It is easy to like ourworldindata.org - breaking the data out by age is most welcome. Suicide at 80 has a very different meaning than suicide at 18.
A grim thought is that in an ideal world there would be a large number of deaths by suicide. Many of the people I know who are in favour of euthanasia have had to watch someone die wasting away from cancer. There are bad ways to die.
I've spent a lot of time suicidal. I'm happy to see this discussion recognizing that people are suicidal because they are suffering.
But suicide is often a rash decision because you are currently miserable and if you knew that you wouldn't be miserable tomorrow morning, you probably wouldn't do it. In contrast, euthansia is a more logically sound decision that "This is not going to get better and I'm not interested in enduring where it goes from here."
I know there's a difference because I've been through experiences where I was physically miserable but clear-headed and rational and realized this was a short-term thing that would soon resolve, but was physically miserable enough that if I had not been absolutely certain it would resolve within a matter of hours, I would have been suicidal. I have also been mentally screwed up at times and lacked that kind of clear thinking.
It's hard to effectively articulate the difference, but when I'm not rational, I can tell my adult sons and let them know it's not safe to leave me alone today. (It's been a while since I've had such an incident. Being back in housing has been good for both my general level of suffering and my mental stability.)
I think that, you were clear headed - and that was the difference. My personal experience/anecdote with suicide (not me, but I was involved in the recovery), the person were not able to think clearly, even if their problems were fixable and _they knew_ that the problems were _fixable_ but required too much effort, just wanted it to end.
I have attempted suicide once and been hospitalized on a suicide watch twice. My adult sons, now in their thirties, are abundantly familiar with the medical and other issues that fuel my suicidal tendencies and were raised with excellent rubrics for how to handle it.
Some things I've said before that bear repeating:
If you know someone who is suicidal, help them deal with their actual problems instead of dismissing their suicidal tendencies as "they just have a mental health issue." Suicidal ideation is often rooted in serious, intractable personal problems. Acting like they are merely crazy actively pushes people over the edge. (It's basically a form of gaslighting.)
There are generally two elements to any mental health issue, like suicidal ideation or depression. One is physical and the other is social or situational.
When you have reason to believe someone is under physical duress, you may be able to mitigate their current crisis by feeding them, making sure they are adequately warm or cool, making sure they are hydrated and helping them get some sleep. If you tend to their physical needs, they may wake up tomorrow feeling more stable.
If someone is clearly irrational, do not argue with them about whatever they are saying. Do not engage with their crazy talk. It only puts out the fire with gasoline. There is no good reply to something like that because agreeing helps push them over the edge and disagreeing will typically not convince them of anything but will help make them feel disrespected, unheard and like no one cares.
Instead, try to help them find distraction or otherwise engage in care-taking. Resist the temptation to focus on the lurid detail that they are suicidal and talking about negative things.
Don't try to shut them down. If they want to talk, let them talk, just don't reply to it in a way that adds fuel to the fire. It shouldn't be forbidden for them to talk about feeling suicidal.
If you have no idea how to reply, it's okay to say that. It's generally vastly better to say something like "I feel out of my depth here and I don't know what a good response is." than to ignore it or pretend you do know what you are doing.
Agreed. I have a background of depression too, so I was able to sympathize with the person but not on that level. Most of my help was just being there for them and taking care of them, and the idea of somebody is there for them was clearly helping.
We got medical help for the recovery, not in the drugs way, but a professional with the experience of dealing with the kind of problems the person had.
Our job was to keep them going with their lives. That was it. Feeling of being cared and loved allowed them to get professional help that they would not seek otherwise.
If there is no effective legal or socially-accepted means to express one's interest in euthanasia, receive help and consultation about that interest, and demonstrate one's level-headedness, then is there any reliable way to know whether a particular suicide was a rash decision?
Even when it is legal, there is no reliable way to know for certain if it's really the right choice. This is one of the reasons people object to right to die laws.
When Dr. Kevorkian was helping people die in the US, I read an article that indicated that most of his patients were basically middle-aged women who lacked adequate social support rather than people whose conditions were genuinely so terrible that death made sense. If they had been middle-aged men, the odds were good that a wife or female relative would have been taking care of them. Instead, they felt they were an unwanted burden to their family.
But here is a story about a woman with a genetic disorder who starved herself to death and wanted her story told to advocate for right to die laws in Canada:
Wouldn't "result of a medical discussion" (as in expert opinion of no way to improve life quality of a terminal patient) vs "personal decision" (made independently by person for variety of other reasons) fit better?
I think there should be legal medical euthanasia/suicide, treated as the same thing (same cause of death) whether it is done with the patient's active participation or done to comply with their previously legally established wish to be killed under certain circumstances.
Suicide done outside this process should be treated differently.
>A grim thought is that in an ideal world there would be a large number of deaths by suicide.
But most deaths by suicide aren't self-inflicted euthanasia to avoid a dicease, but escapes from depression, the impact of far from ideal social/family/economical circumstances, and so on.
I doubt the number would change much is euthanasia was legal everywhere, and even if it did, it would just be toward the end of the battle (with e.g. cancer), where those people would have died soon anyway.
Personally, my fear is wasting away due to some form of degenerative brain disease. I think I could put up with all sorts of other disabilities due to age, but at the moment that I realize some pathogen is attacking the core of my being and I'm going to slowly lose who I am, I don't want to be forced to continue. I especially don't want the rest of my friends and family to watch me waste away in front of them while I forget who they are, lose control of my bodily functions... what a horrible way to go. I'd much rather bow out peacefully, while I can still do so with dignity. When my time is up it's no tragedy for me to move on, it's simply the next generation's turn.
It's a touchy subject for sure, but this is where I draw my personal line in the sand. Many others have a different set of opinions, and I'm not convinced there's one right answer. Just food for thought.
Firearm owners are primarily a danger to themselves, followed by those close to them. Our long-standing epidemic of firearm-induced suicide could be tempered by better gun regulation.
That's within America, not a comparison of national rates. In spite of America having a much higher gun ownership rate than other countries it doesn't appear to have a particularly high suicide rate.
Go compare the USA and its suicide, gun ownership, and veteran rates, as a composite metric, with Switzerland and Israel, which I'm choosing because they're rich democracies with mandatory military service and relatively high rates of gun ownership; one is very reserved, one is more aggressive than the USA, and neither has the endemic problem of military veterans using service-issued firearms to commit suicide.
I found [0] to be a decent introduction to the problem; one needs to take a birds-eye view in order to see it.
The big difference is that American veterans are more likely to be people deployed into combat zone for extensive length of time. Also, being American soldier affects your family situation quite a lot - they have much higher rates of divorces then general population.
The mandatory military service in Switzerland is not comparable to being American soldier.
> their findings that gun ownership is associated with suicide in the US seem rather robust.
Robust is a strong word for that finding. I haven't read the paper extremely closely but page 13 suggests they have a 16 variable linear factor regression for 150 observations. With that sort of model a small but statistically detectable correlation isn't the sort of result that ends arguments.
Realistically it should be discarded out of hand as a evidence for any sort of action; the effect is too small and there are too many ways that result could be misleading for both practical and statistical reasons.
I wouldn't really expect to see such a correlation because there are certainly other factors that have a significantly greater effect on suicide rates and there aren't that many independent countries (so you can't accurately measure from such a small "sample" of "possible" countries) and gun ownership isn't independent of other factors that are known to influence suicide rates: for example, the suicide rate tends to fall (I've been told) during armed conflicts while there is probably a positive correlation between gun ownership and armed conflicts.
Probably you could reduce the suicide rate in a US State by (further) restricting gun ownership though it's anyone's guess by how much and it probably wouldn't make a huge difference, I would guess.
It could also depend on how handy the guns are. If people on certain countries keep their guns locked then teens can just grab them and do bad stuff with them where in some other countries the kids can just go and grab the shotgun(I seen on a YT video where a popular guy, engineer not some farmer, sends his kid to go and grab his gun )
I was expecting that more educated people are more aware of the risk of having guns in the home not locked. Mainly I was thinking that someone would reply that I probably seen some rare case on YT and most people are locking their guns.
>Our long-standing epidemic of firearm-induced suicide could be tempered by better gun regulation.
Are you implying that a significant number of firearm suicides are done with illegal firearms? I'm skeptical of that, being from Canada. If not, what would more regulation do?
I don't think it's a waste to look at the data and see if certain methods of suicide really stand out. It doesn't seem unreasonable to see if (this is a gross way to phrase it but here we go) easy and efficient methods of suicide are associated with more suicides. My gut instinct would say that having easy access to handguns would be associated with more suicides, as it's (relatively) more reliable than an intentional drug overdose.
Does the data here reflect that? I am not a statistician, but what's shown actually makes me question my priors. The US has a huge difference in suicide by gun rates, but the overall suicide rate isn't all that different from European countries. And, this actually surprised me, the male-to-female suicide ratio in the US isn't much different than other countries, which really makes me question my prior that "guys have handguns and thus have an easier way to commit suicide".
Exactly. It's obvious that suicide by gun is going to be correlated to gun ownership, but that's not valuable information at all. The much more interesting question of whether suicide is correlated to gun ownership was (for me) striking in its absence. I guess there's no good data for it.
Also of interest to me is how regulating alcohol and other drug use influences suicide. Because of the failures of the war on drugs and prohibition, this doesn't seem to be a very popular topic of study, but I reckon that making alcohol harder to get would decrease the number of suicides.
There is the hypotheses that rush suicides can happen when your home has a gun or some quick way of ending your life.
There will be hard to study this theories as long as an industry is involved and politics.
I have no idea how can you use statistics from other countries and get the correct conclusions, we probably need the data from people that canceled their suicide and compare the number of gun owners and non gun owners.
It has huge policy implications. Some people push gun controls because of it, or install fences at bridges and subway stations that can cost in the billion dollar range.
In all fairness, it's vastly easier to put up a fence over a bridge or regulate firearm purchases than fix systemic social and economic issues wholesale.
I'm not sure it is - we know how to eg address poverty with income transfers and increase availability of free mental health services, and how to raise the temporary revenue for it (temporary because it pays for itself)
In practice, this makes a noticeable difference; it's why you can't buy paracetamol in significant quantities in the UK, why the suicide rate fell when the UK switched from toxic coal gas to natural gas, and so on.
Suicide motivation is usually understood as "depression", but antidepressants aren't entirely reliable in this case. It's very hard to reach inside someone's head unless they're willing to tell you. Neither of the two people I knew who killed themselves left notes. Both were on antidepressants.
For example, men were more likely to shot themselves and women were more likely to poison themselves. Also, women were less likely to die from suicide, but more likely to attempt it.
Suicide prevention focuses on a package of measures. These include kinder fairer societies as a long term measure. I don't know anyone working in suicide prevention in England who isn't deeply aware of the wider determinants of mental ill health. (And I know a lot of people working in suicide prevention).
But the package of measures also includes "preventing access to means and methods". This is because we know it makes a difference. We have some natural experiments to show this: changing the domestic supply of gas from coal gas to natural gas caused a substantial decline in deaths: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC478945/
Changing cars to have catalytic convertors also caused a decline in deaths.
People get caught up on this. They say "merely making it harder to buy paracetamol isn't addressing the root causes, you need to do that". They're right, but they're missing the point that this is supposed to be a package of measures that also looks at why people attempt suicide.
Isn’t it cruelty on top of cruelty to not address how unkind and unfair our society is and then attempt to block people’s only escape route? If the world isn’t going to become less cruel who are we to prevent individuals from escaping it?
Well, saying that without knowing the impact on outcomes doesn't make sense.
Anyway, the focus usually reflects org structure. Solutions match org structure. If you make a Suicide Reduction Squad, they will not be able to "ensure that all children have education" to reduce suicide, they can only chase methods. After all, it's the Education Increase Squad that makes sure children have education.
I've been looking for any updates on covid19 and suicide. This lancet article is from April.
Gunnell, D., Appleby, L., Arensman, E., Hawton, K., John, A., Kapur, N., ... & Chan, L. F. (2020). Suicide risk and prevention during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Lancet Psychiatry, 7(6), 468-471.
I am curious too. These data are critical to policymakers today. Without knowing what excess deaths from suicide and overdose look like stratified by age, they can't understand the risk and reward of covid-19 lockdowns. And even if they suspect as I do that the number of life years lost to suicide and overdose caused by lockdowns bmay outweigh the number 'saved' by lockdowns, it will be difficult to persuade anyone of this without data.
Not forcing HHS and CDC to prioritize collection of these statistics was a serious mistake.
The thing I take away from comparaison of suicide rates between countries is, to put it bluntly, some cultures suck. Or, more specifically, some cultures are pretty awful for the people actually living in them.
South Korea has a strong economy, is conquering the entertainment world, and is a place of technological marvels. They also have 5% of deaths by suicide, compared to Greece with 0.5%, whose economy collapsed a decade ago. Not to mention SK has the lowest birthrates in the world.
I feel strongly we need policy makers to move away from GDP growth as the primary marker of national health.
I think the key in your comparison is that South Korea is famously a very irreligious country (majority of people are irreligious) while Greece is a famously homogenously religious country (the Greek Orthodox Church dominates).
I don't mean to flame anyone or insinuate anything. But all statistics show that religious people are happier and less likely to commit suicide than religious people.
I don't know specifics re South Korea and Greece but I wouldn't be surprised if what counts as suicide in one country might count as accident or unknown cause of death in another which makes comparisons a bit tricky.
And that is a big difference - Christianity views suicide as disgraceful, punishable, and cowardly. Seppuku on the other hand is honorable and courageous. I've also heard of older Japanese committing suicide to ease burdens on the next generation. I would imagine just this difference in perspective would lend itself to very different rates all else being equal.
Yeah, even non Greeks know this is B.S., lol. During the crisis, everyone just still did what they always did: smoke their cigarettes and have their coffee at the cafenio, and say "eh, ti tha kanome?" which is kind of like shrugging your shoulders and going "well, not much we can do about it right now, might as well enjoy the day"
While this is maybe a bit too bluntly worded and one-sided, I still think that the general issue - prioritising GDP growth over happiness - is important, so I'm unhappy with the downvotes.
You're going to need a way less hot take than "some cultures suck".
Maybe "religion and family formation is associated with less suicide", or "inequality is associated with suicide", or "cultural norms play a role in suicide". Not to get too social justice warrior, but saying "some cultures suck" is such a thought-terminating cliche that it gets you nowhere.
This can be difficult when there is such massive cultural diversity around the world. You can't just explain variance of global suicide rates by just one variable like inequality or religion. Saying "some cultures suck" is sussinct and encapsulates all the variables that go into the issue.
When looking at the numbers, you may want to take consideration the cultural acceptability of suicide. There are cultures where suicide is not viewed the same way, and therefore it may be elevated. Certain philosophies view it as an acceptable decision if someone has suffered greatly and doesn’t wish to anymore (off the top of my head, some stoic philosophers have spoken about it). I haven’t done my research on the topic, but isn’t it somewhat acceptable to kill yourself in Japan in certain circumstances? The taboo factor in other countries likely drives the numbers down as many people won’t entertain the idea because it is “bad”.
The point is, I’m not sure “some cultures suck” is the only part of the equation. We also need to consider how that culture educated their society about suicide.
To add data to this, Japan was similar to South Korea in 1996 (both around 2%) but by 2017 South Korea's share of deaths from suicide is 5.08% vs. Japan's 2.1% and USA's 1.71%. From my understanding, culturally Japan and South Korea are similar, please someone correct me if I am wrong.
If you live in a society that has stopped you from experiencing most things that suck. Think boredom, Hunger, insecurity. Is it any surprise that when something that sucks that we can't prevent - rejection, death, loss - happens it hits these people worse than it would people who haven't had the preventable sucks taken away?
> comparaison of suicide rates between countries is,
Go careful, a lot of them count deaths in very different ways. Some of them even change the way they count death, and so you need to be careful if you're comparing rates across time for one country.
In the UK:
> The previous National Statistics definition of suicide includes deaths from intentional self-harm (where a coroner has given a suicide conclusion or made it clear in the narrative conclusion that the deceased intended to kill themselves) and events of undetermined intent (mainly deaths where a coroner has given an open conclusion) in people aged 15 and over.
[...]
> In 2016, the suicide definition was revised to include deaths from intentional self-harm in children aged 10 to 14. Previously we did not include suicides in young children due to the very small numbers involved (see Table 3). However, after discussions with Public Health England and the constituent countries of the UK, it was decided that it was appropriate to include them. Deaths from an event of undetermined intent in 10- to- 14-year-olds are not included in these suicide statistics, because although for older teenagers and adults we assume that in these deaths the harm was self-inflicted, for younger children it is not clear whether this assumption is appropriate.
So, death after self harm, even if there's no evidence of intent to die.
> Death caused by self-directed injurious behavior with any intent to die as a result of the behavior.
But it's a bit more complicated:
> Despite the large volume of data on certain types of SDV, the utility and reproducibility of the resulting information is sometimes questionable. Mortality data are problematic for several reasons: geographical differences in the definition of suicide and how equivocal cases are classified; jurisdictional differences in the requirements for the office of coroner or medical examiner affecting the standard of proof required to classify a death as a suicide; and differences in terms of the extent to which potential suicides are investigated to accurately determine cause of death.18
> Gathering ongoing and systematic data is important for prevention efforts. However, it is also important to gather data that are uniform and consistent across systems. Consistent data allow public health and other entities to better gauge the scope of the problem, identify high-risk groups, and monitor the effects of prevention programs and policies. Currently, it is common for different sectors, agencies, and organizations to employ varying definitions of suicidal ideation, behavior, and death that can make it difficult to consistently monitor specific outcomes across sectors and over time. For example, the manner in which deaths are classified can change from one jurisdiction to another, and can change based on local medical and/or medico-legal standards.4 CDC’s uniform definitions and recommended data elements for self-directed violence provide a useful framework to help ensure that data are collected in a consistent manner across surveillance systems.
I wonder if there is a correspondence with patriarchal culture. Where there are strong expectations on men to play a certain role in society, and failure to do so is a big unrecoverable hit to status.
I was quite sad to hear of the Mayor of Seoul's death. It was interesting the difference in approach to reporting about it in the english language Korean media. I am used to reports not even mentioning that the death was by suicide anymore.
What do you mean by patriarchy? If you mean traditional gender roles, what about country that have strong gender roles, but a fairly low suicide gender ratio such as india and china?
I guess in the case of Korea, patriarchy would be something influenced by past confucian culture. This would place a patriarchal figure as the head of a household responsible interfacing that household with society.. India is a far more heterogeneous nation, so any aggregated national data would require more detail to correlate with cultures. China has a lot of political intervention into culture in this area, for example pushes to have the state take on the role of the family, and possibly with their demographic imbalance, there are a lot of men who can never have families, so there is less pressure about failure in that sense?
I really have no idea.
China's state doesn't take the role of the family afaik. The state is pretty laissez-faire until something global comes up.
Also I don't think the men to female ratio being higher is that significant in aggregated data. It was like at most 120% vs SK which is ~100%. I don't think it would effect the gender suicide ratio that much. I'd even assume having more male competition pushes them to be more valuable to women i.e. more stress.
Pure speculation but likely reasons could include bad data, traditional societies with lesser pressure to "succeed" and actually developing countries that give opportunities.
However the correlation is not strong enough as evidenced by Egypt and Pakistan.
Stoicism would be my guess. Remember emotions are relative - having something bad happen won't necessarily cause as large an emotional response if you are used to bad things happening to you.
that makes sense, the higher the fall; the harder the impact. Related to this, I think the social nets in poorer countries are stronger so the fall isn't as rough.
Inequality is unfair. The more unfairness someone has to put up with the less sensitive they will be to other stressors and perceived unfairness.
This obviously isn't as simple as I'm making out. Individual people will have different stressors. However when we talk large scale I think this simplistic view can be warranted.
My sound strange, but I’m encouraged by these numbers.
Personally, I think it’s super unfortunate people choose to commit suicide, but it’s a choice.
Everything else (besides addictions) on the mortality chart for the US is not a choice... think about that for a moment, we have reduced all the other risks of death so much that suicides are a meaningful number. In fact, suicides are now above homicides, which are also dropping.
I'm not sure if all survivors would identify with suicide being a choice. I'm willing to be corrected, but I feel like a lot of people who attempt suicide feel like they have expended all of their choices. I'm also not sure if addiction is a choice either, maybe you could expand on your thoughts?
My grandmother committed suicide. My mother has tried to commit suicide on several occasions, and I have suffered from depression for most of my life.
I'm happy to say that ketamine infusion therapy was a breakthrough for me, after decades of making no progress with anti-depressants, I am now virtually depression-free and have been so for years. I highly recommend it to anyone who suffers from treatment-resistant depression. That said...
> Every suicide is a tragedy.
Statements like that on suicide prevention websites have always bothered me because I find them disingenuous, and for me personally have always been counter-productive. I think it's obvious that not all suicides are tragedies. I think that as uncomfortable as it makes us, for many people suicide is the most responsible decision a person can make.
Not everybody has loved ones, and not everybody is a great person. My best friend's father was incredibly abusive and incredibly miserable, despite spending his whole life in various forms of treatment. His death marked a significant improvement in my friend's wellness. I suppose this man could have just left his family but...I wouldn't say his suicide is a tragedy. He's no longer suffering.
A lot of the arguments I see against suicide is that it hurts the people around you. Which is true, and this effect is difficult to understate. I'm still affected by the suicide of my grandmother, whom I never even met.
But that's not a reason to live, that's just a reason not to die.
I'm guessing that access to quality healthcare is one of the best ways to prevent suicide. (Luckily I could afford my ketamine injections and subsequent prescriptions.) I think that's obvious to everyone though. Strange in my country how access is still such an issue...
Maybe the argument that suicide hurts the people around the person who killed themself can be helpful by reminding people that there's others who care about them who would want to help if they could. Either way, it seems to be enough for some people, and I think if it helps people through a crisis then it's an argument worth repeating.
It might work in opposite ways. Introducing more obligations on those who want to get rid of existing ones isn't a good idea to help them get better.
When you can't materially do something for the person, the best is to listen and offer some insight with the disclaimer - that's the best you can do and would have done more if it was possible.
Many people come claiming to help but they make the issue political or about them. A person is likely already aware of generic advice because any query showing suicidal intent on Google will show those helplines and results.
You're right that ketamine seems like a magic switch for at least some people, but please be careful if you have any history of psychosis.
I almost ended up as the murdered half of a murder-suicide due to that. Which is damnable because I've never seen any other treatment have the same effect as esketamine.
I really hope they find some way to solve that, maybe they also need to administer anti-psychotics in that case, I truly don't know. Because the treatment itself is just about as close to turning off depression as anything I've ever seen. Though I understand it may not be that way for everyone, for some, it really helps.
You're wrong, at what point would you be responsible to take your own life? By what authority? Did you bring yourself into the world? It's one thing to say you have a right to take your life, but a responsibility? To who whom is the responsibility owed? If you have no one to care for you then you owe no responsibility to anyone, it you do, all the same you owe the people that care about you a chance to share a life with them, to share tomorrow with you. Now a right, that's a different subject, I don't condone euthnasia but I can't personally criticize a person wanting to leave the world because they can't endure today's pain.
One thing I will say about this subject I have thought about a lot. No one wants to die,absolutley no one. We may want the pain to be over, the boredom to end,the despair to dissipate or some other end we think is achieved by suicide but no one wants to say goodbye to their own self. If all things are possible to everyone, no one would choose death over life.
You are absolutely wrong about nobody wanting to die and it has nothing to do with the pain to be over, the boredom to end, or the despair to dissipate.
You sound young or too invested in your own life to actually understand the real circumstances for why people would not want to live.
You do realize that not everyone sees life as a gift, right? Some people imagine never being alive in the first place a greater gift.
You mention that if all things are possible to everyone, no one would choose death over life.
Again, you’re wrong. You can’t fathom why someone would opt to no longer exist if all things were possible, but I know people who would opt to chase everything from existence if they had the power.
You just don’t understand it.
I’m really amazed that you honestly think you can speak for everyone when it’s clear you’ve never given other peoples’ outlook anything more than a fleeting thought.
Personally speaking, I’m happy with my life. If I reached my old age and someone gave me the option to live indefinitely or to stop, at some point I’m just going to want to stop.
At some point, I’m going to want to cease to being.
I can confidently say you are wrong. Whatever your reasons are to escape this existense, if you can change existense itself you would rather do that instead of death. See, you yourself said it was escaping this existense or something else, you are escaping life not embracing death. It is hatred for life not love of death!
I don't know if I would be consideree young but I am no stranger to the subject.
> You do realize that not everyone sees life as a gift, right? Some people imagine never being alive in the first place a greater gift.
Yes, I do. That's because of the life they know. Not existing to begin with sounds great because of your relative knowledge of what existing means.
So then, what about the people fixated on immortality? If living beyond their natural lifetime is a negative obsession at any point (i.e. once their quality of life is pure suffering) then what? Why would the same logic not apply to people kept alive beyond normal limits for hunter gatherers, either in terms of age or remaining quality of life? Do we have an obligation to use every artificial construction invented that could keep us alive, and who is that obligation to?
Given that many conditions are irreparable, the general direction of the logic that we always want to live if enough things could be changed (i.e. so we enjoy life) is a truism that doesn't mean anything. Even if all forms of dementia get cures, they won't be restorative for those with it today.. for example.
I am not telling you what you should or should not do. I am posing a question. If you get a heart attack and refuse medical care for example I don't consider that suicide, you will die as a result of your inaction but you did not initiate your death, it was not your intenr or premeditation that caused it.
As far as chasing immortality, assuming you had any say in it, any means of staying alive is natural unless you are talking about supernatural things.
I think I understand the core of your argument, which, if the world were perfect and everyone had equal access to resources, I might agree with. But the reality is that there are a lot of people that cannot change their circumstances, do not have the money for medication/therapy, or do not have the social or cultural support for acquiring or even expressing the desire for medication/therapy. I am wondering if you have ever experienced severe depression, be it in yourself or in someone close to you. "Hatred for life" is a massive overestimate of the amount of autonomy someone has over their own thoughts when depressed.
I have experienced all that and more. I speak my experience not my opinion.
I am interested in facts not emotions. Facts work. Let us agree 1+1=2 then let's talk about 1+3 and 2+1,etc... Let us agree that even if you are helpless and hopeless against the realities of life, that is the driver of suicidal tendencies (not depression neccesarily).
How can we solve a problem if we don't agree it is a problem and we don't agree what the prolem is?
Then let us talk about the impossible and let us talk about defeating reality. I would love to talk about how to overcome the impossible. Or we can agree a person is hopeless and helpless against life , they lack control over their thoughts or emotionsand for that reason their only escape is suicide. But let us use facts and critical thinking. I tried emotions, I tried it all but only truth helped me.
Why are so many technical people on here dead set on the impossible and a hopeless reality? This very technology we use to talk to each other was impossible. Not improbable but dead set impossible even half a century or less ago! It should be impossible or me to be alive and talking to you but here I am! Why is hope so unpopular? Ok, you can kill yourself if you want, society approves if it makes you feel better. Now can we talk honestly and critically about the facts, and can you pose factual adversarial challenges against my argument?
I am really glad you found hope, that you’re enjoying the ride, and that you’re trying to help others enjoy the ride.
> Yes, I do. That's because of the life they know. Not existing to begin with sounds great because of your relative knowledge of what existing means.
Let me ask you about that “relative knowledge”. Are you under the impression their relative knowledge is lacking? Or has it occurred to you knowing more and knowing how good life can be can make you appreciate life less?
> at what point would you be responsible to take your own life?
Not the OP but there may be circumstances where someone is justified believing their continued suffering is a burden to themselves and others.
> By what authority?
What authority do you believe is violated by someone making the choice when and how they die?
> Did you bring yourself into the world?
No, exactly. So if adults of sound mind have a right over their own person (despite an involuntary birth) then certainly they have a right over how and if their existence continues.
> If all things are possible to everyone, no one would choose death over life.
This isn't saying much. Not everything is possible to everyone. Rational people are making difficult decisions all the time for this very reason.
I don't advocate suicide. Plenty of survivors can speak to the value of life better than me.
> Not the OP but there may be circumstances where someone is justified believing their continued suffering is a burden to themselves and others.
Yes, they may believe that but they are still not held responsible by anyone to take their own life!
> What authority do you believe is violated by someone making the choice when and how they die?
That's a bigger discussion, I shouldn't have said that to avoid provoking people. But I will say, by the same authority that tells you it's not your right to take other people's lives, even if they want you to kill them. Not yours to give,not yours to take.
> No, exactly. So if adults of sound mind have a right over their own person (despite an involuntary birth) then certainly they have a right over how and if their existence continues.
Legally? Depends on what society finds acceptable I guess. Personally, I can't criticize someone for doing so, but regardless of your sanity the answer to this question depends on the answer to other questions like is your life your own even though you didn't create it and didn't raise yourself? Is the purpose of your existense entirely meaningless or self contained? Or is your life meant to serve a greater purpose? Morally speaking it depends on your view point. Irrespective of how HNers think this is unpopular, the answer depends on your beliefs and I think I made mine clear. Legally, I don't think preventing peoppe from killing themselves would be of any use. The focus should be on offering mental health services not on criminalizing suicidal tendencies.
> This isn't saying much. Not everything is possible to everyone. Rational people are making difficult decisions all the time for this very reason.
I think you and all the downvoters missed my point. What I am saying is, death might appear like the answer and we can debate about that but what a suicidal person desires is to escape from life. You are insisting just because you believe death means ceasing to exist or end of pain, I have to accept that as well. You are saying death equals end of you. For example, few people want money (numbers and paper) they want the ability to buy something, so it I have some money but I am stuck in a supermax prison ,toilet paper means more to me than money I can't spend. Much in the same way, death may or may not allow you to escape life but what you want is not death because you have never experienced it, and even if you have certain beliefs about death you pick death over the present life because of how you have experiences life. If life was better than what you think death entails you would pick life. I am not saying life is better than death, I am saying you hate life and you believe death is an escape, you want an escape from life and you believe that is what death is.
> But I will say, by the same authority that tells you it's not your right to take other people's lives, even if they want you to kill them. Not yours to give,not yours to take..
> ...is your life your own even though you didn't create it and didn't raise yourself?
Other people's lives are their own. You seem to imply that because one doesn't chose to be born and cannot raise themselves that they don't have any right to chose to die. Then who does? Their parents? Some mystical sky being?
You're entitled to your own beliefs, however vague or fantastic they may be. Having spent a few decades being indoctrinated with a fear of an eternal hell (without any evidence) I'd rather not entertain such foolishness anymore.
See, you are entitled to your beliefs as well, but let us agree the answer to your original question depends on more fundamental beliefs about self, life and our place in reality.
I don't think this is the thread for discussing about God,heaven,hell,religion(or lack of it). But in journalism multiple independently verifiable sources count as a reputable source that backs a truthful story. In law, the testimony of two or more people is sufficient even without evidence (not just in the west but in almost every legal system). I and most of humanity disagree with your views of creation/origin, purpose of life and consequences of our actions beyond our lives. If you consider that irrelevant opinion, millions offer you testimonies of first hand experiences regarding these matters. I believe you can independently verify the testimonies of these unrelated individuals with everything to lose and nothing to gain (some get persecuted,tortured and killed for this belief!) should at least make you question the absolute and immovable nature of your conviction. I hope you are open to critical thinking, not emotions or wishy washy buzzwords meant to make you feel good. I can only encourage you to seek truth,however convenient or inconvenient it maybe, as I do the same with myself.
May the truth set us free from falsehoods and folly.
> But in journalism multiple independently verifiable sources count as a reputable source that backs a truthful story. In law, the testimony of two or more people is sufficient even without evidence (not just in the west but in almost every legal system). I and most of humanity disagree with your views of creation/origin
Second hand testimony is hearsay, if I'm not mistaken. And all firsthand witnesses to the most common faiths founders are all long dead. And few if any of them were literate.
Considering that most of their claims are either disproven (faith healing) or unfalsifiable (hell, Eden, etc) there's nothing tangible to gain and plenty for marginalized groups to lose.
No doubt you've been taught some of the mental gymnastics like confirmation bias, survivorship bias, and appeals to authority to 'prove' some personal experience or establish "the truth". In fact you suggest that because those beliefs are popular somehow they are more legitimate. Well, humans believed the world was flat for most of history. Yet I've flown around it without ever reaching the edge.
Whatever the truth it's best to hold ones views loosely. Then when a more fitting explanation appears one can accept it.
> Second hand testimony is hearsay, if I'm not mistaken. And all firsthand witnesses to the most common faiths founders are all long dead. And few if any of them were literate.
Considering that most of their claims are either disproven (faith healing) or unfalsifiable (hell, Eden, etc) there's nothing tangible to gain and plenty for marginalized groups to lose.
I said first hand, to all of that and more.
> No doubt you've been taught some of the mental gymnastics like confirmation bias, survivorship bias, and appeals to authority to 'prove' some personal experience or establish "the truth". In fact you suggest that because those beliefs are popular somehow they are more legitimate. Well, humans believed the world was flat for most of history. Yet I've flown around it without ever reaching the edge.
I am well aware of cognitive biases. You as well should beware just because modern intellectuals hold a certain view as popular,you should take it as fact. It was the intellectuals of the time that burned galileo. You're right, popularity does not serve as evidence. However, popularity should drive you to critically analyze your beliefs and the popular belief while being aware of your own biases. You're not enlightened just because you believe what modern science says.
Whatever the truth is, you should not hold on to it very strongly not giving room for lies.
After thirty years hearing people say "I saw/heard/felt it. It's real." I call bullshit. Bring tangible evidence. (Decades of earnest investigation left me empty handed.)
People with suicidal tendencies don't need conditioning, judgment, "salvation", or imaginary love. They're more likely to benefit from human attention, communication, and understanding; ideally not motivated by some salvation quota.
Is there any chance you're in the Bay Area and would be willing to share which org you got ketamine therapy through? I have a friend in SF who's antidepressants have stopped working over the years - she's hoping to do ketamine therapy but can't find a legit organization to go through.
I would start by contacting a psychiatric organization like MAPS, or personally reaching to it's board members or practices that are listed there. I don't know of any legal organization that will put you on ketamine therapy without having you as a patient from beforehand or having your psychiatrists recommend you to them for treatment.
Is she seeing a psychiatrist? Antidepressants stop working all the time, she should be having this conversations with her psych or telling her psych that she's stopping treatment and finding someone else because it's not working. If she's on any other basic meds like sleeping pills or anxiety meds she should be able to get a prescription for them from a GP or any cheap synch in-network only by saying she's already taking them.
She is, but it's Kaiser and they aren't well known for their mental health care. They did a trial in the past that worked, but apparently aren't doing it any more.
It's a tragedy your best friend's father was a walking ball of abuse and negativity. I get your argument and it's good, but the underlying issues behind suicides are no good either.
People often have very reasonable reasons they want to kill themselves. Doesn't mean they should necessarily do it, but such statements are invalidating or unhelpful to the suicidal.
I think ultimately people just want to be understood.
It's also a little bit cultural isn't it. For instance Euthanasia is a form of suicide that can be entirely reasonable and made in the absence of mental illness.
Even when we can reasonably understand it it's still a tragedy that we can't provide a better alternative. Wether that is working therapy, cures for other illnesses, medication that make life enjoyable or any other change to society.
Viewing it as a tragedy isn't in itself invalidating, it can be a way of viewing the issue as a means to progress.
But I do agree that just blurting it out and pasting it places is inconsiderate, and not acknowledging the current reality of people's situations don't make them better.
"My dad was abusive and killed himself and I'm happier now."
If the child is better off with their dad killing themselves, that's a failure of society to protect the child who was being abused, or possibly the child has inherited some sociopathic tendencies.
For most people, the suicide of a parent is traumatic, regardless of whether there was abuse.
It is interesting given that it seems in a lot of ways, overall trends did not change much since Carlin did hit special on suicides ( men do it more often than women, US leads with guns suicides ) suggesting it is something stable within the human population. Maybe it is a built-in way for basic population control.
But suicides are interesting topic to me all in the themselves.
Personally, I have no problem with suicide since I see it as a personal choice ( as in my body, my right to die ). It seems most people object based on how it affects them. Very selfish.
(EDIT: I am a bit wrong here, and I'm grateful to mthoms below for pointing it out!)
It doesn't tell you how each country defines a death by suicide. It doesn't tell you if that definition has changed over time. It doesn't tell you whether they tried, nor how they've tried, to correct for different definitions of suicide. It talks about age-standardised rates, but doesn't tell you how they standardised for age. And then it puts it all together in very authoritative graphs and charts and invites the audience to draw conclusions and create a narrative and over-interpet the data.
"This country has a high suicide rate because of school pressure"; "that country has a high rate because there are lots of lonely young men", "this country has huge problems with alcohol dependency so of course their rate is higher". These may be true, but we can't tell from OurWorldInData.
I urge you to be cautious when reading this data, especially if you're comparing one country to another.
The page does address the issues you speak of [0]. Having said that, I do agree that the disclaimer is critically important and should probably be placed at the beginning rather than the end of the document.
Yup, this is a big issue in US data where a leading cause of death for otherwise-healthy age groups is "accidental poisoning" which is CDC-NCHS code for drug overdoses.
Just wanted to highlight this piece from the article:
"Depression and other mood disorders are widely recognized among the most important risk factors for suicide... [Bertolote and Fleischmann (2002)] report that 98% of those who died by suicide had a diagnosable mental disorder."
You can dispute the number to some extent, but thinking of suicide as a choice made in sound mind is a misrepresentation of the reality of suicide.
This misses the possibbility of common cause in some or many cases. Also, mental illness can cause immense suffering and choosing to escape that can be entirely rational depending on the circumstances especially considering acccess to health care. The reaction to mental illness socially and economically should also be considered because it can make life even worse for sufferers. If escaping a life of gauranteed pain is irrational then we're going to have to disagree on our conception of rationality here.
The problem is that mental illness affects your ability to think. Most of the time, someone contemplating suicide is not making a rational choice about their future - mental illness often impairs the ability to make well thought out decisions. So sure, someone could hypothetically make the rational choice for euthanasia, but that isn't what is going on most of the time people are suicidal. I don't know what I believe about euthanasia, but I am in no way comfortable with okaying people to independently make that decision without a second opinion.
I thought one of the problems with that figure was that many of those cases were diagnosed after the fact and, in many cases, based on the fact that they committed suicide.
A depression diagnosis may mean that your suffering is a clear defect and unreasonable given the circumstances, or it may mean that someone thought access to a therapist could help you cope better with your shitty life.
I’m disappointed to see that this website only gives you two options, “read the privacy policy” and “agree.” It does not list out each use of cookies and data collection and allow individually opting out of each use case, which is what most sites do and what I believe GDPR requires a business to support.
If the only way to make the large banner go away is to click “I agree” then you are actively harming your users and at the very least should be ashamed of yourself.
Suicide data for the US is incredibly depressing. Suicide among kids aged 12-14 has doubled in the 20 years to 2018 and now outranks any kind of disease as the 2nd leading cause of death (after accidental injury). You probably don't think there are lots of 10-year-old schoolgirls hanging themselves, and that used to be incredibly rare, but now there are several of those every year. It's a dark time.
I'm surprised that nobody pointed out that the country with the largest number of muslim/islam population Indonesia consistently has the least number of percentage for suicide rate. This is quite telling from a stark contrast between the suicide percentage rate of East and West Papua New Guinea even though they belong to the same physical island.
At the other extreme, the country with the least religious affiliation such as South Korea and Japan are consistently on the higher end of the suicide percentage rate.
In most of religions and especially Islam the suicide is a taboo subject, and it's believed that anyone who committed suicide will go straight to hell. This belief probably explains some aspects of the suicide distribution as it is.
> will go straight to hell. This belief probably explains some
That's the negative side, yes. But don't discount the equally if not more powerful positive side: Things like believing there is a greater purpose to your existence, are incredibly powerful and helpful. (i.e. "I'm in pain, but there's a reason I'm here, let me try to accomplish it.")
And that's not even touching on the far greater community support among religious people. Having a horrible day and need someone to xyz. You can talk to someone you have never met before, but who shares your beliefs, and they will most likely go out of their way to help you with it (or at least they'll help you find someone else who can do it).
That's a pretty convincing hypothesis. If I may postulate an alternative one, it is that alternative ways of 'suicide' exist for someone who wishes to end their life, perhaps 'accidents'.
The reason for my scepticism is that India has a bunch of "cooking fire accidents" that coincide with dowry non-payment. Of course, retaliation for dowry non-payment is illegal in India. It is mere accident that kills people whose family has not paid a dowry.
Indonesia is not India, true. It is culturally very different, but my general prior if something is culturally taboo and is therefore rare is not high that it is truly rare but high that it has been renamed. For instance, Iranian homosexuality. There aren't any homosexuals there.
My hypothesis is that religion satisfies (albeit with lies) some basic human needs that leads to a more content life. They don’t say religion is the opium of the masses for no reason.
That’s what faith is in the context of religion. Faith is how completely you believe the lies. Hypothetically the more complete the delusion, the more content you will be.
To end with another platitude, ignorance is bliss.
Qatar is listed with the second-highest rate of suicides, so it isn't quite as easy as that. Islam also isn't the only difference between Indonesia and Papua New Guinea: GDP is five times as much in the former, with $15,000 p.a. vs. $3,000.
Just scanning the map, I can't help but think of alcoholism: Greenland, Russia, Eastern Europe, and Australia have relatively high rates, and enjoying a bit too much is the common theme I can think of. It would even include any correlation with adherence to islam, since alcohol consumption is one of the largest differences in lifestyle setting muslims apart from all others.
Now that you mention it, the gulf states do cause emotions in me not unlike those commonly associated with suicide.
Luckily, I never stay more than a day in transit. That makes life among the cement-fetishists who leave their SUVs idling overnight to that the AC doesn't have to catch up the next morning somewhat bearable.
> Indonesia consistently has the least number of percentage for suicide rate.
I'm familiar with Indonesian culture.
Besides Islam, they typically have very large extended families, often knowing 1,000 family members by name. So there is a real social network, not just a digital one as in the West.
When somebody does have depression, sometimes they will commit suicide by escaping into extreme daily alcohol use. So the cause of death is liver failure, not suicide.
Lifespans are typically short for men there, and hospital treatment is often unaffordable. With shorter lifespans and no long-term care, chronic conditions quickly become fatal so there's no medical reason for suicide as in the West.
Too many students die from suicide each year, and I suspect the situation is greatly exacerbated by the intense stress of academia, combined with extremely high expectations from others and society in general (which says that if you don't get into school X or complete degree Y then you have failed and have no future) and an all-or-nothing reward model (actual learning being a distant second to the credential/stamp of approval of getting into school X or completing degree Y.)
Graduate school can be particularly stressful; in addition to having to complete intense and often very isolated work, students are often completely dependent on their graduate advisors for funding as well as degree progress - but switching advisors is much harder than changing an industry job since it usually requires starting an entirely new research project from the beginning.
Yup. Switched advisors about a year ago. I'm much happier with my research situation, but switching wasn't easy. I was lucky, I was able to transition my research program over pretty smoothly.
The economic aspects (presumably related to people losing their job, income, housing, health care, etc.) are interesting and significant, but the recommended interventions don't seem to address them.
There needs to be more attention/regard (I'm not sure which word is correct) for the contexts of suicide. A book that addresses this is The sealed box of suicide. The contexts of self-death by Simon Tatz and Colin Tatz.
The suicide rate ratio of genders is interesting. Most countries have a >2 ratio of males to females suicide rates, except countries slightly passed the developing country status. Some countries have 6-7, while similar have way less. Any idea why?
182 comments
[ 156 ms ] story [ 5872 ms ] threadA grim thought is that in an ideal world there would be a large number of deaths by suicide. Many of the people I know who are in favour of euthanasia have had to watch someone die wasting away from cancer. There are bad ways to die.
People suicide because they are suffering and they do not see any other way out to end the suffering.
Edit: I know that there are problems that can be fixed and problems that can not, but in their perspective, nothing works.
But suicide is often a rash decision because you are currently miserable and if you knew that you wouldn't be miserable tomorrow morning, you probably wouldn't do it. In contrast, euthansia is a more logically sound decision that "This is not going to get better and I'm not interested in enduring where it goes from here."
I know there's a difference because I've been through experiences where I was physically miserable but clear-headed and rational and realized this was a short-term thing that would soon resolve, but was physically miserable enough that if I had not been absolutely certain it would resolve within a matter of hours, I would have been suicidal. I have also been mentally screwed up at times and lacked that kind of clear thinking.
It's hard to effectively articulate the difference, but when I'm not rational, I can tell my adult sons and let them know it's not safe to leave me alone today. (It's been a while since I've had such an incident. Being back in housing has been good for both my general level of suffering and my mental stability.)
I think that, you were clear headed - and that was the difference. My personal experience/anecdote with suicide (not me, but I was involved in the recovery), the person were not able to think clearly, even if their problems were fixable and _they knew_ that the problems were _fixable_ but required too much effort, just wanted it to end.
Some things I've said before that bear repeating:
If you know someone who is suicidal, help them deal with their actual problems instead of dismissing their suicidal tendencies as "they just have a mental health issue." Suicidal ideation is often rooted in serious, intractable personal problems. Acting like they are merely crazy actively pushes people over the edge. (It's basically a form of gaslighting.)
There are generally two elements to any mental health issue, like suicidal ideation or depression. One is physical and the other is social or situational.
When you have reason to believe someone is under physical duress, you may be able to mitigate their current crisis by feeding them, making sure they are adequately warm or cool, making sure they are hydrated and helping them get some sleep. If you tend to their physical needs, they may wake up tomorrow feeling more stable.
If someone is clearly irrational, do not argue with them about whatever they are saying. Do not engage with their crazy talk. It only puts out the fire with gasoline. There is no good reply to something like that because agreeing helps push them over the edge and disagreeing will typically not convince them of anything but will help make them feel disrespected, unheard and like no one cares.
Instead, try to help them find distraction or otherwise engage in care-taking. Resist the temptation to focus on the lurid detail that they are suicidal and talking about negative things.
Don't try to shut them down. If they want to talk, let them talk, just don't reply to it in a way that adds fuel to the fire. It shouldn't be forbidden for them to talk about feeling suicidal.
If you have no idea how to reply, it's okay to say that. It's generally vastly better to say something like "I feel out of my depth here and I don't know what a good response is." than to ignore it or pretend you do know what you are doing.
We got medical help for the recovery, not in the drugs way, but a professional with the experience of dealing with the kind of problems the person had.
Our job was to keep them going with their lives. That was it. Feeling of being cared and loved allowed them to get professional help that they would not seek otherwise.
When Dr. Kevorkian was helping people die in the US, I read an article that indicated that most of his patients were basically middle-aged women who lacked adequate social support rather than people whose conditions were genuinely so terrible that death made sense. If they had been middle-aged men, the odds were good that a wife or female relative would have been taking care of them. Instead, they felt they were an unwanted burden to their family.
But here is a story about a woman with a genetic disorder who starved herself to death and wanted her story told to advocate for right to die laws in Canada:
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/health-and-fitness/heal...
So I think it is possible to clearly signal that you are rational and serious and it is planned, etc. even in cases where it isn't legal.
So, that statement would say “aren’t all suicides good deaths?”
I don’t and cannot believe that.
Euthanasia involves other people in the planning. Suicide does not.
Procedure vs independent act?
Suicide done outside this process should be treated differently.
But most deaths by suicide aren't self-inflicted euthanasia to avoid a dicease, but escapes from depression, the impact of far from ideal social/family/economical circumstances, and so on.
I doubt the number would change much is euthanasia was legal everywhere, and even if it did, it would just be toward the end of the battle (with e.g. cancer), where those people would have died soon anyway.
It's a touchy subject for sure, but this is where I draw my personal line in the sand. Many others have a different set of opinions, and I'm not convinced there's one right answer. Just food for thought.
I find it frustrating they cluster suicides ages 14 to 59, why!?
On ourworldindata, sources are usually published right next to the charts. Click the 'Sources' button to follow it to the source.
I found [0] to be a decent introduction to the problem; one needs to take a birds-eye view in order to see it.
[0] https://everytownresearch.org/report/those-who-serve-address...
The mandatory military service in Switzerland is not comparable to being American soldier.
Of course with fewer guns people will choose other methods.
> (ii) firearms are also strongly related to overall suicides – despite evidence for substantial substitution in method of suicide;
They go through several different models and their findings that gun ownership is associated with suicide in the US seem rather robust.
There is a lot more to suicide of course: divorce, depression, alcohol use and more.
Robust is a strong word for that finding. I haven't read the paper extremely closely but page 13 suggests they have a 16 variable linear factor regression for 150 observations. With that sort of model a small but statistically detectable correlation isn't the sort of result that ends arguments.
Realistically it should be discarded out of hand as a evidence for any sort of action; the effect is too small and there are too many ways that result could be misleading for both practical and statistical reasons.
Probably you could reduce the suicide rate in a US State by (further) restricting gun ownership though it's anyone's guess by how much and it probably wouldn't make a huge difference, I would guess.
https://mason.gmu.edu/~atabarro/BriggsTabarrokFirearmsSuicid...
It's not perfect, of course, but probably better than a random guess.
Can you explain what you mean by this? Is the engineer supposed to be "too smart" to allow his children to handle guns?
Are you implying that a significant number of firearm suicides are done with illegal firearms? I'm skeptical of that, being from Canada. If not, what would more regulation do?
You literally have to pass a firearms safety course in Canada to legally purchase and own a gun:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Possession_and_acquisition_lic...
I don't think it's a waste to look at the data and see if certain methods of suicide really stand out. It doesn't seem unreasonable to see if (this is a gross way to phrase it but here we go) easy and efficient methods of suicide are associated with more suicides. My gut instinct would say that having easy access to handguns would be associated with more suicides, as it's (relatively) more reliable than an intentional drug overdose.
Does the data here reflect that? I am not a statistician, but what's shown actually makes me question my priors. The US has a huge difference in suicide by gun rates, but the overall suicide rate isn't all that different from European countries. And, this actually surprised me, the male-to-female suicide ratio in the US isn't much different than other countries, which really makes me question my prior that "guys have handguns and thus have an easier way to commit suicide".
https://mason.gmu.edu/~atabarro/BriggsTabarrokFirearmsSuicid...
and this page from our world in data
https://ourworldindata.org/suicide#gun-prevalence
Also of interest to me is how regulating alcohol and other drug use influences suicide. Because of the failures of the war on drugs and prohibition, this doesn't seem to be a very popular topic of study, but I reckon that making alcohol harder to get would decrease the number of suicides.
There will be hard to study this theories as long as an industry is involved and politics.
I have no idea how can you use statistics from other countries and get the correct conclusions, we probably need the data from people that canceled their suicide and compare the number of gun owners and non gun owners.
Suicide motivation is usually understood as "depression", but antidepressants aren't entirely reliable in this case. It's very hard to reach inside someone's head unless they're willing to tell you. Neither of the two people I knew who killed themselves left notes. Both were on antidepressants.
The means matter.
But the package of measures also includes "preventing access to means and methods". This is because we know it makes a difference. We have some natural experiments to show this: changing the domestic supply of gas from coal gas to natural gas caused a substantial decline in deaths: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC478945/
Changing cars to have catalytic convertors also caused a decline in deaths.
People get caught up on this. They say "merely making it harder to buy paracetamol isn't addressing the root causes, you need to do that". They're right, but they're missing the point that this is supposed to be a package of measures that also looks at why people attempt suicide.
Anyway, the focus usually reflects org structure. Solutions match org structure. If you make a Suicide Reduction Squad, they will not be able to "ensure that all children have education" to reduce suicide, they can only chase methods. After all, it's the Education Increase Squad that makes sure children have education.
Gunnell, D., Appleby, L., Arensman, E., Hawton, K., John, A., Kapur, N., ... & Chan, L. F. (2020). Suicide risk and prevention during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Lancet Psychiatry, 7(6), 468-471.
Not forcing HHS and CDC to prioritize collection of these statistics was a serious mistake.
https://chicago.suntimes.com/politics/2020/7/25/21336409/sui...
South Korea has a strong economy, is conquering the entertainment world, and is a place of technological marvels. They also have 5% of deaths by suicide, compared to Greece with 0.5%, whose economy collapsed a decade ago. Not to mention SK has the lowest birthrates in the world.
I feel strongly we need policy makers to move away from GDP growth as the primary marker of national health.
I don't mean to flame anyone or insinuate anything. But all statistics show that religious people are happier and less likely to commit suicide than religious people.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_views_on_suicide
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seppuku
When making bold statement make an effort to give a reasoning behind it.
Economic activity ought to exist to facilitate human flourishing, humans shouldn't be instrumentalized to build paperclip factories.
Maybe "religion and family formation is associated with less suicide", or "inequality is associated with suicide", or "cultural norms play a role in suicide". Not to get too social justice warrior, but saying "some cultures suck" is such a thought-terminating cliche that it gets you nowhere.
The point is, I’m not sure “some cultures suck” is the only part of the equation. We also need to consider how that culture educated their society about suicide.
Go careful, a lot of them count deaths in very different ways. Some of them even change the way they count death, and so you need to be careful if you're comparing rates across time for one country.
In the UK:
> The previous National Statistics definition of suicide includes deaths from intentional self-harm (where a coroner has given a suicide conclusion or made it clear in the narrative conclusion that the deceased intended to kill themselves) and events of undetermined intent (mainly deaths where a coroner has given an open conclusion) in people aged 15 and over.
[...]
> In 2016, the suicide definition was revised to include deaths from intentional self-harm in children aged 10 to 14. Previously we did not include suicides in young children due to the very small numbers involved (see Table 3). However, after discussions with Public Health England and the constituent countries of the UK, it was decided that it was appropriate to include them. Deaths from an event of undetermined intent in 10- to- 14-year-olds are not included in these suicide statistics, because although for older teenagers and adults we assume that in these deaths the harm was self-inflicted, for younger children it is not clear whether this assumption is appropriate.
So, death after self harm, even if there's no evidence of intent to die.
In the US: https://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/pdf/Self-Directed-Vio...
> Suicide
> Death caused by self-directed injurious behavior with any intent to die as a result of the behavior.
But it's a bit more complicated:
> Despite the large volume of data on certain types of SDV, the utility and reproducibility of the resulting information is sometimes questionable. Mortality data are problematic for several reasons: geographical differences in the definition of suicide and how equivocal cases are classified; jurisdictional differences in the requirements for the office of coroner or medical examiner affecting the standard of proof required to classify a death as a suicide; and differences in terms of the extent to which potential suicides are investigated to accurately determine cause of death.18
https://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/pdf/suicideTechnicalP...
> Gathering ongoing and systematic data is important for prevention efforts. However, it is also important to gather data that are uniform and consistent across systems. Consistent data allow public health and other entities to better gauge the scope of the problem, identify high-risk groups, and monitor the effects of prevention programs and policies. Currently, it is common for different sectors, agencies, and organizations to employ varying definitions of suicidal ideation, behavior, and death that can make it difficult to consistently monitor specific outcomes across sectors and over time. For example, the manner in which deaths are classified can change from one jurisdiction to another, and can change based on local medical and/or medico-legal standards.4 CDC’s uniform definitions and recommended data elements for self-directed violence provide a useful framework to help ensure that data are collected in a consistent manner across surveillance systems.
[...]
I was quite sad to hear of the Mayor of Seoul's death. It was interesting the difference in approach to reporting about it in the english language Korean media. I am used to reports not even mentioning that the death was by suicide anymore.
Also I don't think the men to female ratio being higher is that significant in aggregated data. It was like at most 120% vs SK which is ~100%. I don't think it would effect the gender suicide ratio that much. I'd even assume having more male competition pushes them to be more valuable to women i.e. more stress.
I don't know much about indian culture.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/suicide-rate-vs-income-in...
EDIT: responding to the spurious & not a good fit comments, the correlation in 2015 (the first year with good data) is -0.41 (n=64)
Check the wiki page; there are some examples there that will make the argument about as eloquently as HN comments.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spurious_correlation
However the correlation is not strong enough as evidenced by Egypt and Pakistan.
All that said, this is inequality not income.
Inequality is unfair. The more unfairness someone has to put up with the less sensitive they will be to other stressors and perceived unfairness.
This obviously isn't as simple as I'm making out. Individual people will have different stressors. However when we talk large scale I think this simplistic view can be warranted.
Personally, I think it’s super unfortunate people choose to commit suicide, but it’s a choice.
Everything else (besides addictions) on the mortality chart for the US is not a choice... think about that for a moment, we have reduced all the other risks of death so much that suicides are a meaningful number. In fact, suicides are now above homicides, which are also dropping.
My grandmother committed suicide. My mother has tried to commit suicide on several occasions, and I have suffered from depression for most of my life.
I'm happy to say that ketamine infusion therapy was a breakthrough for me, after decades of making no progress with anti-depressants, I am now virtually depression-free and have been so for years. I highly recommend it to anyone who suffers from treatment-resistant depression. That said...
> Every suicide is a tragedy.
Statements like that on suicide prevention websites have always bothered me because I find them disingenuous, and for me personally have always been counter-productive. I think it's obvious that not all suicides are tragedies. I think that as uncomfortable as it makes us, for many people suicide is the most responsible decision a person can make.
Not everybody has loved ones, and not everybody is a great person. My best friend's father was incredibly abusive and incredibly miserable, despite spending his whole life in various forms of treatment. His death marked a significant improvement in my friend's wellness. I suppose this man could have just left his family but...I wouldn't say his suicide is a tragedy. He's no longer suffering.
A lot of the arguments I see against suicide is that it hurts the people around you. Which is true, and this effect is difficult to understate. I'm still affected by the suicide of my grandmother, whom I never even met.
But that's not a reason to live, that's just a reason not to die.
I'm guessing that access to quality healthcare is one of the best ways to prevent suicide. (Luckily I could afford my ketamine injections and subsequent prescriptions.) I think that's obvious to everyone though. Strange in my country how access is still such an issue...
When you can't materially do something for the person, the best is to listen and offer some insight with the disclaimer - that's the best you can do and would have done more if it was possible.
Many people come claiming to help but they make the issue political or about them. A person is likely already aware of generic advice because any query showing suicidal intent on Google will show those helplines and results.
I almost ended up as the murdered half of a murder-suicide due to that. Which is damnable because I've never seen any other treatment have the same effect as esketamine.
I really hope they find some way to solve that, maybe they also need to administer anti-psychotics in that case, I truly don't know. Because the treatment itself is just about as close to turning off depression as anything I've ever seen. Though I understand it may not be that way for everyone, for some, it really helps.
See also: https://slatestarcodex.com/2019/03/11/ketamine-now-by-prescr...
One thing I will say about this subject I have thought about a lot. No one wants to die,absolutley no one. We may want the pain to be over, the boredom to end,the despair to dissipate or some other end we think is achieved by suicide but no one wants to say goodbye to their own self. If all things are possible to everyone, no one would choose death over life.
You sound young or too invested in your own life to actually understand the real circumstances for why people would not want to live.
You do realize that not everyone sees life as a gift, right? Some people imagine never being alive in the first place a greater gift.
You mention that if all things are possible to everyone, no one would choose death over life.
Again, you’re wrong. You can’t fathom why someone would opt to no longer exist if all things were possible, but I know people who would opt to chase everything from existence if they had the power.
You just don’t understand it.
I’m really amazed that you honestly think you can speak for everyone when it’s clear you’ve never given other peoples’ outlook anything more than a fleeting thought.
Personally speaking, I’m happy with my life. If I reached my old age and someone gave me the option to live indefinitely or to stop, at some point I’m just going to want to stop.
At some point, I’m going to want to cease to being.
I don't know if I would be consideree young but I am no stranger to the subject.
> You do realize that not everyone sees life as a gift, right? Some people imagine never being alive in the first place a greater gift.
Yes, I do. That's because of the life they know. Not existing to begin with sounds great because of your relative knowledge of what existing means.
Given that many conditions are irreparable, the general direction of the logic that we always want to live if enough things could be changed (i.e. so we enjoy life) is a truism that doesn't mean anything. Even if all forms of dementia get cures, they won't be restorative for those with it today.. for example.
As far as chasing immortality, assuming you had any say in it, any means of staying alive is natural unless you are talking about supernatural things.
I am interested in facts not emotions. Facts work. Let us agree 1+1=2 then let's talk about 1+3 and 2+1,etc... Let us agree that even if you are helpless and hopeless against the realities of life, that is the driver of suicidal tendencies (not depression neccesarily).
How can we solve a problem if we don't agree it is a problem and we don't agree what the prolem is?
Then let us talk about the impossible and let us talk about defeating reality. I would love to talk about how to overcome the impossible. Or we can agree a person is hopeless and helpless against life , they lack control over their thoughts or emotionsand for that reason their only escape is suicide. But let us use facts and critical thinking. I tried emotions, I tried it all but only truth helped me.
Why are so many technical people on here dead set on the impossible and a hopeless reality? This very technology we use to talk to each other was impossible. Not improbable but dead set impossible even half a century or less ago! It should be impossible or me to be alive and talking to you but here I am! Why is hope so unpopular? Ok, you can kill yourself if you want, society approves if it makes you feel better. Now can we talk honestly and critically about the facts, and can you pose factual adversarial challenges against my argument?
> Yes, I do. That's because of the life they know. Not existing to begin with sounds great because of your relative knowledge of what existing means.
Let me ask you about that “relative knowledge”. Are you under the impression their relative knowledge is lacking? Or has it occurred to you knowing more and knowing how good life can be can make you appreciate life less?
TV Show - The Good place. Highly entertaining, lots of ethics material.
Ultimately ends up saying the same thing but takes you there so wonderfully that you feel the joy of it all at the end.
Not the OP but there may be circumstances where someone is justified believing their continued suffering is a burden to themselves and others.
> By what authority?
What authority do you believe is violated by someone making the choice when and how they die?
> Did you bring yourself into the world?
No, exactly. So if adults of sound mind have a right over their own person (despite an involuntary birth) then certainly they have a right over how and if their existence continues.
> If all things are possible to everyone, no one would choose death over life.
This isn't saying much. Not everything is possible to everyone. Rational people are making difficult decisions all the time for this very reason.
I don't advocate suicide. Plenty of survivors can speak to the value of life better than me.
Yes, they may believe that but they are still not held responsible by anyone to take their own life!
> What authority do you believe is violated by someone making the choice when and how they die?
That's a bigger discussion, I shouldn't have said that to avoid provoking people. But I will say, by the same authority that tells you it's not your right to take other people's lives, even if they want you to kill them. Not yours to give,not yours to take.
> No, exactly. So if adults of sound mind have a right over their own person (despite an involuntary birth) then certainly they have a right over how and if their existence continues.
Legally? Depends on what society finds acceptable I guess. Personally, I can't criticize someone for doing so, but regardless of your sanity the answer to this question depends on the answer to other questions like is your life your own even though you didn't create it and didn't raise yourself? Is the purpose of your existense entirely meaningless or self contained? Or is your life meant to serve a greater purpose? Morally speaking it depends on your view point. Irrespective of how HNers think this is unpopular, the answer depends on your beliefs and I think I made mine clear. Legally, I don't think preventing peoppe from killing themselves would be of any use. The focus should be on offering mental health services not on criminalizing suicidal tendencies.
> This isn't saying much. Not everything is possible to everyone. Rational people are making difficult decisions all the time for this very reason.
I think you and all the downvoters missed my point. What I am saying is, death might appear like the answer and we can debate about that but what a suicidal person desires is to escape from life. You are insisting just because you believe death means ceasing to exist or end of pain, I have to accept that as well. You are saying death equals end of you. For example, few people want money (numbers and paper) they want the ability to buy something, so it I have some money but I am stuck in a supermax prison ,toilet paper means more to me than money I can't spend. Much in the same way, death may or may not allow you to escape life but what you want is not death because you have never experienced it, and even if you have certain beliefs about death you pick death over the present life because of how you have experiences life. If life was better than what you think death entails you would pick life. I am not saying life is better than death, I am saying you hate life and you believe death is an escape, you want an escape from life and you believe that is what death is.
> ...is your life your own even though you didn't create it and didn't raise yourself?
Other people's lives are their own. You seem to imply that because one doesn't chose to be born and cannot raise themselves that they don't have any right to chose to die. Then who does? Their parents? Some mystical sky being?
You're entitled to your own beliefs, however vague or fantastic they may be. Having spent a few decades being indoctrinated with a fear of an eternal hell (without any evidence) I'd rather not entertain such foolishness anymore.
I don't think this is the thread for discussing about God,heaven,hell,religion(or lack of it). But in journalism multiple independently verifiable sources count as a reputable source that backs a truthful story. In law, the testimony of two or more people is sufficient even without evidence (not just in the west but in almost every legal system). I and most of humanity disagree with your views of creation/origin, purpose of life and consequences of our actions beyond our lives. If you consider that irrelevant opinion, millions offer you testimonies of first hand experiences regarding these matters. I believe you can independently verify the testimonies of these unrelated individuals with everything to lose and nothing to gain (some get persecuted,tortured and killed for this belief!) should at least make you question the absolute and immovable nature of your conviction. I hope you are open to critical thinking, not emotions or wishy washy buzzwords meant to make you feel good. I can only encourage you to seek truth,however convenient or inconvenient it maybe, as I do the same with myself.
May the truth set us free from falsehoods and folly.
Second hand testimony is hearsay, if I'm not mistaken. And all firsthand witnesses to the most common faiths founders are all long dead. And few if any of them were literate.
Considering that most of their claims are either disproven (faith healing) or unfalsifiable (hell, Eden, etc) there's nothing tangible to gain and plenty for marginalized groups to lose.
No doubt you've been taught some of the mental gymnastics like confirmation bias, survivorship bias, and appeals to authority to 'prove' some personal experience or establish "the truth". In fact you suggest that because those beliefs are popular somehow they are more legitimate. Well, humans believed the world was flat for most of history. Yet I've flown around it without ever reaching the edge.
Whatever the truth it's best to hold ones views loosely. Then when a more fitting explanation appears one can accept it.
Considering that most of their claims are either disproven (faith healing) or unfalsifiable (hell, Eden, etc) there's nothing tangible to gain and plenty for marginalized groups to lose.
I said first hand, to all of that and more.
> No doubt you've been taught some of the mental gymnastics like confirmation bias, survivorship bias, and appeals to authority to 'prove' some personal experience or establish "the truth". In fact you suggest that because those beliefs are popular somehow they are more legitimate. Well, humans believed the world was flat for most of history. Yet I've flown around it without ever reaching the edge.
I am well aware of cognitive biases. You as well should beware just because modern intellectuals hold a certain view as popular,you should take it as fact. It was the intellectuals of the time that burned galileo. You're right, popularity does not serve as evidence. However, popularity should drive you to critically analyze your beliefs and the popular belief while being aware of your own biases. You're not enlightened just because you believe what modern science says.
Whatever the truth is, you should not hold on to it very strongly not giving room for lies.
After thirty years hearing people say "I saw/heard/felt it. It's real." I call bullshit. Bring tangible evidence. (Decades of earnest investigation left me empty handed.)
People with suicidal tendencies don't need conditioning, judgment, "salvation", or imaginary love. They're more likely to benefit from human attention, communication, and understanding; ideally not motivated by some salvation quota.
The human predicament by David Benatar. https://www.amazon.com/Human-Predicament-Candid-Biggest-Ques...
The conspiracy against the human race by Thomas Ligotti. https://www.amazon.com/Conspiracy-against-Human-Race-Contriv...
Is she seeing a psychiatrist? Antidepressants stop working all the time, she should be having this conversations with her psych or telling her psych that she's stopping treatment and finding someone else because it's not working. If she's on any other basic meds like sleeping pills or anxiety meds she should be able to get a prescription for them from a GP or any cheap synch in-network only by saying she's already taking them.
People often have very reasonable reasons they want to kill themselves. Doesn't mean they should necessarily do it, but such statements are invalidating or unhelpful to the suicidal.
I think ultimately people just want to be understood.
It's also a little bit cultural isn't it. For instance Euthanasia is a form of suicide that can be entirely reasonable and made in the absence of mental illness.
Viewing it as a tragedy isn't in itself invalidating, it can be a way of viewing the issue as a means to progress.
But I do agree that just blurting it out and pasting it places is inconsiderate, and not acknowledging the current reality of people's situations don't make them better.
If the child is better off with their dad killing themselves, that's a failure of society to protect the child who was being abused, or possibly the child has inherited some sociopathic tendencies.
For most people, the suicide of a parent is traumatic, regardless of whether there was abuse.
Subtle cultural hint
I've never been a SWE or developer. Communicating with lawyers and PMs is what I mostly do.
Schizophrenia is less common than depression so less absolute burden, but it's deadlier.
But suicides are interesting topic to me all in the themselves.
Personally, I have no problem with suicide since I see it as a personal choice ( as in my body, my right to die ). It seems most people object based on how it affects them. Very selfish.
before modern tech people death was rampant.
I don't see how a suicidal population control could have developed, evolutionary.
(EDIT: I am a bit wrong here, and I'm grateful to mthoms below for pointing it out!)
It doesn't tell you how each country defines a death by suicide. It doesn't tell you if that definition has changed over time. It doesn't tell you whether they tried, nor how they've tried, to correct for different definitions of suicide. It talks about age-standardised rates, but doesn't tell you how they standardised for age. And then it puts it all together in very authoritative graphs and charts and invites the audience to draw conclusions and create a narrative and over-interpet the data.
"This country has a high suicide rate because of school pressure"; "that country has a high rate because there are lots of lonely young men", "this country has huge problems with alcohol dependency so of course their rate is higher". These may be true, but we can't tell from OurWorldInData.
I urge you to be cautious when reading this data, especially if you're comparing one country to another.
[0] https://ourworldindata.org/suicide#data-quality
More power to ourworldindata.org and everyone working on the research.
"Depression and other mood disorders are widely recognized among the most important risk factors for suicide... [Bertolote and Fleischmann (2002)] report that 98% of those who died by suicide had a diagnosable mental disorder."
You can dispute the number to some extent, but thinking of suicide as a choice made in sound mind is a misrepresentation of the reality of suicide.
If the only way to make the large banner go away is to click “I agree” then you are actively harming your users and at the very least should be ashamed of yourself.
At the other extreme, the country with the least religious affiliation such as South Korea and Japan are consistently on the higher end of the suicide percentage rate.
In most of religions and especially Islam the suicide is a taboo subject, and it's believed that anyone who committed suicide will go straight to hell. This belief probably explains some aspects of the suicide distribution as it is.
That's the negative side, yes. But don't discount the equally if not more powerful positive side: Things like believing there is a greater purpose to your existence, are incredibly powerful and helpful. (i.e. "I'm in pain, but there's a reason I'm here, let me try to accomplish it.")
And that's not even touching on the far greater community support among religious people. Having a horrible day and need someone to xyz. You can talk to someone you have never met before, but who shares your beliefs, and they will most likely go out of their way to help you with it (or at least they'll help you find someone else who can do it).
Negative only if we're presumptuous enough to think we know better to call it that. Otherwise, your remaining points generally hold.
The reason for my scepticism is that India has a bunch of "cooking fire accidents" that coincide with dowry non-payment. Of course, retaliation for dowry non-payment is illegal in India. It is mere accident that kills people whose family has not paid a dowry.
Indonesia is not India, true. It is culturally very different, but my general prior if something is culturally taboo and is therefore rare is not high that it is truly rare but high that it has been renamed. For instance, Iranian homosexuality. There aren't any homosexuals there.
Depends on the religion. Islam doesn't need (and is actively against) lies.
To end with another platitude, ignorance is bliss.
Just scanning the map, I can't help but think of alcoholism: Greenland, Russia, Eastern Europe, and Australia have relatively high rates, and enjoying a bit too much is the common theme I can think of. It would even include any correlation with adherence to islam, since alcohol consumption is one of the largest differences in lifestyle setting muslims apart from all others.
What's the demographic/religious breakdown of those who commit suicide in Qatar? Most people living there are expats.
Luckily, I never stay more than a day in transit. That makes life among the cement-fetishists who leave their SUVs idling overnight to that the AC doesn't have to catch up the next morning somewhat bearable.
I think this view has something to do with how humans are absolutely dominating the earth and collectively killing ourselves. collective suicide.
I'm familiar with Indonesian culture.
Besides Islam, they typically have very large extended families, often knowing 1,000 family members by name. So there is a real social network, not just a digital one as in the West.
When somebody does have depression, sometimes they will commit suicide by escaping into extreme daily alcohol use. So the cause of death is liver failure, not suicide.
Lifespans are typically short for men there, and hospital treatment is often unaffordable. With shorter lifespans and no long-term care, chronic conditions quickly become fatal so there's no medical reason for suicide as in the West.
Graduate school can be particularly stressful; in addition to having to complete intense and often very isolated work, students are often completely dependent on their graduate advisors for funding as well as degree progress - but switching advisors is much harder than changing an industry job since it usually requires starting an entirely new research project from the beginning.
https://www.amazon.com/Sealed-Box-Suicide-Contexts-Self-Deat...