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Suicide and the Media?

dreamers75

Strange one suppose best for After Hours, in recent times the Media has decided to blanket ban any reporting of Suicides in this country.

I know of quite a few people who have topped themselves in the last 2 years all young around the 14-18 age all in secondary schools. (one today which noone will ever hear about

)

Why has the media just stopped reporting it? Is reporting it not hightlighting the issue and giving people who may lean towards it some sort of reason not to?

its like the sweep it under the carpet but by doing that it means possibly one more will do it. calling it a "tragedy" just doest work, call it as it is and it may save one life in the future.

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Buceph

Standman wrote: »

Seems the only way a suicide gets reported is if they kill a whole bunch of other people first, don't see the media self censoring when those kind of things happen.

A lot of doctors have called for it. There was a guy on Charlie Brooker's show talking about how the media handle these events, and he says they're acting very dangerously as it can encourage copycat behaviour by glorifying the act.

As someone said, the Bridgend suicides were a big part of how the media now act. But the thinking behind it has been around for a lot longer.

MagicSean

faw1tytowers wrote: »

Hmm this is bizzarre. In the area I live in 3 youths have committed suicide in as many months and before that many others. But since then A polititian Roche(whos son sadly was one of the mentioned) has been trying to campaign about the stigma of suicide. I have noticed more signs and 'help' cards in local shops. But this I am shocked at. Maybe it is true though that what is happening is it is becoming a trend and less publicity of actual suicides might be better?

If you are from where I am thinking of those youths all were connected and didn't learn about the previous suicides from the media.

faw1tytowers

k_mac wrote: »

If you are from where I am thinking of those youths all were connected and didn't learn about the previous suicides from the media.

Yes you are correct all connected....

It baffles me how someone can go through seeing the effects suicide causes and then to follow suit.

I am a suicide Survivor.... and know survivors and I just cant understand this kind.

hondasam

faw1tytowers wrote: »

Yes you are correct all connected....

It baffles me how someone can go through seeing the effects suicide causes and then to follow suit.

I am a suicide Survivor.... and know survivors and I just cant understand this kind.

heartbreak and guilt can be hard to live with. No one knows what anyone is thinking at any given time.

Millicent

hondasam wrote: »

heartbreak and guilt can be hard to live with. No one knows what anyone is thinking at any given time.

Couple with that that teenage (I'm assuming they were teenage?) relationships tend to be more intense than adult ones, so for an already troubled teenager, losing a close friend who they identified with could make them feel like life is not worth living.

faw1tytowers

hondasam wrote: »

heartbreak and guilt can be hard to live with. No one knows what anyone is thinking at any given time.

Oh totally, I get that, no disrespect.. as I say I have been there. I literally mean I cant understand it though how this becomes the "best route" in such case where time has gone by and thought has been taken.

hondasam

faw1tytowers wrote: »

Oh totally, I get that, no disrespect.. as I say I have been there. I literally mean I cant understand it though how this becomes the "best route" in such case where time has gone by and thought has been taken.

Depends in how much time has gone by, I don't think anyone can understand it. I suppose if we could understand it our questions would be answered.

ShagNastii

Am I the only one who thinks that the whole issue of bringing awareness to suicide is a whole different story to that of highlighting road safety.

I hate to seem insensitive but I think there is only so much you can do to prevent suicide. As we all know it is a huge epidemic nationwide (especially amoungst young males). In my home village I can name many people who have commited suicide. Everytime there is a death my mother always tells me and my siblings "not to go down that road" and that "there is always someone to talk to". It might be the fact that I've never been suicidal but is it not (and again I hate to make it sound so willy nilly) blatantly obivious that topping yourself is stupid thing to do.

I know about AWARE and helplines for depression do these people not know about them? They get good press from the media are also almost weekly talked about in papers and on radio.

I don't want anyone to jump on my post as being out of order but I find the whole issue a bit head scratching.

Like somebody commented, it is often reported on the ront of local paper but suicide is never mention. If say this was to change and all details were given

i.e. The male shot himself with a pistol which he found in the family home. He guy had just split with is long term girlfriend and was having drinks with his friends in the local bar.

How does this make the report better, re: reporting the suicide?

mikemac

Sitec wrote: »

a lot of road deaths are underwritten as accidents when some are suicides.
.

I agree it happens.
However it's pretty much impossible to prove.

And even then it's not realy fair to speculate on.

I posted on another forum I used to work nights and would drive home while wrecked tired, yes I was a fool!
But if I feel asleep at the wheel on a straight piece of road I wonder would people say "oh, just left the perfectly straight road, no bend and perfect dry road conditions, possible suicide??"

So best to say nothing unless the gardai or coroner have it in their report. And so the media waits

wild_cat

ShagNastii wrote: »

Am I the only one who thinks that the whole issue of bringing awareness to suicide is a whole different story to that of highlighting road safety.

I hate to seem insensitive but I think there is only so much you can do to prevent suicide. As we all know it is a huge epidemic nationwide (especially amoungst young males). In my home village I can name many people who have commited suicide. Everytime there is a death my mother always tells me and my siblings "not to go down that road" and that "there is always someone to talk to". It might be the fact that I've never been suicidal but is it not (and again I hate to make it sound so willy nilly) blatantly obivious that topping yourself is stupid thing to do.

I know about AWARE and helplines for depression do these people not know about them? They get good press from the media are also almost weekly talked about in papers and on radio.

I don't want anyone to jump on my post as being out of order but I find the whole issue a bit head scratching.

Like somebody commented, it is often reported on the ront of local paper but suicide is never mention. If say this was to change and all details were given

i.e. The male shot himself with a pistol which he found in the family home. He guy had just split with is long term girlfriend and was having drinks with his friends in the local bar.

How does this make the report better, re: reporting the suicide?

When your suicidal your thinking that the world is better off without you and it wouldn't matter if you had never existed in the first place thus saving yourself isn't high on the list of priorities.

Common as...

The-Rigger wrote: »

Rather than wasting time in school teaching children about useless sh1t most of the time, they ought to be taught about life, and how to live and handle what it will throw at you.

+1 Considering the amount of people who take their own lives in this country, I think the education system is completely ****ed up, rather than educating people to have fulfilled and happy lives, its only interested in results, exams and filling young peoples heads with knowledge that will be of no use to them in later life.The success of an education system should be measured by how happy in their daily lives the people that have come through it are.
In this case the Irish system is a complete failure.

ShagNastii

Yep I know that, but how is christs name can we deal with this? When someone is like this AWARE or the Samaritians can't call them.

faw1tytowers

I think the fact is when it comes to suicide its end of road..... so its the before suicidal thoughts enter head that has to be tackled. I know people who have had counselling and still done it, people who were medicated and still done it, people with families, people who did it over money worries, or on a whim cos drunk or whatever etc etc..... its our coping mechanism that is the issue..... is it not? There has to be something underlying that makes people press auto destruct. Life is never that bad..

reap-a-rat

The-Rigger wrote: »

A line of thought is that reporting of suicides lead to more suicides.
I imagine this is why it is under reported.
Whether there is merit to this line of thought or not, I don't know.

Not reporting it and having sh1it mental health care and attitudes is certainly not the way forward.

stupidusername wrote: »

Don't think it's a matter of disrespect, I'm fairly sure that it's not reported because of this idea it's going to lead to more. thought I'm also fairly sure this idea has been, what's the word... debunked..? I think if it was to be reported more it would highlight what a problem depression actually is in this country and would mean more people could talk about it, and probably lead to less suicides over all.

geetar wrote: »

i think not reporting it is also out of respect for the families. my extended family experienced a suicide, and the media was an absolute disgrace. it stayed in the papers for far too long, and made it very painful for everyone.

Buceph wrote: »

A lot of doctors have called for it. There was a guy on Charlie Brooker's show talking about how the media handle these events, and he says they're acting very dangerously as it can encourage copycat behaviour by glorifying the act.

As someone said, the Bridgend suicides were a big part of how the media now act. But the thinking behind it has been around for a lot longer.

I have to agree that sometimes the media don't report suicides out of respect for the family. Obviously, sometimes they do and are often inappropriate, which gains negative publicity for the paper/show and probably discourages them from doing it again.

I also feel though that if suicides were widely reported, potential victims would be "encouraged" at the apparent success of it. They might research different ways of doing it, and when suicides are reported they may figure out that one way is more surefire than others they have researched themselves.

Just my thoughts on it. Its such a sad subject.

vinchick

There is research which has shown a strong link between the media reporting of suicides and an increased number of people dying by suicide after a report is published. There have been a number of factors identified which increases the likelihood of somebody dying by suicide after reading an article. These include reports on how and why, the age, gender, and occupation of the person. Basically things that a person can relate to and get ideas from.

There is a call for the media to stop reporting on individual cases in order to prevent further deaths.

In case of suicide awareness campaigns there are ways to run them to avoid this trap but they have to be very careful to avoid the influencing factors.

kumate_champ07

galwayrush wrote: »

They went a step further in Germany some time back, they banned public funerals for suicides, apparently they had a very high number of people taking their own lives so they decided that public funerals were somehwhat making the victims into a type of hero , even if it was only for a day. After they banned the public funerals, the numbers dropped significantly.

was this before the Berlin Wall came down? East Germany had a very high suicide rate(possibly highest in Europe/World), it was called 'self murder', they stopped publishing the stats because it didnt look so good for their rulers

Daegerty

DailyBlaa wrote: »

They should be reporting it, more dead due to suicide than road accidents. Yet all they they do is bang on about how we should be doing more to stop deaths on the roads, e.g NCT, speed cameras, etc.

I have lost a two friends over the years due to it. It is true what they say you can't tell. One friend I only talked to him a few hours before he died. We were planning going to a local event in a few days time. There were no apparent signs what an awful shame.

2 ( or is it 3) times as many people top themselves as die in car accidents.

Yakult

Daegerty wrote: »

2 ( or is it 3) times as many people top themselves as die in car accidents.

Source?

ShagNastii

faw1tytowers wrote: »

I think the fact is when it comes to suicide its end of road..... so its the before suicidal thoughts enter head that has to be tackled. I know people who have had counselling and still done it, people who were medicated and still done it, people with families, people who did it over money worries, or on a whim cos drunk or whatever etc etc..... its our coping mechanism that is the issue..... is it not? There has to be something underlying that makes people press auto destruct. Life is never that bad..

+1 well put across post.

It only takes five minutes of utter madness for someone it kill themselves no one can do anything to stop it.

strobe

galwayrush wrote: »

They went a step further in Germany some time back, they banned public funerals for suicides, apparently they had a very high number of people taking their own lives so they decided that public funerals were somehwhat making the victims into a type of hero , even if it was only for a day. After they banned the public funerals, the numbers dropped significantly.

I would need some sort of official statistics before I would believe that. I'm not saying it isn't true or anything. It just sounds very makey uppy. So I want some evidence before I accept it. The whole 'suicide is contagious' thing.

========================================================

I can imagine it is the gutter press having a tiny bit of humanity though, in terms of it being under reported......

Dave!

It's well established that reporting suicides can lead to copycats, and that's the main rationale behind the agreement not to report them.

Suicide as a general issue/problem does get discussed in the media, whether it's as much as it should be is another question. Only recently Pat Kenny had a psychologist on his radio show talking about it -- pointing out that more people commit suicide than are killed on the roads every year, yet it's the latter that gets the attention. Also pointing out that rural areas in particular have an obscenely high rate of suicide among young men.

So yeah, copycats is the reason.

dreamers75

strobe wrote: »

I would need some sort of official statistics before I would believe that. I'm not saying it isn't true or anything. It just sounds very makey uppy. So I want some evidence before I accept it. The whole 'suicide is contagious' thing.

Dunno about others i "heard" 500+ a year from a reliable source.

imo its rampant and nothing is done about it, the RSA thing sticks in my head they got 80 million last year and failed to stop the increase. Do others get 80 million to fail?

mikemac

Daegerty wrote: »

2 ( or is it 3) times as many people top themselves as die in car accidents.

Yakult wrote: »

Source?

Professor Kevin Malone of UCD on the Pat Kenny Show this week, it's the first minute of the podcast I have open in front of me

527 recorded in 2009
But the figure may be higher, with open verdicts may go up to 722 according to the Professor.

RSA state 239 road traffic deaths in 2009

vinchick

strobe wrote: »

I would need some sort of official statistics before I would believe that. I'm not saying it isn't true or anything. It just sounds very makey uppy. So I want some evidence before I accept it. The whole 'suicide is contagious' thing.

========================================================

I can imagine it is the gutter press having a tiny bit of humanity though, in terms of it being under reported......

I did proof read a thesis which was done on this very issue and it was a review on all the research as well as expert interviews all saying the same thing, after big media coverage there is a suicide spike. Now for the life of me I can't remember any of the three/four page bibliography but the research is there and comes down strongly on the side of no reporting should be done.

Dave!

strobe wrote: »

I would need some sort of official statistics before I would believe that. I'm not saying it isn't true or anything. It just sounds very makey uppy. So I want some evidence before I accept it. The whole 'suicide is contagious' thing.

========================================================

I can imagine it is the gutter press having a tiny bit of humanity though, in terms of it being under reported......

Here [pdf] is an article by the WHO which gives a summary. Go to page 499 in this book for a literature review.

strobe

vinchick wrote: »

I did proof read a thesis which was done on this very issue and it was a review on all the research as well as expert interviews all saying the same thing, after big media coverage there is a suicide spike. Now for the life of me I can't remember any of the three/four page bibliography but the research is there and comes down strongly on the side of no reporting should be done.

I don't doubt you (I have no reason to) I just want to see the actual research rather than the hearsay. I have asked for it before elsewhere and it has never materialised.

*Edit*

Dave! wrote: »

Here [pdf] is an article by the WHO which gives a summary. Go to page 499 in this book for a literature review.

......

vinchick

strobe wrote: »

I don't doubt you (I have no reason to) I just want to see the actual research rather than the hearsay.

Yeah I would too! I guess what I was getting at is that it is out there, I just can't remember where....pretty useless lol

faw1tytowers

There is ofcourse the other types of suicide..... where people do it cause they are ill maybe terminal/euthanaisa .... also when people do it out of shame..... and I am sure many more types.. Will the media blanket all these stories. After all news is news. the media dont care about the stories.

vinchick

strobe wrote: »

I don't doubt you (I have no reason to) I just want to see the actual research rather than the hearsay. I have asked for it before elsewhere and it has never materialised.

Wait I has two!

Cullen, J. (2006). Meanings, Messages + Myths: The Coverage and Treatment of Suicide in the Irish Print Media. Health Service Executive: Ireland.

http://www.samaritans.org/pdf/samaritansmediaguidelines-ireland2006.pdf

These go through what should/shouldn't be said in order to prevent further deaths.

Millicent

strobe wrote: »

I don't doubt you (I have no reason to) I just want to see the actual research rather than the hearsay. I have asked for it before elsewhere and it has never materialised.

Dunno if it constitutes research (it's not a case study but is an interview) but that NPR link from my post before is thought-provoking.