[AQuantized]

> You really don't want to end up with dementia and related illnesses, it totally sours everyone's view of you.

This seems like such an absurd conclusion to this, as though the opinions of other people of you are what matter when you functionally lose your personhood and then die.

Maybe a better focus would be that there often isn't a good way for a community to manage a person who suddenly becomes irrational because of an illness.

[sillyfluke]

The parent described someone who went above and beyond the norm of other members in his community in his constant positive interaction with his neighbors, collegues, and former students. It is highly likely this kind of person would give a considerable shit if he knew he would become a nightmare for the same community.

There may be others reading in the thread who also can relate to the personality of the teacher and may care about their affect on others when they are "not themselves".

[dns_snek]

There's a difference between "I don't want the disease because I don't want to become a menace to others" (what you're saying) and "I don't want the disease because it would make me lose social status" (what the original commenter said).

[carefulfungi]

In my experience having had a parent suffer this way, you lose them before they are dead and you grieve along the way. I can understand the "souring" phrasing - in that there is less affection for the altered person in the present even while feeling a duty for their care and a deep love for who they were.

I'm grateful for this story - it's powerful to see examples of autonomy at end of life - and contrasts starkly with the experiences many of us have with aging parents. End of life, at least in the US, can be deeply flawed and misery for all.

[wazdra]

Valuing how others remember you is definitely a motivation in life for many. I respect that it is not your own, respect that it may be mine. It is by no means "absurd".

[lo_zamoyski]

It is absurd because it places subjective opinions over objective goods. This is the vice of “human respect”. Human beings do not have a final say about others. They can opine, but opinions are like buttholes, everyone has one.

Sure, it is nice to be remembered well, if you deserve it, but I do not live for the opinions of others. This is slave mentality and pathetic. I care about being good, and if I am hated for that, then so be it. Sad, but better to be hated for being a good person than loved for being a mediocrity or a knave.

And to off yourself out of concern with how people remember you is a condemnation of our society, our lack of charity, our lack of magnanimity, and our selfish prioritization of convenience. Full throttle consumerism.

[Noaidi]

My brother had schizophrenia. No one thought well of him. I guess he should have killed himself as well by the logic some are professing on here. Oh, he tried, but he ended up dying of heart disease.

> Maybe a better focus would be that there often isn't a good way for a community to manage a person who suddenly becomes irrational because of an illness.

Yes, this is the focus. Science has stalled when it comes to neurological disorders. But the response is love and understanding. I do not understand how someone would "sour" on a person because they have an illness. A very absurd conclusion indeed.

[prmoustache]

Dementia and Alzheimer is not something that can simply be managed throught treatment. It is an inexorable descent into suffering for both the person and its entourage with absolutely zero hope of getting better. At best in the last stages you get very short glimpses of normality within hours of confusions, frustrations, anger and pain.

If I am ever diagnosed with one of those, I absolutely want the chance to end my life before I reach a stage I become a burden to my loved ones and can't give a trustable consent. I'd rather go too soon than too late.

[Aeolun]

> I do not understand how someone would "sour" on a person because they have an illness.

It is extremely exhausting to try and be ‘understanding’ of someone that does everything to sabotage themselves.

[ghssds]

> I guess he should have killed himself as well by the logic some are professing on here.

Maybe people are able to answer that question by themselves and don't need the judgement of other people answering differently.

[pas]

the conclusion is true, though obviously the worst part is that this guy spent at least a year in varying states of despair, anger, and even worse psychological terrors.

you don't want dementia because it damages and hurts you and everything and everyone around you

(my grandpa physically attacked grandma multiple times in his last year)

[coldtea]

>This seems like such an absurd conclusion to this, as though the opinions of other people of you are what matter when you functionally lose your personhood and then die.

They do matter.

Being concerned with how your behavior affects your family or your community, and the opinion they have of you, above your own self-interest, is how good parents, good friends, good citizens, and so on, are made.

[dns_snek]

> Being concerned with how your behavior affects your family or your community, and the opinion they have of you, above your own self-interest, is how good parents, good friends, good citizens, and so on, are made.

You've changed the meaning behind the original comment in a subtle but important way. The original commenter wasn't concerned about their effects on other people, they were concerned about how the disease would ruin their public image. Maybe they didn't mean that but it's what they wrote.

This distinction matters because those people whose top priority is their public perception (i.e. social status) are never "good people". It's normal to care about your social status to some degree but it shouldn't be the first thing you consider.

[idiotsecant]

It's not so absurd. The only afterlife that exists (in a materialist sense) is what other people think of you. The only part of 'you' still around us quite literally just a memory in someone's head. That's not nothing.

Whether we should care about that or not is a philosophical conversation, I suppose. I would take the side of if we care about what people think about us when we are alive, surely we should care what they think of us when we are dead. Otherwise, we only value their opinion of us as a function of what they will do for/to us, which seems not great.

[abustamam]

My wife's grandma passed some years back due to dementia/Alzheimers. Her final memories of her were of struggling to change her diaper because she insisted "she didn't need a change" and being really racist.

I really don't want my family's last memories of me to be that. Yeah my wife remembers when her grandma was of sound mind, and has some good memories with her back then, but they stopped due to the disease.

Everyone should be entitled to their own opinions on how they want to be remembered. I would rather be allowed to pass in sane mind.

[doetoe]

To more precisely represent the words of the person you're replying to, you should have said "memories" not "opinions".

[dkga]

This. Life is such a precious random occurrence that failing to protect it in the face [dementia|physical disabilities|etc] is the real tragedy.

[darkmighty]

It's not like life stops when someone (with a grave an irreversible condition that causes suffering) dies. It goes on with the young generations (i.e. the billions of them!). I think too much clinging to a single life causes the whole (which is more important) to suffer. That's not to say we shouldn't value and respect elders, but clinging to life excessively is ignorant and potentially cruel, in my humble opinion. I defend the right to die in the face of incurable diseases that cause a lot of anguish and suffering.

I think clinging to life is partially rooted in an egoist/solipsistic metaphysics that you yourself are all that matters (to yourself at least, of course). Relax, we're just a small part of the cosmos. Ancient and immortal :)

[sillyfluke]

As I mentioned in a another comment, framing it as "how one is remembered" is leading to pointless tangents in this thread.

The important point is this: are you causing emotional, psychological, physical distress in the real world to those you care about when you have this disease? Yes or no. That's what I care about. Whether they are able to remember me well despite that, or poorly because of that should be completely secondary.

[paulryanrogers]

What does protecting life look like when one is literally losing everything about themselves that they value?

[alex77456]

This is a maximalist view, in reality not feasible or scalable. Of course this is what we need to strive for, but aiming to decrease 'total unhappiness' with what we have, is a rational, if somewhat cynical, aim.

But even at aface value, more rational long-term approach would be to treat it, surely

[ratelimitsteve]

idk man whether the people I love hate me matters to me...