Should Suicide Be Allowed?

598 Words3 Pages
The extenuating circumstances that surround suicide make it difficult to classify suicide as either a crime or not. Suicide should not be a crime, but that does not mean it is always justified. The subject of the morality of suicide is a controversial issue that is met with gridlock due to the fervent discussion of the topic by both sides. The novel “The Road” and various online articles will prove that suicide is sometimes ethically justifiable. In “The Road” the environment in which people live in is desolate and unforgiving. In this fictitious world suicide is the easy way out. Suicide is not considered a crime because there are no laws. In “The Road” suicide is the only way out of the hell on earth that everyone is forced to live through. The wife of the father commits suicide, leaving the father and the boy alone. The wife claims that she has “taken a new lover” (McCarthy 57). The wife’s new lover is Death and she finally wants to be united with him. The wife uses death as an escape from the harsh world. She is so terrified of the world that she is willing to abandon her new born son, over riding all of her maternal instincts. Her selfish nature is clearly demonstrated here which makes it impossible to deem her suicide just. The wife's behavior is the antithesis of the father's behavior. While the wife was very selfish in nature, the father was selfless. The father attempts throughout the novel to ensure his son's survival at all costs, but to also spare him an unfortunate death. The boy contemplates suicide when he is trapped in the house of the cannibals. The father instructs him that “if they find you you are going to have to do it (pull the trigger)” (McCarthy 113). The boy is going to kill himself in order to escape a painful and degrading death by the hands of the cannibals. This is equivalent to someone with a terminal disease who knows they are going
Open Document