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Memory Alpha
Multiple realities
(covers information from several alternate timelines)
Suicidal tendencies

Masaro seconds before committing suicide

Suicidal Romulan female

A Romulan female Zhat Vash member committing suicide.

Death wish redirects here; for the VOY episode with a similar title, please see "Death Wish".

Suicide was the termination of one's life by one's own hand. The action could be a personal choice brought on by extraneous circumstances, part of one's culture, or a military directive.

Cultural considerations[]

  • Klingon warriors believed that a suicide that caused the death of an enemy was an honorable form of death. Warriors who became infirm or who lost honor could request the assistance of another to perform Hegh'bat or Mauk-to'Vor, forms of ritual suicide. However, Klingons believed that unassisted suicide was an honorless death, and thus souls of Klingons who did so were condemned to Gre'thor. (TNG: "Reunion", "Ethics"; DS9: "Sons of Mogh", "Children of Time")
  • All Kaelons were required to perform suicide at age sixty so that the elders wouldn't stress the society. (TNG: "Half a Life")
  • A Kasseelian prima donna trained her entire life for one performance, and completed suicide by driving a dagger into her chest upon hitting the last high E note. (DIS: "Brother")
  • Some Vulcans performed ritual suicide when they "reach[ed] a certain infirmity of age". (VOY: "Death Wish")
  • A Bolian medical philosophy on euthanasia was developed during their Middle Ages known as the "Double Effect Principle". The position held that an act which had the principle effect of relieving suffering was ethically acceptable even if the same act had the secondary effect of causing death. (VOY: "Death Wish")

Attempted or considered[]

  • Lieutenant Commander Data once considered zeroing his neural net, essentially wiping his entire memory and completing suicide. The formation of new neural pathways was very disorienting and he felt that starting all over again would be easier. He later decided not to do it. (TNG: "Eye of the Beholder")
  • Miles O'Brien almost killed himself with a phaser after experiencing two decades of virtual imprisonment in a virtual Argrathi prison. He was talked out of it by Julian Bashir. (DS9: "Hard Time")
  • Worf wanted Riker to help him perform a ritual suicide called hegh'bat after experiencing a paralyzing spinal injury. (TNG: "Ethics")
  • Worf's brother Kurn wanted Worf to kill him in order to restore the honor of their family. Worf attempted to grant him this request, and stabbed his brother in the chest, but the ritual was interrupted by Lt. Commander Jadzia Dax and Constable Odo, who arrived in time to beam Kurn to Sickbay, where he was successfully treated for his injury. (DS9: "Sons of Mogh")
  • The single survivor of a shipwreck, Anna, threatened to kill herself by jumping off a cliff in order to make Picard fall in love with her. In reality she was Voval, an Iyaaran ambassador assigned to investigate the Human emotion of love. (TNG: "Liaisons")

Suicides completed[]

22nd century[]

23rd century[]

Kryton commits suicide

Kryton commits suicide

  • Kryton committed suicide with a phaser after sabotaging the engines of the Enterprise for the Klingons, in order to keep the sabotage secret. (TOS: "Elaan of Troyius")
Clark Terrell's suicide

Terrell, vaporizing himself

  • In order to cause a distraction, Maab made a conspicuous demonstration before a Klingon and no attempt to evade the ensuring phaser fire that killed him. (TOS: "Friday's Child"

24th century[]

  • In an alternate timeline in which his father became trapped in subspace during a subspace inversion, an elderly Jake Sisko injected himself with poison during the short time when his father re-appeared in normal space – by dying when their "bond" was at its strongest, he was able to send him back to the time of the accident, and the captain knew to dodge the energy discharge which would trap him in the first place. (DS9: "The Visitor")
  • Scientist Gideon Seyetik flew a shuttlepod into the dead star at Epsilon 119, dying in the name of science to restart the star's nuclear reactions. His wife Nidell was unable to divorce him even if she wanted to. He felt how unhappy she was and decided the only way to make her happy was to end his life. (DS9: "Second Sight")
  • Boraalan Vorin performed ritual suicide due to cultural shock. He was unable to cope with the transition from his pre-industrial culture to the highly futuristic 24th century. (TNG: "Homeward")
  • A squad of Jem'Hadar, having failed to prevent the death of a Founder, killed themselves for their failure. (DS9: "The Ship")
  • A member of Species 8472 disguised as David Gentry released a cellular toxin into his bloodstream on discovering that he had been captured by Humans, thereby killing itself. (VOY: "In the Flesh")

Euthanasia[]

Euthanasia was the termination of life by another party at the request of an individual who wished to die. This could be for religious, cultural, or medical reasons. It could be regarded either as assisted suicide or as murder upon request of the victim.

  • Euthanasia services were provided to the victims of the "Quickening", the final stage of the painful, incurable and potentially fatal Teplan blight. (DS9: "The Quickening")

Fictional suicides[]

Methods of suicide[]

Death wishes[]

Sometimes, individuals could have suicidal urges that drove them into putting themselves into extremely dangerous and life-threatening situations. A tendency to expose oneself to such danger was often referred as a death wish.

In a deleted scene from "Death Wish"), Janeway says that attempted suicide is a crime on Romulus, and helping someone commit suicide is considered homicide.

See also[]

Appendices[]

Background information[]

Suicide has been a plot element on several Star Trek episodes, but only "Ethics", "Eye of the Beholder", and "Death Wish" have discussed the ethics of suicide.

External links[]

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