EMC Co-Founder Commits Suicide 538
The Register is reporting that EMC co-founder Richard Egan has committed suicide. The article has an interesting look back at some of his accomplishments. "Egan had an amazing life, encompassing involvement in the Apollo space program, the US Marines, starting and building the most successful storage company on the planet, and becoming the US ambassador to Ireland. Finally, aged 73 and facing a lingering death, he ended the battle decisively and on his terms. He was never a shrinking violet."
"Committed Suicide?" (Score:5, Insightful)
"Suicide" makes it sound like he was depressed. Sounds like this guy wasn't. He decided to go out on his own terms. He chose euthanasia. If only we all had such bravery when facing such a long debilitating decline.
The EASY way out! (Score:5, Insightful)
What a coward! He should have faced his imminent slow and painful death like a man: by watching his dignity slowly fade away as he soils his bed and sobs uncontrollably about a life ill spent.
Wait, his life wasn't ill spent, so he realized that everything I just typed is bullshit. Society's attitude towards suicide is fucked up.
Rest in peace.
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:5, Insightful)
While I think Bill Maher is a misogynist dickhead, he does have one great quote on suicide.
It's our way of telling God "You can't fire me. I quit!"
The sad thing is this guy should NOT have had to go in a closet and blow his head off. Never ceases to amaze me how we euthanize animals on compassionate grounds, and yet we humans, we're expected to suffer.
EMC (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:4, Insightful)
Most people fear death - a lot.
He, instead of scrabbling away and clinging to anything he could (and just making it longer) like many of us would, stood tall, squared his shoulders, and walked into it's maw.
That, is bravery.
Death, is the one final unknown. Our species seems to be wired into fearing the unknown. Death, being one of the absolute unknowns, is also one of the absolute fears. The man was not afraid of this absolute.
That, is bravery.
Re:The EASY way out! (Score:4, Insightful)
There's two (well, more than that, really) sides to the suicide coin.
1. You have men like this. Men who have seen that which they have wrought, and found a life well spent. Rather than wither away and die as you say, these people deserve an 'easy out.'
2. Then, you have the "oh woe is me" crowd, where suicide is the cowards way out - because it's easier to kill themself than deal with their problems - consequences to everyone else be damned. A selfish, cowardice-ridden exit.
3. Also, you have those who genuinly have something wrong with their mind that pushes them to it. You can't blame someone for something external pushing it down on you like that.
4. Finally, unless there are more I'm too tired to think of, you have those that go for a good cause. The good soldier diving on a grenade. Sacrificing one's self for the good of many, etc - the true altruistic finale.
I think the problem is that most people hear 'suicide' and think of group #2 above, to the exclusion of all else. If only the world was that defined into black in white.
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, please read the article. He was suffering from Stage 4 lung cancer, diabetes and high BP. I'm no doctor, but that looks fairly terminal to me. Why the fuck should I hang around as a vegetable?
Suicide is devastating to those who care, yes; but in this case at least, there's no selfishness. He saw that he was beyond extended support; and decided to go. Committing suicide takes a phenomenal amount of courage, and/or some mental instability. In this case, it seems to be mostly the former. Rest in Peace.
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Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:5, Insightful)
we're 'expected to suffer' because relgion *still* dominates our legal system.
remove religion and there's zero issue with people killing themselves.
it really is that simple.
and yet its not. because people won't let go of explanations that let them sleep easy at night.
even ones we know are not really true.
Did he have to pick such a messy method? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:3, Insightful)
Assuming the terminal cancer was the reason for his suicide, which is a supposition to begin with. The fact that he was caught up in a tax haven and the IRS was on his back ... well, one could imagine it can be a little more nuanced and complicated.
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Re:The EASY way out! (Score:5, Insightful)
"It is every American's Constitutional right to avoid paying taxes to the maximum extent permissible by law." -- Judge David R. Hansen, Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals
There's nothing wrong or immoral with reducing your tax bill. It's only wrong to do it in violation of the law. The IRS claims he engaged in a legal fiction to dodge taxes illegally. He claims he engaged in a legal fiction to dodge taxes legally. We decide who's right or wrong in the courts: we don't leap to judgment on Slashdot. (I know, I know, I must be new here. Check the UID, kids, I'm not.)
If the IRS is right, then yes, his actions were unjust. If he's right, then more power to him.
If you believe it's virtuous to pay more taxes than you absolutely have to, I'm sure the IRS wouldn't mind if you threw an extra couple of hundred on your check come April 15. Otherwise, let's give the dead the benefit of the doubt, and not declare him to have been taking advantage of us.
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:3, Insightful)
remove religion and there's zero issue with people killing themselves.
No, not really. It's usually the family and friends that suffer the most. I knew a guy with a 3 year old daughter that shot himself. That was some time ago, she's an adult now. I'm sure she still carried the scars with her.
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Re:The EASY way out! (Score:3, Insightful)
It depends. Truthfully I think there is no real distinction between #1 and #2 in your post. Reality is we all die eventually, so everyone who commits suicide is speeding up the inevitable, but in both #1 and #2 both people have problems. Death will get both eventually so saying "I'm going to die anyways" doesn't do much. Why do some people's problems (cancer) become a good enough reason to kill one's self whereas other people's problems (a lost job for example) not get the same consideration, and they get branded a "coward" for taking that same "easy out"?
I could make the same argument - why should I have to subject myself to homelessness and digging through garbage hoping for my next meal rather than going out with dignity?
Whether or not one supports suicide or not really isn't important to me, but IMHO it comes down to a Mr Miyagi situation: "Walk left side - fine; walk right side - fine; walk middle ". Either suicide is a valid say of dealing with personal problems or it's not - judging which problems are good enough to kill yourself over and which ones aren't just gets way too subjective.
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:2, Insightful)
Well, if you went by the philosophies under which the US was founded then it's no one's business but the person seeking death. The problem are the religious busybodies who feel the need to butt in and interfere with people's decisions for the sake of their personal moral gratification.
Is not forcing someone to live in pain, with no dignity, not causing harm? Is it truly harm if the person is granted the relief they desire? Have you hurt anyone?
Are they now? If there's no reasonable expectation of a cure for some terminal disease and the inevitable result is crippling disability, pain, and death, who are you to say someone who wishes to book early, preserving their dignity, is acting irrationally?
Could it not be argued that those willing to spend every last cent to stay alive, no matter how debilitating and painful life may become before death, are themselves acting irrationally?
On an unrelated note, the first quote of this paragraph was, before I previewed it, enclosed with the "blockbuster" tag. Please, anyone, tell me what I was thinking?
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, because people left behind would never get screwed up seeing you die slowly and painfully, weezing (quite literally) your last in some hospital ward as you gradually lose control of your bodily functions. That would obviously be much less traumatic for them than putting your affairs in order, saying goodbye with dignity and making a (relatively) clean exit.
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:5, Insightful)
My grandfather died (ostensibly) from Parkinson's. My other grandfather died (also, ostensibly) from a stroke. I say "ostensibly" because neither of these things were capable of killing the men by themselves.
In the first case, the man's wits were always totally about him, but his communication and motor skills dropped to such a useless extent that he plainly felt he was a burden. He was very intelligent, and a quiet thinker: Someone you listened to when they talked, no matter how lengthy or succinct the conversation. My family kept him alive for years too long -- he was only going to get worse, not better.
In the latter case, the man's wits weren't always about him, but he was plainly aware that he was on his last legs and wouldn't be long in this world. He was an intelligent, outgoing, and very lucky reactionist who thrived on stress: Someone you listened to very intently, even if you thought they were wrong, because their thoughts were still very useful to absorb. My family kept him alive for years too long, as well -- he had more than one stroke in the nursing home, and had a long history of cardiac problems before then.
Both were accomplished (in terms of family reverence and fiscal good fortune). They lived good, honest lives, had their shit together, and were completely loved by those around them.
But, they lived too long. They were all used up.
Death is as natural as life itself is. It is an eventuality. One can either go out on one's own terms, or one can sap the Estate for all that its worth as the State sucks it all in to maintain "healthfulness" at everyone's (including the patient) detriment.
I hope your Grandpa-in-law does well with whatever comes.
(And for a disclaimer: No, death and suicide aren't always fair, and aren't always the fair means to an end. My own sister, whom I was also very close to, killed herself while she was still young and in rather good physical health about three years ago. Something about a hose, some duct tape, a 1996 Chevrolet Monte Carlo, a secluded garage, a bunch of cocaine, a lot of unhelpful friends, and an undiagnosed case of schizophrenia combined to make this happen. I wish I could've done more for her, and will probably regret that I hadn't for the rest of my own life.)
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually, I wouldn't choose a bullet. I think jumping off Half Dome sounds a lot more fun. Or seeing exactly just how fast I can take those turns in a motorcycle on Skyline, and then push just a bit more. Go sky diving and simply don't pull the cord. How about taking an overdose of some very fun drug while enjoying the company of a well-paid lady friend? Free-climb some way-too-hard slope without a rope? Rent a Corvette, and crash it at 170Mph. See just how far you can swim into the ocean, or just how far you can free-dive, and then push a bit further. I think I'd prefer any of those to a slow painful death stretched over months or years. You only get to die once. Might as well die doing something you'd normally be to scared to try.
Personally, I'd rather not be the kind of jerk that leaves a huge mess for someone else to clean up when it's time to fold up my affairs, but YMMV.
Re:The EASY way out! (Score:3, Insightful)
(Hey, kids!: Quick poll. Who among you were completely honest on your IRS Form 1040 last year? Anyone?)
To the best of my knowledge, I was. Not only do I genuinely believe that you're a parasite if you try to take advantage of government services while paying as little as possible for them, but I'm not a fan of lying to save/make a buck (aka fraud), and I'm not a big enough gambler to think that a few bucks here and there is worth up to $100,000 and 5 years in prison.
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:4, Insightful)
The only sad part is that our sick society is in such denial about the inevitability of death that he was forced to choose such a gruesome method rather than having the option of something more peaceful.
Being a man of quite some means, so to speak, it's pretty naive to think he couldn't have just hopped a plane to say, Oregon, and offed himself there neatly and legally. He blew his head off with a shotgun because that's the way he wanted to go out, clearly.
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:3, Insightful)
The problem is that these all have varying degrees of potential failure. Jumping off Half Dome or skydiving and not pulling the chute? Pretty good chance you'll die, and quickly--but if you don't, there's also a high risk you live in agony for hours, probably destroyed so bodily that you couldn't even do anything to finish the job. And god help you if somebody saw it happen and called an ambulance that ended up saving your life. There was a story just a few days ago about an Australian quadraplegic getting a court to acknowledge his right to die--but of course nobody can help him, so he has to waste away by starvation.
Drowning? I don't know. I've heard it said that drowning is actually a pretty horrible way to die. A bullet isn't surefire either, of course, but a sufficiently high-caliber weapon in the proper location comes awfully close.
Either way, if somebody's going to commit suicide they should couple whatever action they choose with a Do Not Resuscitate order. Of course the best solution is for us as a society to get over this "ZOMG LIFE IS TOO SACRED TO HELP SOMEBODY DIE, HE'LL HAVE TO DO IT HIMSELF AND SUFFER IN AGONY!" thing and just provide ways of helping people end their lives.
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:3, Insightful)
In fact, they fear long and helpless suffering that precedes it.
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:0, Insightful)
Horrible because he won't quit?
And was Egan not scared of death - or scared of trying to live. I say he's a quitter.
Oh and I did watch my father-in-law die from cancer. That was true bravery - he fought it every step of the way - never believing that it would beat him. He didn't win - but he went down with nothing but admiration from his family, friends and the medical professionals that treated him.
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:3, Insightful)
Religion?
Or a medical industry the brings in the lion's share of its profits from the last years of people's lives.
Short of being paralyzed you can kill yourself anyway. The's the cool part about killing yourself--even if it's illegal it's not like they can prosecute you for it.
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:3, Insightful)
Suicide doesn't take courage by default. Often times it's a chicken shit's way out. However, in the case of being old and terminal, it's common place in a lot of older cultures to simply "leave the tribe" so you're not a burden anymore. In industrialized nations have become oddly life obsessed to the point that it defies reality. The old and sick can but put out and while it's perfectly acceptable to lock people in a maximum security penitentiary where they're alone 23 hours a day, killing them is "cruel and unusual."
Of course, there's less money in death than in prolonging the inevitable. Plus, people in pain are the most desperate sort of suckers out there.
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:3, Insightful)
To each his own, right?
I agree, the blood splatter mess isn't exactly the legacy I'd want to leave behind. I've spent my life making sure I'm well preserved, between bad food with lots of preservatives, and generally pickling myself with alcohol. Archeologists in 1000 years will dig up my body, and I'll look as fresh as when they planted me, even without embalming. I'll leave a lovely, yet well worn corpse. :) My friends will say "yes, he lived his life to the fullest, and was happy." Well hell, who knows what they'll really say. There may only be one person show up to say "finally that bastard is gone."
But hey, he was picking his exit, and that's how he wanted it. I hope he laid down plenty of plastic so he didn't leave a mess for the family and friends to clean up. When it all comes down to it, we all pick our way out. Some people go the "legal" and "moral" way, and die slowly and painfully in hospice. Some take a more express method. As with life, to each his own.
I guess it's better than slitting your wrists or hanging yourself in a hotel, for housekeeping to find sometime the next day (or days later).
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:3, Insightful)
Your corvette crash - what happens if you just end up a paralyzed vegetable? Oops!
I've put some thought into this. I've determined that it's not so hard to die in a single-car accident. The trick is using a car which is early enough to have few safety measures and good engine output, while being late enough to be light-weight. A late ('78-81) second-generation Camaro SS or Firebird Trans-Am fits the bill pretty well: No crumple zones, no electronics to speak of to overrule your foot, plenty of power, lots of speed, zero safety features except for the optional seatbelt, and hard, metal dashboard components.
Add that to a race with death on any road you can come up with, so long as it has either a sheer cliff on one side, or the occasional overhead bridge, and you're golden. Just make sure the driveline, tires and suspension are in good shape beforehand, lest you accidentally live due to mechanical failure.
(An '09 Civic, Camry, or Golf probably would not work so well, even if it is faster.)
Meanwhile...
Drowning, of course, sucks.
Drugs? Shoot. Lots of good folks die from drugs. Done right, one doesn't feel a thing. Research is important.
Sky diving without a chute? Hard to pull off. Too much documentation. The posthumous Inquisition would be ugly for the accessories. But it is quick, sure, and painless.
Kevorkian approach, though? IIRC, those folks took awhile to die, and didn't appear to particularly be enjoying themselves. Fuck that - if it's time to go, go out with something fun. That sounds ugly, to me.
YMMV.
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:3, Insightful)
So you would dismiss the effort of the runner who tears an Achilles tendon for not crawling on bloody hands and knees hundreds of meters to the finish line? Whether they finished or not, they would have more of my respect than you are likely to garner.
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:5, Insightful)
As an active skydiver, I'm asking you nicely to pick another one of those choices. It's no fun for anyone standing around the DZ on a nice sunny day when selfish fuck decides to use our sport as his means to kill himself. It's no fun having to watch the paramedics try to save their life when you can see in their eyes they're dead. It's no fun to see the faces of the children who just came to see mummy get strapped to some man and go tandem when they realise that shit on their shoes used to be a living person.
So do us all a favour, and fuck off.
I'll leave the other ideas to the active climbers, motorcyclists and others who you'd like to make shit for.
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:2, Insightful)
Do you really think a guy facing imminent death gives a rat's ass about the IRS? Imagine having absolutely nothing to look forward to. Your future is a brick wall. You can't see past it because there is nothing past it. Faced with a slow, agonizing journey to oblivion or a momentarily painful express ride, which would you choose? Well, he opted for the latter, and I'd be willing to bet he wasn't thinking about the IRS when he did it. Well, maybe a quick "heh, fuck them," but that's it.
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:2, Insightful)
Except what you seem to ignore is that all the runners in this particular race, every single goddamn one of us, is going to make it to the end. The same end. There's no different finish line for people who get there by suicide and people who don't conk out until someone shuts off their ventilator and pulls their breathing tube out. Either way, you're dead. What's beyond that is a point of debate, but we're all crossing the same finish line.
So it's just a matter of picking the route you want to run. You, apparently, seem to think that the slow-death route is the more scenic one; quite a few people believe the exact opposite -- that since we're all going to the same place anyway, no need to slog through a briar patch just to prove that it can be done. Quite a bit easier, especially if you have a pretty good idea of what going through the briar patch is going to involve, to just go around.
Re:The EASY way out! (Score:2, Insightful)
Well, assuming you are in a society where you can get another job, that's why it's #2 and not #1. It's not an irreversible state.
However, hypothetically, I guess I can imagine a society where a job loss really wouldn't be reversible. There are probably some historical examples. Some situation where, even though you're physically fine, you're essentially doomed for some social reason. In that particular, admittedly contrived, situation, I think it would be more like #1 and not #2. Of course, the long-term solution in that situation would be to try and fix society so that people don't get trapped like that, just like the long-term solution to people killing themselves because they have untreatable cancer ought to be to improve cancer treatment, but that doesn't mean that someone who chooses to kill themselves should be branded a coward, if their situation really was unwinnable and likely to bring them and others ignominy for the rest of their lives. We should abhor the social systems that produce such outcomes but the suicides themselves could be reasonable as individual decisions, even if the system isn't.
It's a question of circumstance which doesn't lend itself to black-and-white "always good" or "always wrong" judgment. Demanding that it either always be a valid or invalid choice for all "personal problems" is convenient, but the world is not that simple.
Re:Suicide Rate in Japan (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:3, Insightful)
Less than a week before my father's death, he took off work early to go to a doctor's appointment with my Mom. On the way, the car got a flat tire which he changed. At the appointment, the doctor said that the tumor had started growing again and suggested stopping Chemo for a month or two and then deciding what to do. That was a Friday. That Sunday the church I grew up in had a service for my father where many people who had known him came and expressed their love and support for him and my family. That afternoon, he discussed with my brother (an engineer) how to deal with a problem with the equipment at my Dad's work then laid down in his bed for a nap. He never got out of that bed (except with help to go to the bathroom). The following Thursday he talked on the phone with another brother who lived out of state. His last words were "It's OK."
Life is a series of tests, suicide is cheating on the final exam.
Re:Suicide Rate in Japan (Score:3, Insightful)
As a westerner you've also more time to reflect on live itself. If you are continuously struggling for your life, ending it is not something that comes into your mind easily. You can't be trying to get a living while reflecting upon it too much; it brings too much indecisiveness with it. Also, if you are very religious, you are required to have a goal and not to do sinful things like killing yourself.
So it's not just the length of life that matters. I think most people in Africa that don't die as a child get to an age, say 15, where suicide becomes common.
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:5, Insightful)
Thanks from your local public servant!
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:1, Insightful)
Life is a series of tests, suicide is cheating on the final exam.
I would've liked to see you say that if your father had spent his final few weeks screaming, because no amount of drugs could do anything but slightly dull the pain.
Your father was in good enough health to function until the end, that's great. I wish it was like that for everybody killed by cancer (or any other slow working malady). But that's not how it works.
There's suicide, and there's euthanasia. They are _not_ synonymous.
My grandfather took that very option (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm one of the Oregon voters who voted twice for Death with Dignity, and am very glad that my grandfather was able to die at his own choosing, in a humane manner. (I don't think having to grab a shotgun and shoot yourself in the head, plus knowing others will find you and have to witness the scene, is humane - I say it not against Egan, but because I wish Egan had had a better choice.)
Re:Suicide Rate in Japan (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't know, but I suspect he doesn't need a Wii, he needs you.
Re:Suicide Rate in Japan (Score:0, Insightful)
Re:Suicide Rate in Japan (Score:2, Insightful)
Most African nations do have shockingly high death rates, but that is due to murder.
Actually I've heard that almost every continent in the world has a shockingly high death rate: 100%
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:3, Insightful)
And if you think religion has more power over the minds of people in modern industrialized nations than the corporate economy, you're deluding yourself. I'm certainly not saying religion has nothing to do with it, but as I said in another post, look at our "justice" system:
It's cruel and unusual to kill someone but locking them up in a little room alone 23-hours a day in a maximum security penitentiary is "civilized"? Keep in mind, historically the "religious" were the ones most in favor of killing these guys. And what did they lose out to? The fact that there's more money to be made in keeping them alive in a private prison than there is to just get it over with.
So much for those thousands of years of impact. And even if it's not just the money interests, something changed in the population in a very rapid manner to go from "kill the criminals and let God deal with them" to "they have to live!" We've been killing "the guilty" for about as long as religion's been around.
I see I was flagged as a troll too. I keep forgetting that on Slashdot I have to concede that religion is the root of ever evil perpetrated on the mind of man and any thinking that goes against that is gonna get modded down. Oh well. I just get sick to deal of religion being the scapegoat for everything around here.
Re:"Committed Suicide?" (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Suicide Rate in Japan (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Suicide Rate in Japan (Score:3, Insightful)
"What Richard Egan did is very Japanese. He concluded that his life would be a burden on his family, his friends, and himself. So, he chose to die by his own sword. He died with honor."
Very reasonable response.
Contemplate, after you KNOW what it looks like, the slow, horrible deterioration of mind, body, or both that is normal with the infirmities and diseases of age. If you live long enough, you are vastly more likely than not to be crippled and mad (not the happy sort of "mad"). Hmmm, do I want to die in a piss-soaked diaper with my pain barely controlled by medication (because physicians are often overcautious about managing the pain of dying people)? Does dementia look like fun? Modern medical technology can extend life for long after any reason (other then the delectation of imaginary celestial friends) for living is gone.
Society should get comfortable with discussing suicide, even though it means admitting we don't live forever.