Why do I get "AttributeError: 'super' object has no attribute '__del__'" when calling the destructor of super from my Thread subclass' destructor?

In my Python (3.6) program, I have a thread object, like so:

class MyThread(threading.Thread):
    def __init__(self):
        super(MyThread, self).__init__()
        ...

    def __del__(self):
        ...
        super(type(self), self).__del__()

    def run(self):
        ...

used in the main program like this:

def main():
    my_thread = MyThread()
    my_thread.start()
    ...
    my_thread.join()

But as soon as I try to run this program, I get the following Python crash:

Exception ignored in: <bound method MyThread.__del__ of <MyThread(Thread-6, stopped 1234)>>
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "c:/my_proj/my_program.py", line 123, in __del__
  super(type(self), self).__del__()
AttributeError: 'super' object has no attribute '__del__'

Why is this, and how can it be fixed?

Is it not allowed to call the __del__() method of super explicitly like this, or what? (Google seems to tell me otherwise, but still won't give me any answer to why this happens)

super(type(self), self) is always wrong. In Python 2, you must explicitly name the current class, e.g. super(MyThread, self). In Python 3, you can simply use super():

class MyThread(threading.Thread):
    def __init__(self):
        super().__init__()
        # ...

    def run(self):
        # ...

That said, if if the superclass has no __del__ then you'll get this AttributeError. If your base classes have no __del__ you can simply omit it. There is rarely a good reason to implement __del__ in your class.

If you need controlled cleanup, consider using implementing a context manager.