ABSTRACT
Engaging with a recent suicide case that gained worldwide attention, this chapter highlights the devastating consequences of the de-agentification of the suicidal person in suicide prevention. In 2017, Michelle Carter was convicted of involuntary manslaughter for the suicide of her boyfriend Conrad Roy, even though she was not physically present at the scene and did not provide the means through which Roy enacted his suicide. The consensus was that she encouraged him to end his life and should thus be held responsible for his death. This chapter analyses how representations of the case mobilise mental illness according to discourses of pathology, madness, monstrosity, and evil and, as such, shows how mental illness functions as a tool to ascribe different levels of agency to Roy and Carter based on their (lack of) proximity to normative categories and actions in relation to suicide. Thus, the chapter explores the different subject positions that are enabled for Roy and Carter, and for those who (support) suicide. In doing so, it addresses the question of how “help” is both understood and produced in the context of suicide prevention, and its consequences for those who are suicidal, those close to them, and prevention initiatives.
