I like that this happened (not in a morbid way) because it is bringing suicide, something I am very interested in from a personal and sociological perspective, to the public forum.
I have learned through visceral personal experience that most people
really, really do not like talking about suicide, especially from a person seriously considering it. It makes them very uncomfortable and usually they resort to cliche responses such as "suicide is so cowardly" (arguably the most insulting thing you could say to a person considering suicide, as I believe it is one of the most courageous things a human being can do, regardless of the morality of it.)
------------------
(On a personal note, the only thing that has kept me personally from committing suicide, after years and years and years of suicidal thoughts, was ultimately realizing that no matter how badly I was personally suffering, killing myself would only bring much more suffering to those who do care about me or "love me", despite my complete inability to understand this on emotional terms. I believe my sister saying something like "I don't want [your niece and nephew] to have to go to your funeral....", and that was when I decided I could probably never do it.
But at the time, I was convinced that if someone really loved me or cared about me, giving me their personal permission to kill myself would be the most merciful and loving thing that they could do. This is how bad existence can be for certain individuals.)
------------------
So, for me, suicide, while bringing relief to the individual, ultimately causes more suffering, which is why I subsequently became much more interested in the elimination of suffering as a concept (hence my interest in Buddhism). Robin Williams deserved to die however he wished; he brought joy to quite literally millions, maybe billions of people throughout his life. However he chose to exit, (which was inevitable anyways), was his choice, and I respect that he had the bravery to go out on his own terms.
Which brings me to my final point; the vast majority of people simply do not understand clinical depression. Maybe they do -- let's not get into subjective vs. objective feelings.
But odds are, if you haven't seriously contemplated buying or borrowing a gun to shoot yourself in the head with, or looked over the edge of a rocky cliff thinking about what the fall would be like, or whether you would die immediately or suffer on the rocks before bleeding out , or stared at pill bottles for hours upon hours upon hours contemplating the effects of the actions you're considering taken, or anything else along the lines, you've probably never been clinically depressed, you've just been really sad.
And that's where the big confusion lies, I think. People who have "just been really sad" throughout their lives, and down, often talk with suicidal people and think "shit, I made it through MY problems, why is this person complaining so much? Why don't they just cheer up?" You simply don't know. You don't know what it's like to wake up every day and immediately wanting to die.
The ignorance behind this line of reasoning is incalculable. It's not your fault, and you should be grateful that you don't know -- the experience of hopelessness and despair that depression brings, every hour of every day, for months, years, sometimes a lifetime --- is a burden I would wish on nobody. Yet millions experience it every day, and feel that they have no one to talk to about it, simply because of how uncomfortable it makes people feel. Often depressed people are very ostracized from society, not because they are down on themselves, but because they don't want to bring others to their level of depression.
There is, quite clearly, a spectrum of human suffering, and only the person experiencing a particular wavelength truly knows how far on the spectrum they are, that is, until we develop empathy-sharing technology. The point is, if you are talking with someone suicidal, refer them to someone who has been through it, don't parrot ignorant bullshit that you've heard from others simply because the topic makes you uncomfortable.
Life may be meaningless, but there are ways to let the parts of yourself that want to die, die, without actually experiencing a physiological death. This should be the focus of this branch of psychotherapy and individuals who have been suffering long and intensely enough to want to commit suicide need way more attention in our society. The
Mindfulness/CBT movement is helping much in this area.
[b]TL;DR - Millions of people being on antidepressants is not a normal state of evolution. Evolution does not create individuals that want to kill themselves -- I'm sure I don't have to go into basic evolutionary biology here -- evolution favors the creation of conscious beings which enjoy living and reproducing, indefinitely. Human beings experience depression and suicide because of the high degree of consciousness that we are privileged enjoy, but our society has not caught up--- has not "allowed" itself to fully enjoy life yet. We're approaching, whether it takes hundreds or thousands of years, a time where life can be paradise for everyone on Earth (perhaps through genetic removal of warring, apelike traits through projects like Dent's Hedonistic imperative). Widespread depression and suicidal thoughts is a genetic abberation, imho. Suicide itself is such an interesting concept compared to the almost complete lack of such behavior in animals (fact: lemmings don't commit suicide en masse, this is a myth)
If I had to guess, (and i've read nothing about it) Robin Williams has been struggling with depression for decades, and used comedy as his outlet to offset that depression. Many artists do this; you simply cannot be as honest and aware of society's often hilarious (if not depressing) flaws without being depressed enough to "see things as they are". And that's what comedians do -- call forward, in an entertaining way, the things about every day existence that we take for granted.
If you truly understand comedians, if you truly understand how much joy and humor they bring to this often bleak world, then you will see Robin Williams, despite all his faults, as a true hero of humanity. The planet is a better place him having been a part of it.