Robin Williams found dead at 63

[Atomoa]

Yes, when he could have made the choice to help so many instead. Sell the Napa Valley mansion for say, 22 million instead of $29 million.

The money the Napa ranch would have netted goes directly to his ex wives. He was forced to do television. Imagine where your career would be @ age 62. Now picture yourself having to apply at McDonalds after making "Good Will Hunting".

Tell you what. Manage to infect yourself with Parkinson's and you go help people.

After all, it's your life. Robins was his.

My family knows the minute if I get a debilitating/terminal diagnosis that I will take a long walk in the woods long before I set foot in a hospice.

[Queen K]

McDonald's? Really?

The rest is just uncalled for.

And a movie job is a movie job, and nothing more.

[Atomoa]

McDonald's? Really?

Television is to movie starts (good ones at that) as McDonald's is to the common citizen in terms of employment.

You wont see Meryl Streep doing a sitcom along side Anthony Hopkins anytime soon. John Malcovich doing a used car lot commercial?

...people actually *care* what they do, you know. People like to take pride in their work. Especially artists.

He's not your personal clown, and he doesn't owe the world anything in terms of being a face of a disease. He's not your puppet and he doesn't answer to your expectations of what you think he should do with HIS life.

[vinnied]

Sure does if you're a gold digging biatch.

well we can put some blame on the judges in the courts as well, there the ones who got to decide how much of his money he needed to shell out to these gold diggers. Funny how they cant read between the lines.

[Queen K]

He's not your personal clown, and he doesn't owe the world anything in terms of being a face of a disease. He's not your puppet and he doesn't answer to your expectations of what you think he should do with HIS life.

First of all, I'm the last person on Earth to think an actor is "my personal" anything.

Steven Lloyd is right, you need to get outside and take walk in fresh air.

[Glacier]

I’m not normally one to write a blog post about a dead celebrity, but then I suppose there is no such thing.

There are only living celebrities, not dead ones. In death, wealth and prestige decay and we are brought into a new reality, the only reality there is or ever was — one which, for much better or much worse, doesn’t care at all about our popularity or our money.

The death of Robin Williams is significant not because he was famous, but because he was human, and not just because he left this world, but particularly because he apparently chose to leave it.
Suicide.

A terrible, monstrous atrocity. It disturbs me in a deep, visceral, indescribable way. Of course it disturbs most people, I would assume. Indeed, we should fear the day when we wake up and decide we aren’t disturbed by it anymore.

So I’m just like you, then, because I can’t stomach the thought of it. I’ve seen it in the neighborhoods where I’ve lived and the schools that I’ve attended. I’ve seen it in my family. I’ve known adults and kids who’ve done it. I’ve seen it on the news and read about it in books, but I can’t comprehend it. The complete, total, absolute rejection of life. The final refusal to see the worth in anything, or the beauty, or the reason, or the point, or the hope. The willingness to saddle your family with the pain and misery and anger that will now plague them for the rest of their lives.

It’s a tragic choice, truly, but it is a choice, and we have to remember that. Your suicide doesn’t happen to you; it doesn’t attack you like cancer or descend upon you like a tornado. It is a decision made by an individual. A bad decision. Always a bad decision.

And that’s why I felt compelled to say something here. There are important truths we can take from the suicide of a rich and powerful man, yet I’m worried that we are too afraid to tackle the subject, or too blind to tackle it with any depth, so we only perpetuate the problem. But worse than the glossing over of suicide is the fact that we seem to approach it with an attitude that nearly resembles admiration.

Take this well intentioned tweet from The Academy of Motion Pictures, for example:

Genie, you're free.
5:56 PM - 11 Aug 2014
330,091 RETWEETS 234,874 FAVORITES

Free? I’ve seen a lot of this kind of rhetoric. Robin Williams is “in a better place,” he is “free,” he is “at peace,” he is “smiling down upon us,” he’s “happy.”

This all might seem pleasant enough, but have we stopped to think how it looks and sounds to those who may be contemplating this heinous deed themselves? Can we tell our friend to step away from the ledge after we just spoke so glowingly of Robin Williams’ newfound “peace” and “freedom”? This is too important a subject to be careless about. We want to say nice things, I realize, but it isn’t nice to lie about suicide.

It is not freeing. In suicide you obliterate yourself and shackle your loved ones with guilt and grief. There is no freedom in it. There is no peace. How can I free myself by attempting to annihilate myself? How can I free something by destroying it? Chesterton said, “The man who kills a man, kills a man. The man who kills himself, kills all men; as far as he is concerned he wipes out the world.” Where is the freedom in that?

I understand the inclination to be positive, but there is nothing positive to say about it. The cloud is infinitely dark, and there is no silver lining around it. That’s another tragic element to the evil of suicide — it robs your family of the solaces they naturally seek when a loved one passes away.

Do you want to be uplifted? Then concentrate on this:

Happiness and contentment are not found in our talents, our money, our luxuries, or our reputations. If wealthy, brilliant, beloved people tell us anything when they murder themselves, it must be that.

We are all meant to lead joyful lives, and the key to unlocking our joy isn’t hidden under a pile of money and accolades.
Also, incidents like this give us an opportunity to talk about depression, and we certainly should. Only we shouldn’t turn the subject into a purely cold, clinical matter. “Chemical imbalances,” people say. “A man is depressed because of his brain chemicals, and for no other reason.”

No, we are more than our brains and bigger than our bodies. Depression is a mental affliction, yes, but also spiritual. That isn’t to say that a depressed person is evil or weak, just that his depression is deeper and more profound than a simple matter of disproportioned brain chemicals. And before I’m accused of being someone who “doesn’t understand,” let me assure you that I have struggled with this my entire life.

We tend to look for the easiest answers. It makes us feel better to say that depression is only a disease and that there is no will and choice in suicide, as if a person who kills themselves is as much a victim as someone who succumbs to leukemia.

[Symbonite]

Not only that but in the Bible if you commit suicide you commit a sin against god....

and by that you will never go to heaven..

http://catholiceducation.org/articles/r ... e0123.html

well unless your an Atheist...Then its ok.

[GordonH]

Oh yes the church/bible and their view on suicide, that is interesting puzzle. What does the bible say on the subject and how does the church interpret, big question is their Interpretation the correct one... the answer is any one best guess.

[Symbonite]

I dont know either...but i guess if you google it...and research it..then you will find out.

but like it said....suicide goes against all natural law of self preservation.

[oneh2obabe]

Back on topic please. If you want to debate whether suicide is a sin, open a new thread.

[Woodenhead]

That blog post quoted above is extremely biased, childishly simplistic, closed-minded, anecdotal blather. Nice.

nanu nanu

[Lady tehMa]

I found the blog to be eloquent and thought-provoking.

We should not take away the hope of the depressed by stating that suicide is inevitable (because it isn't).

[logicalview]

That blog post quoted above is extremely biased, childishly simplistic, closed-minded, anecdotal blather. Nice.

nanu nanu

If you've ever had someone close to you commit suicide, you'd be whistling a different tune. You are left with feelings of horrible guilt and anger. It's an incredibly selfish act. I am all for spinning RW's suicide in a positive way for fans etc but I hope that no one else is persuaded to take the plunge and commit suicide because of it.

Also - everyone should watch this David Letterman tribute, it had me tearing up.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4bVgilYncao#t=76

[Lady tehMa]

I wonder how many people decided to commit suicide after Robin Williams did . . . I know of at least one incidence in the week following his death :(

[1nick]

Everyday I'm surrounded by people who are fighting for their lives,yet so many throw their's away.
We're a funny species.