Comradeship // Freechat

You only fear death because your mind is attached to your self, your memories, your experiences, your subjective perceptions... As an exercise, try to the remember the time before you were born. You can't really remember anything, but you know, you can even feel it, there was just total emptiness, no subjective experience, nothing. There is nothing to be afraid of, it's just emptiness. This, to me, was the first step in pacifying my mind in relation to death.

I feel it's like the people who jumped from the building during 9/11. You are of course scared to jump but eventually what's behind you, pushing you to jump is even scarier.

I don't fear death. I don't wanna die either though so I'm trying my best not to lol. But worrying about death itself seemed rather pointless eventually. I will just let it happen if my time comes, nothing I can do about it I guess.

When it comes to suicidal thoughts: I managed to turn those around by seeing death as an option rather than a wish. By thinking: 'well, I can always die' I managed to get some strength to continue when I was at low points in my life. Probably not the healthiest option but Oh well 🤷🏼 it helped me.

I live and breath the revolutionary catechism, which might be a good read to understand your own feelings through something of a complete opposite of how you feel.

But it's also important that there exist ordinary, self-preserving people. Those are the ones the revolutionaries seek to protect and draw their passion from. The same way you think of your mother in case you die, she might feel similar to you. To each person who is still socially connected there are other people who matter. And those, either in concrete relations (like somebody's child) or abstract social understanding (the set of all children in a community) are what usually leads people to be willing to die.

Another important point is to consider how dire the situations are for the revolutionaries you mentioned. Imagine a genocidal imperialist country is invading your homeland, knowing full well that survival would mean slavery, exploitation, torture and all that happened in, for example, the Japanese invasion of China. In those conditions choosing death may not only seem preferable, but also just accelerating the same outcome in case of defeat.

All men must die, but death can vary in its significance. The ancient Chinese writer Szuma Chien said, "Though death befalls all men alike, it may be weightier than Mount Tai or lighter than a feather." To die for the people is weightier than Mount Tai, but to work for the fascists and die for the exploiters and oppressors is lighter than a feather. Comrade Chang Szu-teh died for the people, and his death is indeed weightier than Mount Tai.

I take comfort in knowing that I am part of the world. When I die, the world won't really go on without me, because I will always be part of the world. History is irrevocably changed because I lived. I was here.

People will remember me, but memories fade and those people will die someday too. But the impact I leave on the world is immortal,. whatever form that might take. I become part of a greater history in whatever small way I can.

It's basically a materialist afterlife. And think of how lucky are we to be the ones that are remembered! How many millions came before us that have been so completely forgotten that not even their bones remain? We live in a data age where everything is recorded, our afterlives will be far longer and greater than people that came before us.

It's true that we become subjects of history and cease to be agents in history, but we'll never really die as long as humanity endures.

Just gotta make sure we survive the next century.

My fear of death is mostly because I’m scared of leaving my wife and child in a desolate world where I can’t be there to support them, but at the same time, they are my biggest motivation for changing this world.

I don’t think you’re a coward, comrade. This is a very natural fear that we all carry with us at some point in our lives.

What helped me accept death is asking the question: “Would I really want to live forever?” Imagine immortality really. Watching everyone you know and care about die while you remain. Sounds like an awful existence to me.

Don't beat yourself up about being a coward. Not everyone needs to be willing to die. Most of us have more useful things to offer than our lives.

It not that those people don't fear death, it is that they fear the continuation of the status quo even more and in some cases they know that their death will further their cause.

For many people being under the continuation of the white supremacist imperialist patriarchy is a fate is worse than death. Its a trade off and the less you have to gain and more you have to lose the less sense that makes.

There is always a risk of death and suffering in any moment. The risk rises when you decide to be a vocal advocate for opposition to the white supremacist imperialist patriarchy. The ending of that system decreases the chance of death and suffering moment to moment for most people.

Quick answer for the time being cause I don't have time to write something longer atm: I think it's normal to fear death to an extent. Don't forget some of the bravest revolutionaries are people who were pushed into it by the conditions they lived in. That's not to say they were unwilling, necessarily, but that they had reasons to do it that many of us will (hopefully) never be desperate enough to have. I mean, you mention Fred Hampton: black people in the US were enslaved and then still hounded in regular life beyond that, and even today, can get gunned down by cops. A whole people, family, friends, culture, under prolonged existential threat.

I won't pretend to try to explain it beyond that because I've never been in that same place as they have, but yeah.

i am not afraid of death, but i do not want to suffer for an extended time.. if it is quick then no problem

I really don't see it as people NOT fearing death, and more of a "their fear of death is not a greater force than whatever they are willing to die for."
Whether it's a cause they will die for, or their own despair that causes them to take their own life.
I truly believe everyone, at some level, is afraid to die. You may put on a brave face and say stuff like "I don't fear death but I also don't want to die," like half the thread, but I mean, come on. Just say it. You all are probably afraid to die at some level, you just accepted it and also have things you care about more than that fear. Even people who are religious, and see death as a release to whatever afterlife, and claim to embrace death. Is it really no fear of death? Or are their convictions to their religion just so much stronger it overrides it?

Like, fear is good. It keeps you on edge. It keeps you alive. You can't "be brave" if you aren't afraid. Because being brave, or in the case of religion, having faith, pretty much requires there to be fear or uncertainty that you are fighting, pushing aside, whatever.
Aren't their lots of various sayings based around things like "If you don't fear death, you aren't being brave, you're being dumb."?

The trick is to not let it rule you. I'm afraid of getting mutilated in a car accident. It doesn't prevent me from driving, and I'm not thinking about it every time I drive, but is someone swerves in the direction of my car, my adrenaline is gonna spike and I'ma react in an attempt to not be in an accident. And I do that because I am afraid of the outcome. I am afraid of being injured, or even dieing. But I don't sit around and dwell on it.

That's just how I see it.

I can't speak for most people, but I know I personally put on a brave face whenever the subject of death comes up, but I also admit to anyone who cares to listen that I'll likely go out of this world afraid if I happen to be lucid and aware of what's happening.

I don't think I'm a coward because of it though, I'm just a living being that naturally wants to keep on living.

As for laying down your life for a cause, that's different, and imho, that situation just sucks, cuz usually your fighting something that fucked up your desire for a quiet simple life cuz of your race or religion or lifestyle, and now you have to set aside not only your dreams for the simple everyday life, but now you have to fight some authoritarian asshole who decided you and your loved ones deserved to die or be subjugated or be tortured, etc. In those situations laying down your life is still scary, but so is living, so laying down your life becomes entwined with a desire for you and/or your loved ones to survive and hopefully at least one of you gets to have that simple everyday life authoritarianism robs from you and so many people.

But now I'm just rambling again. Hopefully that offers up some insights. I don't think you're a coward, I think you're human. To be afraid of death is normal regardless of the situation.

Life and death are intertwined though, and so just as it is important it is to ask yourself the question, "How do you want to live?", it's perhaps equally important to ask the question, "How do you want to die?"