History Main / SuicideForOthersHappiness

[[folder:Live-Action Television]]
* ''Series/{{CSI}}'': A guy makes it appear that he's been stabbed in the back so his family will get his insurance money. Unfortunately for them, the CSI[=s=] are too good at their job.
** This has probably happened at least a few times per series.

* ''Literature/JudeTheObscure'': Jude's son, nicknamed [[CreepyChild "Little Father Time"]] for how somber he is for his age, commits MurderSuicide on himself and his two younger half-siblings because he believed that his father Jude and his pregnant adoptive mother Sue would be better off without their children; the family was poor, and Jude being shut out of the house they were granted shelter in for the night because there wasn't enough room was the nail in the coffin for his abysmally bleak outlook on life. The note he leaves behind simply says, "Done because we are too menny." Sue's grief causes her to miscarry less than a few days later and she takes the children's deaths as punishment from God unto her for [[KissingCousins marrying her cousin]]; she soon leaves Jude to remarry her ex-husband (who she didn't really love) as a form of self-flagellation, and Jude remarries his ex-wife (who he also didn't really love) in a drunken stupor -- he later falls ill and dies in misery. Safe to say that Little Father Time did the opposite of what he intended.

* ''Literature/JudeTheObscure'': Jude's son, nicknamed [[CreepyChild "Little Father Time"]] for how somber he is for his age, commits MurderSuicide on himself and his two younger half-siblings because he believed that his father Jude and his surrogate mother Sue would be better off without their children; the family was poor, and Jude being shut out of the house they were granted shelter in for the night because there wasn't enough room was the nail in the coffin for his abysmally bleak outlook on life. The note he leaves behind simply says, "Done because we are too menny." Sue's grief causes her to miscarry less than a few days later and she takes the children's deaths as punishment from God unto her for [[KissingCousins marrying her cousin]]; she soon leaves Jude to remarry her ex-husband (who she didn't really love) as a form of self-flagellation, and Jude remarries his ex-wife (who he also didn't really love) in a drunken stupor -- he later falls ill and dies in misery. Safe to say that Little Father Time did the opposite of what he intended.

This is essentially IWantMyBelovedToBeHappy but in this case a character wants to erase themselves from existence/kill themselves because they think that it will make the one they love/care about happy.

For example, if we put our characters onboard the Nostromo in ''Film/{{Alien}}'', and Bob attacks the alien, knowing he'll probably be killed but it will give Alice and Carl a chance to escape, that's HeroicSacrifice. If he then discovers the alien has been killed by a falling piece of equipment, but decides not to rejoin Alice and Carl because he knows Alice will be happier married to Carl than him, even though he knows the escape pod is his best hope at survival, it's this.

** When Jellal is revived with no memories in the Nirvana arc, and Erza angrily throws all of his past atrocities in his face, he attempts to kill himself with a self-destruction spell because he believes that Erza won't be free while he's around for her to hate. She doesn't actually hate him, and talks him out of it. Post-TimeSkip, having remembered his actions and becoming TheAtoner, he considers that he would be better off dead before Erza gives him a GetAHoldOfYourselfMan.

* In ''Manga/TokyoGhoul re'' [[spoiler: Kaneki/Sasaki thinks dying in a cool way will make others love him and that they'll be happier if he sacrifices himself to protect them. He wants to die in the same way he perceives Hide had done for him when he goes to battle Arima. However, a hallucination of Hide steps in to strengthen his resolve to win as he meant that he just wanted to survive on together with Kaneki.]]

* ''ComicBook/JourneyIntoMysteryGillen'' concludes with young Loki discovering he wasn't really an reincarnation of the original Loki, only an innocent ''clone'' of sorts, whom the original intended from the start to eventually erase from existence and take the body of, with his good name restored, in order to get back to backstabbing everyone whose trust Kid Loki had re-earned. Kid Loki is horrified- but Loki had also manipulated him into creating a MacGuffin currently causing a multiverse-endangering civil war that will only exist as long as Kid Loki does. Kid Loki ultimately agrees to be erased from existence so that his family- particularly Hela and Thor- don't get dragged down in the war and are allowed to be happy.

* ''Film/TheButterflyEffect'': One of the endings has [[spoiler:Evan Treborn go back in time to strangle himself with his own umbilical cord while still in the womb, resulting in a stillbirth. The people Evan cares about, for whose sake he does this, do in fact go on to lead better and happier lives]], even if his mother has to go through ''another'' [[spoiler:miscarriage]]. [[EsotericHappyEnding Fortunately]], while it's implied [[spoiler:this has happened with ''every one'' of Evan's parents' sons]], the next one is [[spoiler:a girl, who has none of the powers]] that drove Evan to do it.[[note]]It's strongly implied that Evan's sister has a different father, and that Evan got his ability from his own father.[[/note]]
* ''Film/CruelAndUnusual'': Doris believed she was just a burden to her family, being an alcoholic that could barely function, so she hanged herself. Instead it made her family suffer greatly (one of her daughters blamed herself) and leaves Doris still reliving the suicide in the afterlife decades after this.

* In the 1996 movie ''Film/{{Kissed}}'', a young man falls in love with a seriously disturbed girl. She has been attracted to dead things since childhood, and took a job in a mortuary to give herself access to comely dead men. The young man tries to lead her into a (marginally) healthier relationship with him, and the girl tries, but is revolted by sex with the living. The young man eventually commits suicide in front of her so that she will finally love (and make love) with him.
* ''Film/LightsOut2016'' had this as some UnfortunateImplications, as (due to a FocusGroupEnding), the climax concludes with [[spoiler: Sophie committing suicide in order to [[HeroicSacrifice stop Diane from killing her children]], as it's a case of CantLiveWithoutYou. The audience didn't like the initial cut in which it was a SenselessSacrifice, but the result comes across as this trope because Diane was intended as a representation of depression by the author, who also suffers from (and has lost friends to) the ailment]]. Suffice to say, this was ''not'' the intention, and he plans to address it further in [[SequelHook the sequel]].
* ''Film/{{Looper}}'': [[spoiler: Younger Joe kills himself right before his future self kills Sara, which would have in turn caused her son, Cid, to become the evil Rainmaker in 30 years from then.]]

* ''Literature/JudeTheObscure'': Jude's son, nicknamed [[CreepyChild "Little Father Time"]] for how somber he is for his age, commits MurderSuicide on himself and his two younger half-siblings because he believed that his father Jude and his surrogate mother Sue would be better off without their children; the family was poor, and Jude being shut out of the house they were granted shelter in for the night because there wasn't enough room was the nail in the coffin for his abysmally bleak outlook on life. The note he leaves behind simply says, "Done because we are too menny." Sue's grief causes her to miscarry less than a few days later and she takes the childrens' deaths as punishment from God unto her for [[KissingCousins marrying her cousin]]; she soon leaves Jude to remarry her ex-husband (who she didn't really love) as a form of self-flagellation, and Jude remarries his ex-wife (who he also didn't really love) in a drunken stupor -- he later falls ill and dies in misery. Safe to say that Little Father Time did the opposite of what he intended.

* ''Sacred Sins'' by Creator/NoraRoberts: Joey is a troubled teenaged boy who is depressed, suicidal, and has dabbled in alcohol and the occult as attempts to cope with his depression, stemming from his mother's divorce from his alcoholic father and the fact that his father apparently doesn't want anything to do with him. His mother has remarried, the stepfather is basically the opposite of Joey's father, and the two of them have a baby. So on Thanksgiving night, after dinner, he sneaks out of the house, goes to a bridge, and jumps off it, convinced that his mother and stepfather will be happier without him and that they have the baby who can just replace him. He dies in a hospital, leaving his mother, stepfather, and the psychiatrist who tried to help him in tears.

* ''Series/{{CSI}}'': A guy makes it appear that he's been stabbed in the back so his family will get his insurance money. Unfortunately for them the CSI[=s=] are too good at their job.

* ''Series/{{Leverage}}'': A hockey player is pretty much doing this: not only does he pick fights with the opposing team for a bonus, ''his own manager'' pays the opposing players to fight him. By the time the Leverage team meets him he's one concussion away from death and he knows it, but he loves his son too much to pass up the extra money.

* In ''Theatre/DeathOfASalesman'' Willy Loman kills himself ([[MakeItLookLikeAnAccident by having an "accident" in his car]]) so his wife and sons will get his insurance money.

* In the ''Film/JamesBond'' film ''Film/TheWorldIsNotEnough'', the BigBad (or possibly TheDragon, it's not made clear) is willing to die in order to further [[spoiler: [[BitchInSheepsClothing Electra]]'s]] plan to [[spoiler: irradiate all her competitors' oil by blowing up a nuclear submarine]]. The fact he's [[DisabilityImmunity slowly dying from a bullet wound to the head]] probably helps though.

Compare ItsAWonderfulPlot, where (as a ShoutOut to ''Film/ItsAWonderfulLife''), a character gets to see what would have happened if they had never existed. As such plots usually prove, this sort of thing rarely makes anyone nearly as happy as the person doing it thinks it will (bt see BetterIfNotBornPlot for the usual BlackComedy subversion).

* In ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/2336553/1/After-the-fall-of-Giants After the Fall of Giants]]'', [[Manga/RanmaOneHalf Gosunkugi]] attempts to kill himself so that Miyo, the girl who is to become his future wife, will not suffer DeathByChildbirth. Luckily, he's found and taken to hospital in time.
* ''Webcomic/HetaliaAxisPowers'' fanfic ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/12086351/1/Kanashī-Wütend-Desolato Kanashī, Wütend, Desolato]]'', a WhatIf for ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/11886910/1/Gankona-Unnachgiebig-Unità Gankona, Unnachgiebig, Unità]]'': Italy sure thought this. He thought it was his fault for causing the torment [[OneTrueThreesome Germany and Japan]] were forced to experience because he revealed [[{{Polyamory}} their relationship to the world]]. He thought the only way to end the ostracising and ridicule was to kill himself. [[BungledSuicide It only failed]] [[NighInvulnerability because it is nearly impossible to kill the countries' personifications]].

* The Kid Loki run of ''ComicBook/JourneyIntoMystery'' concludes with young Loki discovering he wasn't really an reincarnation of the original Loki, only an innocent ''clone'' of sorts, whom the original intended from the start to eventually erase from existence and take the body of, with his good name restored, in order to get back to backstabbing everyone whose trust Kid Loki had re-earned. Kid Loki is horrified- but Loki had also manipulated him into creating a MacGuffin currently causing a multiverse-endangering civil war that will only exist as long as Kid Loki does. Kid Loki ultimately agrees to be erased from existence so that his family- particularly Hela and Thor- don't get dragged down in the war and are allowed to be happy.

* ''Film/TheButterflyEffect'': One of the endings has [[spoiler:Evan Treborn go back in time to strangle himself with his own umbilical cord while still in the womb, resulting in a stillbirth. The people Evan cares about, for whose sake he does this, do in fact go on to lead better and happier lives]], even if his mother has to go through ''another'' [[spoiler:miscarriage]]. [[EsotericHappyEnding Fortunately]], while it's implied [[spoiler:this has happened with ''every one'' of Evan's parents' sons]], the next one is [[spoiler:a girl, who has none of the powers]] that drove Evan to do it.

Compare ItsAWonderfulPlot, where (as a ShoutOut to ''Film/ItsAWonderfulLife''), a character gets to see what would have happened if they had never existed. As such plots usually prove, this sort of thing rarely makes anyone nearly as happy as the person doing it thinks it will.

* ''Literature/JudeTheObscure'': Jude's son, nicknamed [[CreepyChild "Little Father Time"]] for how somber he is for his age, commits MurderSuicide on himself and his two younger half-siblings because he believed that his father Jude and his surrogate mother Sue would be better off without their children; the family was poor, and Jude being shut out of the house they were granted shelter in for the night because there wasn't enough room was the nail in the coffin for his abysmally bleak outlook on life. The note he leaves behind simply says, "Done because we are too menny." Sue's grief causes her to miscarry less than a few days later and she takes the childrens' deaths as punishment from God onto her [[KissingCousins marrying her cousin]]; she soon leaves Jude to remarry her ex-husband (who she didn't really love) as a form of self-flagellation, and Jude remarries his ex-wife (who he also didn't really love) in a drunken stupor -- he later falls ill and dies in misery. Safe to say that Little Father Time did the opposite of what he intended.

* ''Literature/JudeTheObscure'': Jude's son, nicknamed [[CreepyChild "Little Father Time"]] for how somber he is for his age, commits MurderSuicide on himself and his two younger half-siblings because he believed that his father Jude and his surrogate mother Sue would be better off without their children; the family was poor, and Jude being shut out of the house they were granted shelter in for the night because there wasn't enough room was the nail in the coffin for his abysmally bleak outlook on life. The note he leaves behind simply says, "Done because we are too menny."

* ''Literature/JudeTheObscure'': Jude's son and a CreepyChild "Little Father Time" commits suicide because the family is poor and he feels... Well, this was his suicide note: ''Done because we are too menny.'' [[spoiler: He killed his younger siblings as well, making it a case of murder/suicide for others' happiness, though he probably never believed that anybody could be if only slightly happy.]]

[[folder: Anime and Manga ]]

* In ''Manga/PandoraHearts'' [[spoiler: Vincent]] is so [[{{Yandere}} obsessed]] [[IncestYayShipping with his older brother]] [[spoiler: Gilbert]] that he wants to do this in regards to him.

* In ''Manga/{{Bleach}}'' Shishigawara is [[HoYay utterly devoted]] to Tsukishima and is willing to throw away his life for him. The implication being that he would do so if it would help Tsukishima in his plans and make him happier in the long run.

* In ''Manga/{{Monster}}'' Johan's whole "perfect suicide" plot was an attempt to eradicate his own existence in order to make his sister Anna happy. As Anna puts it, this "suicide" was the "only expression of love" that Johan could convey.

* ''Manga/KoharuNoHibi'': Koharu in regards to Akira. She stalks him, obsesses over him, and devotes her whole life to him. In chapter 21 she even told him she would die if he asked her to if she thought it would make him happy.

[[folder: Fan Works ]]

* In ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/2336553/1/After-the-fall-of-Giants After the Fall of Giants]]'', [[Manga/RanmaOneHalf Gosunkugi]] attempts to kill himself so that Miyo, the girl who is to become his future wife, will not suffer DeathByChildbirth. Luckily, he's found and taken to hospital in time.

[[folder: Film ]]
* In the ''Film/JamesBond'' film ''Film/TheWorldIsNotEnough'', the BigBad (or possibly TheDragon, it's not made clear) is willing to die in order to further [[spoiler: [[BitchInSheepsClothing Electra]]'s]] plan to [[spoiler: irradiate all her competitors' oil by blowing up a nuclear submarine]]. The fact he's [[DisabilityImmunity slowly dying from a bullet wound to the head]] probably helps though.
* ''Film/DonnieDarko'': [[spoiler: Donnie allows himself to be killed by the falling plane turbine to allow the various people in his life to live/be happy.]]

* In the 1996 movie ''Kissed'', a young man falls in love with a seriously disturbed girl. She has been attracted to dead things since childhood, and took a job in a mortuary to give herself access to comely dead men. The young man tries to lead her into a (marginally) healthier relationship with him, and the girl tries, but is revolted by sex with the living. The young man eventually commits suicide in front of her so that she will finally love (and make love) with him.
* The alcoholic main character in the [[Film/AStarIsBorn1937 1937]], [[Film/AStarIsBorn1954 1954]], and [[Film/AStarIsBorn2018 2018]] versions of ''A Star Is Born'' kills himself so his wife won't have to sacrifice her career to care for him.
* ''Film/{{Looper}}'': [[spoiler: Younger Joe kills himself right before his future self kills Sara, which would have in turn caused her son, Cid, to become the evil Rainmaker in 30 years from then.]]

* In ''Literature/{{Twilight}}'', Jacob threatens to do this, but Edward says it's just a ploy to get Bella to kiss him.
* ''Literature/TheNightCircus'': [[spoiler: Because the Challenge only ends when one of the competitors kills themselves, and the intimacy of the competition typically leads to the two competitors falling in love, both challengers go through a period where they contemplate suicide to relieve the other from continuing the game]]. It's implied that [[spoiler:Tsukiko's opponent may have ended their competition this way]].
* ''Sacred Sins'' by Creator/NoraRoberts: Joey is a troubled teenaged boy who is depressed, suicidal, and has dabbled in alcohol and the occult as attempts to cope with his depression, stemming from his mother's divorce from his alcoholic father and the fact that his father apparently doesn't want anything to do with him. His mother has remarried, the stepfather is basically the opposite of Joey's father, and the two of them have a baby. So on Thanksgiving night, after dinner, he sneaks out of the house, goes to a bridge, and jumps off it, convinced that his mother and stepfather will be happier without him and that they have the baby who can just replace him. He dies in a hospital, leaving his mother, stepfather, and the psychiatrist who tried to help him in tears.
* Gregor Samsa, the suddenly-insectile protagonist and AuthorAvatar of ''Literature/TheMetamorphosis''. Already in poor health from a crippling injury he'd received from his own family, he overhears them complaining of what a burden he is and wishing he would go away. A heartbroken Gregor retreats to his room and allows himself to die, which greatly pleases the Samsa family and allows them to move on and prosper in their lives. Author Franz Kafka was not a very happy soul.

[[folder: Live Action Television]]

* ''Series/{{Leverage}}'': A hockey player is pretty much doing this: not only does he pick fights with the opposing team for a bonus, ''his own manager'' pays the opposing players to fight him. By the time the Leverage team meets him he's one concussion away from death and he knows it, but he loves his son too much to pass up the extra money.

[[folder: Theatre]]

[[folder: Video Games]]

[[folder: Webcomic]]

* Happens in ''Manga/KannazukiNoMiko'': [[spoiler:Chikane plans to die and be erased from Himeko's memories in order for Himeko to live on and be happy. It doesn't really work out, because even without her memories, Himeko's love for her remains ingrained into her very being, causing her anguish. So Chikane comes back from the dead for her.]]

* In ''Manga/KatekyoHitmanReborn'' Gokudera is implied [[HoYay to have a crush on Tsuna]] and was prepared to sacrifice himself for Tsuna's happiness during the battle with Belphegor but stops when Tsuna tells him he wouldn't be happy if he sacrificed himself.

* ''Webcomic/AxisPowersHetalia'' fanfic ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/12086351/1/Kanashī-Wütend-Desolato Kanashī, Wütend, Desolato]]'', a WhatIf for ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/11886910/1/Gankona-Unnachgiebig-Unità Gankona, Unnachgiebig, Unità]]'': Italy sure thought this. He thought it was his fault for causing the torment [[OneTrueThreesome Germany and Japan]] were forced to experience because he revealed [[{{Polyamory}} their relationship to the world]]. He thought the only way to end the ostracising and ridicule was to kill himself. [[BungledSuicide It only failed]] [[NighInvulnerability because it is nearly impossible to kill the countries' personifications]].

[[folder: Literature ]]

[[folder: Live Action Television ]]

[[folder: Theatre ]]

[[folder: Video Games ]]

[[folder: Web Comic ]]

[[folder: Western Animation ]]

Compare/Contrast DrivenToSuicide, UndyingLoyalty, DeathIsTheOnlyOption, SpurnedIntoSuicide.

* ''Film/TheButterflyEffect'': One of the endings has [[spoiler:Evan Treborn go back in time to strangle himself with his own umbilical cord while still in the womb, resulting in a stillbirth. The people Evan cares about, for whose sake he does this, do in fact go on to lead better and happier lives.]]

* In ''Series/DayBreak'', Chad suggests this as a possible solution to Hopper's failure to end the loop and the misery he causes to his loved ones.

For any tropers who feel this way... '''This is NOT true!''' Losing someone to suicide has never made anybody happier; on the contrary, it is extremely traumatic and painful to everyone left behind. [[YouAreNotAlone You matter, and people want to help you]]. '''[[UsefulNotes/SuicidePrevention There are numbers you can call. Please, talk to someone.]]'''
----

* Creator/JRRTolkien [[WordOfGod once remarked]] that [[WhatMightHaveBeen this could have happened]] in ''Literature/TheLordOfTheRings'' if the character development had taken a different turn: If [[spoiler:Gollum]] had been redeemed, he would probably have stolen the ring and thrown himself into the mountain with it to save Frodo.

Those left behind by a successful attempt will almost certainly ''not'' be made happier by it, as suicide is a tragedy and [[CaptainObvious tragedies tend not to make people happy]]. If anything they will likely suffer SurvivorGuilt or even blame themselves.

* The alcoholic main character in ''Film/AStarIsBorn'' [[spoiler: kills himself so his wife won't have to sacrifice her career to care for him.]]

* ''Film/LightsOut'' had this as some UnfortunateImplications, as (due to a FocusGroupEnding), the climax concludes with [[spoiler: Sophie committing suicide in order to stop Diane from killing her children, as it's a case of CantLiveWithoutYou. The audience didn't like the initial SenselessSacrifice, but the result comes across as this trope. Given that Diane was intended as a representation of depression by the author, who also suffered from (and has lost friends to) the ailment]], this was ''not'' the intention, and he plans to address it further in [[SequelHook the sequel]].

Compare/Contrast DrivenToSuicide, UndyingLoyalty, DeathIsTheOnlyOption.

For any tropers who feel this way... '''This is NOT true!''' Losing someone to suicide has never made anybody happier; on the contrary, it is extremely traumatic and painful to [[SurvivorGuilt everyone left behind]]. [[YouAreNotAlone You matter, and people want to help you]]. '''[[UsefulNotes/SuicidePrevention There are numbers you can call. Please, talk to someone.]]'''

For any tropers who feel this way... '''This is NOT true!''' Losing someone to suicide has never made anybody happier; on the contrary, it is extremely traumatic and painful to everyone left behind. [[YouAreNotAlone You matter, and people want to help you]]. '''[[UsefulNotes/SuicidePrevention There are numbers you can call. Please, talk to someone.]]'''