It is a difficult thing for a living organism to think of nothingness. The closest thing we have to compare to it is sleep, and even that isn’t permanent.

But often when we think of death, whether we believe in an afterlife or not, we imagine nothingness. It might be a subconscious signal to ourselves that perhaps we somehow know there isn’t an afterlife. If there is, it could just be a coping mechanism that signals to us that once life ends, so does the pain.

Nothingness — that infinite abyss of sleep — comes true in death. It’s a lack of life.

So why might someone want nothingness? And why might they glamorize it?

Abraham Biggs, a 19-year-old college student at Florida’s Broward College, killed himself Saturday while broadcasting his death via webcam. The Web site on which he chose to carry out the act allows users to chat next to the webcam feed. Some begged him to stop while others urged him on. Biggs swallowed a few pills and after 12 hours of the lifeless man lying on his bed were broadcast onto the Internet, someone finally notified authorities.

How’s that for your Monday buzzkill? It’s a sad window into the life of today’s depressed youth, but somehow it’s still a foggy one. You can hardly make out what Biggs’ real intent in suicide was. Somehow I don’t think it was really death.

I hate when people blame things on the media, but I think in this case — the case of a glamorized suicide — the media might be to blame. The public is bombarded with constant messages that suicide is something less than permanent.

When movie star Heath Ledger downed a lethal concoction of pills earlier this year, accidentally committing suicide, he became more popular than he had ever been before. People knew him before as little more than one of the gay cowboys in “Brokeback Mountain” and the Australian heartthrob in “10 Things I Hate About You.”

After his accidental death, Ledger became a hero of sorts. Imagine a young, talented actor’s life cut short just before the premiere of his breakout role as the Joker in this summer’s Batman film “The Dark Knight.” It’s tragic, without a doubt. But media coverage of Ledger’s death glamorized him in a way he never really had been by the public. His movies live on, so is he really dead? Yes.

Movies are a huge culprit in perpetuating suicide as being non-permanent. Hundreds of examples come to mind, but the one that sticks out is Luke Wilson’s role in “The Royal Tenenbaums.” When he realizes he and his adoptive sister will likely never be together, Wilson’s character slits his wrists in front of a bathroom mirror, blood dripping everywhere as Elliott Smith’s ultra-depressing “Needle in the Hay” plays in the background. Somehow the scene is beautiful and the audience is lead to believe it is in a dark, gruesome way.

As much as I hate to admit it, even journalism plays a huge part in perpetuating glamorized suicide. Just recently, Rolling Stone printed an article about the life and death of literary genius David Foster Wallace.

At 46, just when he considered his life to be happy again, Rolling Stone portrays Wallace as a tortured genius who just couldn’t bear to cope with his own intellect any longer. In a stable, happy, committed marriage with all of the success in the world, Wallace, who had a lifelong bout with depression, tied a noose around his neck in the basement when his wife went to run some quick errands, and died hanging by a rope.

When you add up the infinite amount of celebrities that have died at their own hand, either intentionally or unintentionally, you begin to realize what a waste suicide really is. Some of the names that come to mind — Elvis Presley, Jimi Hendrix, John Bonham, Marilyn Monroe, Kurt Cobain and Elliott Smith. The full list of celebrity suicides and overdoses is exhausting to go through.

The number of suicides in this country far surpass the amount of murders. I can’t help but think that these cases, among others, have something to do with it.

Death by suicide isn’t just self-induced permanent sleep. It’s death.

It’s nothingness.

If you can’t live with that, then you probably don’t want to die. No one really does.

Sorry to bring down your Monday. Yell at me (please use caps lock to express anger) at christina.caldwell@asu.edu.