Earlier quoted context omitted.
Do some research into who the author is.
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Author != Submitter
Why Aaron died
11–20 of 99 posts
Re: Why Aaron died
#12Aaron died because he killed himself. He was the proximate cause of his own death so to speak. Are there other factors without which he wouldn't have killed himself? Indeed, there are an infinite number of them. An infinite number of things could have happened to change the course of his life. Indeed, ultimately you can trace the blame all the way back to his parents (depression is quite heritable): http://depression…
Not a very useful comment.
Depression was not the issue according to someone much closer to the situation than you.
Are his parents depressed? No, I know them both. They are not depressed. Were his grandparents depressed? No. I knew his grandfather.
Re: Why Aaron died
#13Aaron died because he killed himself. He was the proximate cause of his own death so to speak. Are there other factors without which he wouldn't have killed himself? Indeed, there are an infinite number of them. An infinite number of things could have happened to change the course of his life. Indeed, ultimately you can trace the blame all the way back to his parents (depression is quite heritable): http://depression…
Not a very useful comment. Depression was not the issue according to someone much closer to the situation than you. Are his parents depressed? No, I know them both. They are not depressed. Were his grandparents depressed? No. I knew his grandfather.
You just don't like the implications of the facts. If you took 100 people and put them in the same situation, the vast majority of them wouldn't have killed themselves. People face longer sentences and the prospect of being imprisoned among violent offenders everyday without killing themselves.
The fact is that suicides are statistically aberrational behavior, even among people in high-stress situations. There are lots of factors that lead to suicides, not just the final stressor that might precipitate them. Our standard of blame cannot be so lax as to hold people accountable for atypical reactions to situations.
Re: Why Aaron died
#14Re: Why Aaron died
#15Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not a very useful comment. Depression was not the issue according to someone much closer to the situation than you. Are his parents depressed? No, I know them both. They are not depressed. Were his grandparents depressed? No. I knew his grandfather.
You just don't like the implications of the facts. If you took 100 people and put them in the same situation, the vast majority of them wouldn't have killed themselves. People face longer sentences and the prospect of being imprisoned among violent offenders everyday without killing themselves. The fact is that suicides are statistically aberrational behavior, even among people in high-stress situations. There are lo…
>You just don't like the implications of the facts.
I am not sure you are willing to be acquainted with the facts, regardless of how they are presented or who presents them.
I don't think you are close enough to the facts of the situation to speak with such resounding authority about them.
Re: Why Aaron died
#16Earlier quoted context omitted.
You just don't like the implications of the facts. If you took 100 people and put them in the same situation, the vast majority of them wouldn't have killed themselves. People face longer sentences and the prospect of being imprisoned among violent offenders everyday without killing themselves. The fact is that suicides are statistically aberrational behavior, even among people in high-stress situations. There are lo…
>You just don't like the implications of the facts. I am not sure you are willing to be acquainted with the facts, regardless of how they are presented or who presents them. I don't think you are close enough to the facts of the situation to speak with such resounding authority about them.
Did it occur to you that the facts with which you are acquainted are not the relevant ones?
Indeed, if you're talking about laying the blame for Aaron's suicide on the feet of Carmen Ortiz, isn't it patently ridiculous to consider the intimate facts of his situation relevant? Are we now to charge prosecutors with being sensitive to the details of the personal lives of the people which they prosecute?
Re: Why Aaron died
#17The last sentences makes me think: Ask yourself this: If on January 10, Steve Heymann and Carmen Ortiz at the Massachusetts US Attorney’s office had called Aaron’s lawyer and said they’d realized their mistake and that they were dropping all charges — or even for that matter that they were ready to offer a reasonable plea deal that wouldn’t have marked Aaron as a felon for the rest of his life — would Aaron have kill…
This would imply that the US Attorney's office made a mistake in charging him for the crimes he committed. In reality, this would have been letting him off the hook because ZOMGAARONSWARTZ.
Aaron died because he forgot that civil disobedience is not about sticking it to The Man, but about getting into the sort of vulnerable position that makes it possible to win people over with dialogue. It's about paying the price, not doing the deed, and he wasn't prepared for that. This is not something he should be martyred for.
Re: Why Aaron died
#18The last sentences makes me think: Ask yourself this: If on January 10, Steve Heymann and Carmen Ortiz at the Massachusetts US Attorney’s office had called Aaron’s lawyer and said they’d realized their mistake and that they were dropping all charges — or even for that matter that they were ready to offer a reasonable plea deal that wouldn’t have marked Aaron as a felon for the rest of his life — would Aaron have kill…
Furthermore, even if that statement is true does it mean we should blame the prosecution? The analogy I have been using is getting fired or going through a breakup. Those type of events are sometimes catalysts for suicide, but I don't think anyone would blame the employer or significant other for that. People are responsible for their own actions. They are responsible for how they react to adversity or tragedy. Aaron was the one who killed himself. The charges likely played a role in his decision, but that doesn't mean his "death was caused by [the] criminal justice system."
Re: Why Aaron died
#19Aaron died because he killed himself. He was the proximate cause of his own death so to speak. Are there other factors without which he wouldn't have killed himself? Indeed, there are an infinite number of them. An infinite number of things could have happened to change the course of his life. Indeed, ultimately you can trace the blame all the way back to his parents (depression is quite heritable): http://depression…
It's interesting how often it needs to be restated that Aaron had depression, which probably had much more to do with his final act than the prosecution did.
Was Carmen Ortiz a factor? Maybe. But I don't know, because I didn't know Aaron.
What I do know is that depression has its own insidious way of taking hold of even the strongest-seeming people, and it can make them do things that seem completely out of the blue to everyone around them.
Re: Why Aaron died
#20Aaron died because he killed himself. He was the proximate cause of his own death so to speak. Are there other factors without which he wouldn't have killed himself? Indeed, there are an infinite number of them. An infinite number of things could have happened to change the course of his life. Indeed, ultimately you can trace the blame all the way back to his parents (depression is quite heritable): http://depression…
It's interesting how often it needs to be restated that Aaron had depression, which probably had much more to do with his final act than the prosecution did. Was Carmen Ortiz a factor? Maybe. But I don't know, because I didn't know Aaron. What I do know is that depression has its own insidious way of taking hold of even the strongest-seeming people, and it can make them do things that seem completely out of the blue…
It should be stated that Taren knew Aaron really, really well. Perhaps better than anyone.
That can be good or bad in terms of how she's interpreting everything, but it's not like she's randomly bloviating on the Internet.