 other attempts. Selfish is not in their vocabulary. Much like Dakota Meyer didn't want to become a burden to his family and put a gun to his head, pulled the trigger but lived to tell his story, he was not selfish during combat when he earned the Medal of Honor or afterwards when he came home. But there is an even larger list of others wanting to heal to still be of service to others and they want to make sure others do not suffer the same way they did. They've seen way too many die as well.