Queerying Health Research: Undoing Suicidism

Undoing Suicidism: Queering, Transing, Cripping and Maddening (Assisted) Suicide

In this presentation, I argue that suicidal people are oppressed by structural suicidism. Suicidism and its preventionist script reproduce violence and cause additional harm and death through forms of incarceration, discrimination, stigmatization and pathologization. This is particularly true for marginalized groups, such as trans people living at the intersection of multiple oppressions. I show how the preventionist logic represents “cruel optimism” because the help offered often increases the structural violence experienced, such as cisgenderism. I therefore question the idea that the best way to help suicidal people is through prevention. I put forth the argument that supporting assisted suicide for suicidal people could more effectively prevent unnecessary deaths. Drawing on trans-affirmative approaches and on the theoretical tools from queer, crip and Mad studies, I propose a suicide-affirmative approach that allows for genuine accompaniment of suicidal individuals. By offering a new queercrip model of (assisted) suicide, I invite us to imagine what could happen if we started thinking about (assisted) suicide from an anti-suicidist and intersectional framework.

Alexandre Baril is Associate Professor at the University of Ottawa. His work is situated at the crossroads of gender, queer, trans, disability/crip/Mad studies, critical gerontology and critical suicidology. His forthcoming book (spring 2023) is entitled Undoing Suicidism: A Trans, Queer, Crip Approach to Rethinking (Assisted) Suicide. His commitment to equity has earned him awards for his involvement in queer, trans and disabled communities, including the Canadian Disability Studies Association Tanis Doe Francophone Award (2020), and the Equity, Diversity and Inclusion President’s Award at the University of Ottawa (2021). A prolific author, he has over 75 publications and has given over 185 presentations at the international level.

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