Why do people put pistols in their mouth to kill themselves?
I’m remembering a scene from Fight Club and Possessor where the main characters put pistols in their mouth in an attempt to “kill themselves” (plus other movies I’ve seen).
In Fight Club, Tyler misses (I guess on purpose), and in Possessor, the main character needs to do it after completing a contract (to leave the body she possessed).
In Possessor, the angle suggests she might miss her brain entirely.
I can understand something like a shotgun; it’s not exactly something you can hold to your temple, but why put a pistol in your mouth?
Is it more effective somehow? Does it hit a part of your brain where firing from the side might otherwise leave you alive, yet disabled?
I’m sure you could argue it’s just more dramatic from a movie critic perspective, but I’m sure people have really done this, and it maybe be a case of art imitating life, but I believe it would be the other way around.
I have no experience nor done any research into this topic but I would think that a gun to the temple is easier to mess up resulting in either a slow death or a non-lethal shot with a life altering disability or disfigurment.
Gun in the mouth is more guaranteed a kill shot. Under the chin would probably be even more guaranteed. Just be sure to aim up and not back.
I think aiming back/down towards the spinal chord/medulla oblongata, not up, would be more effective in guaranteeing death. That said, suffocating on an inert gas would likely be less painful as you’d pass out after only a few seconds and then die within minutes. Don’t ask me how I know.