Does Raising Suicide-Awareness actually help anyone?

jiggeryqua said:
So does staying alive...
Click to expand...

That must be some moral burden there, maybe we should just shoot people with cancer and heart disease.

What burden could you be talking about that will be better because someone kills themselves?

(I will not guess, I will wait for your answers)

Warning, you are veering into dangerous territory and I am considering the outright stupidity of honor killings and 'family honor'.
Or the stupid 'shame' of having a family member with a disablity.
 
Dancing David said:
The main things is this, when someone talks about suicide, ask them if they have a plan.

If they say 'yes' then get help.
Click to expand...

I've heard this before, too.

"Having a plan" isn't a magic charm. I'm pretty sure people who had no plan still managed to kill themselves, and I'm sure part of it was because no one would take them seriously and help them when they asked for help.
 
jiggeryqua said:
With all due respect, you're very wrong. Yes, it hurts. It is shocking, since successful suicide often comes 'out of the blue'. Grief is a component of life. But it has never led me to believe that the person taking their own life should have stayed their hand on my account.
Click to expand...

That is a different issue, but since when do you treat a broken finger by cutting off your hand? Do you burn down your house because it has a broken window ?

Euthenasia is a separate issue. If someone is in physical pain, that can not be treated well by high doses of narcotics or has a condition that will kill them, I agree, if they are in their right mind they should be able to request medical intervention to end their life.
 
slingblade said:
I've heard this before, too.

"Having a plan" isn't a magic charm. I'm pretty sure people who had no plan still managed to kill themselves, and I'm sure part of it was because no one would take them seriously and help them when they asked for help.
Click to expand...

Yes anyone who asks for help should get it and people who know someone who is talking about suicide should always refer them to a professional. I did not mean to say that if they don’t have a plan then they are okay and can be ignored. I did not mean that and apologize.

Having a plan, is a critical factor in assessment.

Here we go:

Many people when interviewed will say certain very specific things and it is important to ask very specific questions, which is why professionals should intervene, especially in the case of manipulation, because it defuses the 'pay-off' for the manipulative individual.

In assessment you have to judge risk of actual harm and so it is crucial to find out what the person actually wants and is thinking about.

There is some risk but very low is what someone is actually saying, 'I don't like my life right now' , 'I just can't take it anymore' which is actually what a lot of people will say when you ask them. these people can safely be returned to the community with a safety plans and intervention.

There is very high risk when you ask someone "Are you planning on harming yorself?" and they say Yes. In that case a whole host of factors that you asses any way become much more important.

1. Current and past history of impulse control.
2. Level of ability to make reasoned judgments.
3. Level of insight into situation provoking crisis.

(These are the big three, that you have to establish, low impulse control, lack of judgment and lack of insight create very high risk.)

Then:
-past attempts
-current plans
-access to plans
-perceived level of lethality of plan
-guns

(all of those increase risk)

Mental status:
-current perceptions of hopelessness
-stated willingness vs, reluctance
-depression, psychosis or mania

followed by the standard demographics
-male
-older
-isolated
-chronic medical condition that is disabling or causes pain
-isolated
-persistent substance abuse or dependence
-lack of options and perceived control of life

You start with the first three after the judgment of
-are there actual thoughts of self harm
--is there a plan?

If they have just one of the first three, you might be able to set up a supportive plan to keep them safe in the community, but if they have two of three (low impulse control, lack of judgment, lack of insight) and the other factors that increase risk then you will almost always have to go for crisis respite or hospitalization.
 
Saraffina said:
I dont think it would really help. If a person is determined enouh to tale their own life then it would have no effect. It might even give the person the idea
Click to expand...
Want to address two myths here. The first (though I'm fairly sure if this is not what you're saying) is that if a person is suicidal, there's no stopping or deterring him or her. Setting up a fence to keep people from jumping off of bridges won't work, because then they'll just do something else. Talking to them or admitting them to psychiatric hospitals won't work, because they've made up their mind. This is akin to saying that security cameras and armed guards at banks won't have a preventive effect, because if a robber is determined enough, he'll try to rob the bank anyhow. Of course this isn't true. Suicide, needless to say, is a big decision. It's often carried out by the unloved or irrational. Talking to them about your fears often goes a long way towards keeping their thoughts at bay. A hospital stay can be very helpful, too.

As for the "giving someone an idea" part, you don't give someone the idea to commit suicide by worrying about them. Not 100% sure about awareness-raising, but an ad for a suicide hotline, for example, should do more harm than good. I do have an anecdote from a girl who became anorectic along with one of her girlfriends after someone visited her school and gave a talk about anorexia. So yes, you could probably give someone an idea by presenting things the wrong way.

I'm not writing this to put words into your mouth, just wanted to talk about these things.

That must be some moral burden there, maybe we should just shoot people with cancer and heart disease.

What burden could you be talking about that will be better because someone kills themselves?
Click to expand...
It's my firm belief that everyone is a burden at least once in their lives, and that if everyone were to go jump off a cliff when they considered themselves a burden, there'd be no more humans on Earth.
 
kittynh said:
Life itself is what is sacred.
Click to expand...
Emphasis added.

I think this underscores the point jiggeryqua made that objections to suicide are predominantly religious in nature. Even among professed agnostics and atheists, objections are still coloured by cultural attitudes which have their origins in religion.

I haven't read the entire thread yet; but so far Ducky's been the only one to cleary enumerate a rational objection -- abdication of responsibility. Sorry, that's not the only one. Dancing David also brought up the rational consideration of mental illness being a primary factor in most suicides (at least in Western countries)

But what about someone with no such responsibilities, and no mental illness? What rational reason is there for opposing it? Do we take the collectivist argument that others have an equal (or higher) claim on your life; or the individualist position that a person is has sole and entire ownership and control over one's life and its disposition. What about situations of terminal illness? Declining faculties?

Although I've never had a family member commit or attempt suicide to my knowledge (unless you count heavy drug use and similarly self-destructive behaviour); I've had a few friends (not close friends, but still) attempt or commit suicide, as well as one or two people I've admired (Dr. Duke for example). I've also attempted it once, and considered it many times. Only two things have kept me from it, my personal responsibilties to my family; and the hope that someone will find out what the fk is wrong with me, and it will be something treatable.
 
Dancing David said:
That must be some moral burden there, maybe we should just shoot people with cancer and heart disease.

What burden could you be talking about that will be better because someone kills themselves?

(I will not guess, I will wait for your answers)

Warning, you are veering into dangerous territory and I am considering the outright stupidity of honor killings and 'family honor'.
Or the stupid 'shame' of having a family member with a disablity.
Click to expand...

Given that my point, clearly, was that suicide involves taking a life that is, I contend, indisputably your own to take, how do you manage that leap to euthanasia - the taking of someone else's life because it suits you?

I was aware I was in dangerous territory - the death of loved ones, by any cause, is bound to raise strong emotional arguments (even here), but that's the dangerous territory I stepped away from for a while, in the hope of avoiding the sort of forum rule-breaking that this thread has attracted.

I do not share the opinion of some other posters on this thread. The strength of their emotion does not alter my position. Your slippery strawman does not alter my position.

I do appreciate the depth of feeling, and the nature of grief, which leads some people to believe that the life of others entails an obligation to those who love them (we'd need another thread for the discussion of love as blackmail, and another still for the extent of parental obligation). I do not know the specific circumstances of any suicides that have impacted the lives of posters here, nor of the vast majority of suicides worldwide - that latter being shared by all posters. I am prepared to hazard a guess that many, if not most, do not revolve around 'broken fingers' or 'broken windows'.

Is a parental obligation not to take ones own life trumped by an obligation to fight and die for ones country? Or the need to undertake hazardous work or the drive to participate in risky recreation?

Your diversion into 'being a burden' was a misunderstanding of my comment. You said "Suicide [...] hurts other people and leaves a mess for others to clean up, bith figurative and emotional", and I replied "So does staying alive..."

Being (staying) alive hurts other people. Well, I've hurt people, emotionally and physically. I would interested to hear from someone who can honestly say they have not - though I'd be inclined to think they were so self-absorbed that they were merely unaware of the hurt they had caused.

Being alive creates mess, emotional, figurative and literal, which others are obliged to clean up

It was perhaps misleading of me to use the words 'staying alive' in a thread on suicide. 'Being alive' would have been a better choice. All lives create mess and pain. I did not mean to imply that they were created only by lives lived after the rejection of suicide. That particular objection to suicide applies equally to life.
 
One of my circle of friends committed suicide last winter. Took everyone by surprise.

Well, not everyone. Seems there were one or two people who knew the story, but were sworn to secrecy. His father had died of Huntington's, and he was positive for it. He 'didn't want pity' so he kept it a secret, even as he descended from cheerful slacker to living in a homeless shelter, and then after a fun weekend with a couple of friends (who didn't know) he went to bed and quietly ODed. He was in his early thirties and was still asymptomatic to the people around him.

Meanwhile I have other friends fighting tooth and nail to extract every scrap of joy out of life during terminal neurological or motor neuron illnesses.

Some people are wired to want to keep going, and some people aren't. Even in my worst depressions and suicidal moods, I've almost always been too curious, too interested in learning and loving the people around me to want to die - I usually just want surcease for a while.

My mother, OTOH, really did want out. After several serious attempts when we were teens, we pretty much knew it was a matter of time, and sure enough, the very weekend the last of us kids moved out, she killed herself, with great care taken to make sure it succeeded.

I think there are those people who want help and relief, and raising suicide awareness could help them. I think there are others who are quite determined and decided, and nothing will stop them.
 
Typicallucas said:
I just ran across someone who was going on about how it's important to raise suicide awareness...

Is it? Does being aware of suicide stop kids from killing themselves?
Click to expand...
Good question. Has anyone ever stopped a suicide in progress after noticing the warning signs? I knew a man who constantly talked about killing himself and one day he did it. There really was no way to stop him.
 
Typicallucas said:
I just ran across someone who was going on about how it's important to raise suicide awareness...

Is it? Does being aware of suicide stop kids from killing themselves?
Click to expand...

It worked for me.

Professor Yaffle said:
As someone who has had suicidal ideation at times, feeling that you have to lock those thoughts and feelings up inside your head and not let anyone even suspect how bad you are feeling makes it spiral out of control. It is an enormous relief to be able to let someone else know what is going through your head.

http://helpguide.org/mental/suicide_prevention.htm
Click to expand...

true, much like an heavy weight on your back suddenly being removed.

I think that is the point of raising "awareness" to give occasion to those in danger to open themselves to other, and not being received poorly.
 
Last edited:
I think it would be good if there was an awareness campaign for the best ways for people to handle a situation where they have reason to believe someone is suicidal.
 
Aepervius said:
It worked for me.



true, much like an heavy weight on your back suddenly being removed.

I think that is the point of raising "awareness" to give occasion to those in danger to open themselves to other, and not being received poorly.
Click to expand...

Actually that may be a great point. When told to "suck it up" or "get over it and be a man" while in the midst of a major depression can seriously invalidate one's feelings and make things worse.

As for reasons not to, not wanting to be a burden or hurt others is pretty high on the list.
 
"With all due respect, you're very wrong. Yes, it hurts. It is shocking, since successful suicide often comes 'out of the blue'. Grief is a component of life. But it has never led me to believe that the person taking their own life should have stayed their hand on my account."
(sorry don`t know how to quote)

My son killed himself in September,he was 22. and it was out of the proverbial blue.
Despite my desperate grief,i have never once thought that this was something he did to me...us. He did it to himself,because,well I don`t really know.

But the pain of living must have been more than the fear of dying,I feel it was his choice to make...I think he was wrong,and if he had let someone stay his hand for a while,maybe the pain would have gone away or maybe not.
As i said at his memorial,I trust my children to make their own choices,with the best information to hand at the time,that doesn`t mean they are always right,and that they will never make a mistake,but what other way could there be.

I think suicide awareness is helpful to certain people ( i have been a Samaritan,counseling depressed people) but there will always be those that never ask for help or give any indication that they are depressed or suicidal
 
jiggeryqua said:
Suicide is honourable.

Depending where you live, I suppose.

I am still, perpetually, slightly bemused by societal attitudes to suicide. If it isn't your life, to take as and when you please, whose is it? I'd always assumed western attitudes to suicide related to the body being a temple, life being god-given and so on, but that surely wouldn't hold here, would it?
Click to expand...
The God thing wouldn't hold here but most if not all atheists on this forum consider suicide tragic because you throwing away the only life you'll ever have. I personally would go to great lengths to stop a suicide.
 
I feel compelled to tinkle in here a bit. Um. I had a laugh regarding this thread in a previous page, and I did so with a purpose. I think one person got it.

For everyone else, here goes... the only tool that can match fear, is humor. Comedy was borne from fear of death, knowledge of how we cannot escape death.

And so I circle back to the OP. I think "Suicide Awareness" programs serve a purpose, yes. But what we really need, is a sort of Comedy Vaccine to inject some "come on it's alright dude" into kids. And I would argue this has to start in the educational/media/entertainment mediums, since a vast majority of parents just do not care. Or they do not have the time. Fill in the Blank Problem.

The reality is that pop culture is a system already in place. Why not use the already existent platform and then just give them some good ideas en masse?

Common sense embedded in jokes. Who decides what? You do. We do. Get in the business and say something.
 
cienanos said:
I feel compelled to tinkle in here a bit. Um. I had a laugh regarding this thread in a previous page, and I did so with a purpose. I think one person got it.

For everyone else, here goes... the only tool that can match fear, is humor. Comedy was borne from fear of death, knowledge of how we cannot escape death.

And so I circle back to the OP. I think "Suicide Awareness" programs serve a purpose, yes. But what we really need, is a sort of Comedy Vaccine to inject some "come on it's alright dude" into kids. And I would argue this has to start in the educational/media/entertainment mediums, since a vast majority of parents just do not care. Or they do not have the time. Fill in the Blank Problem.

The reality is that pop culture is a system already in place. Why not use the already existent platform and then just give them some good ideas en masse?

Common sense embedded in jokes. Who decides what? You do. We do. Get in the business and say something.
Click to expand...

No.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom