Suicide

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"Evidence showed that Mr. Littleton had once tried suicide by going into the ocean and waiting for sharks to eat him."

from today's New York Times

Tracer Hand, Friday, 7 June 2002 00:00 (10 years ago) Permalink

Why the fuck are there so many people with emotional health problems and the like here? Not just this thread, but ILX in general. It's enough to make a person nervous.

Josh, Friday, 7 June 2002 00:00 (10 years ago) Permalink

well there's nothing wrong with YOU, Josh. I'm almost positive.

Tracer Hand, Friday, 7 June 2002 00:00 (10 years ago) Permalink

Interweb is the place everyone cuts loose and lets out with all the otherwise difficult things to discuss --> i.e. there are MANY in society but it only becomes apparent in semi-anonymity?

Sterling Clover, Friday, 7 June 2002 00:00 (10 years ago) Permalink

I thought of that too Sterl, but that makes things seem bleak for the human race on the whole. (Of course, that is an option.) Maybe what I'm wondering is what kind of angst to have over the situation: angst at the terrible lot of humanity, or angst at the terrible lot of the brighty and funny and witty and wonderful.

(Ha ha Tracer maybe I just don't post to the interweb about my troubles as much as some.)

Josh, Friday, 7 June 2002 00:00 (10 years ago) Permalink

it would've been better to either fix the typo or write 'wonderfuly' I think

Josh, Friday, 7 June 2002 00:00 (10 years ago) Permalink

new answers

Josh, Sunday, 9 June 2002 00:00 (10 years ago) Permalink

This thread is mildly saddening. Thus far, my own life has been asymptotal to suicide - I know I've contemplated it, once or twice. The only two real incidences are one my favourite teacher told us about her friend whom she met on her way to her hanging tree. She was going one way, her friend the other. And that saddens.

And mark s' post uppage, which is probly bout the seriousest thing I've ever read from him on these pages - thus --> its impact. Saddening.

Not really adding anything to the theoretical/moral debate, just personal 'experience' as usual - sorry.

Having done Forensic Medicine last year (CSI - eat yr hrt out) I have seen many suicide victim stills. The worst was the one on Cadaveric Spasm. Man, holding knife a foot from his stomach, he's stabbed himself once, mortally killed instantly and instant Cadaveric Spasm has occurred and he's fixated in the one position.

Pan out and the bathroom gasps into clear view: a thin film of red lines the walls, from the ledge of the bath half way up the wall, dots and exclamations of blood. Blood-seeped bath water. It is very saddening. And gruesome. My shillings.

New answers, indeed. Tsk tsk. ;)

david h(owie), Sunday, 9 June 2002 00:00 (10 years ago) Permalink

search: "don't try suicide" by queen. destroy: M*A*S*H theme.

queenoftheharpies, Sunday, 9 June 2002 00:00 (10 years ago) Permalink

5 years pass...

For the Suicides
in memory: J & G & J

If we recall your voices
As softer now, it's only
That they must have drifted back

A long way to have reached us
Here, and upon such a wind
As crosses the high passes.

Nor does the blue of your eyes
(Remembered) cast much light on
The page ripped from the tablet.

* * *

Once there in the labyrinth,
Your were safe from your reasons.
We stand, now, at the threshold,

Peering in, but the passage,
For us, remains obscure; the
Corridors are still bloody.

* * *

What you meant to prove you have
Proved: we did not care for you
Nearly enough. Meanwhile the

Bay was preparing herself
To receive you, the for once
Wholly adequate female

To your dark inclinations;
Under your care the pistol
Was slowly learning to flower

In the desired explosion,
Disturbing the careful part
And the briefly recovered

Fixed smile of a forgotten
Triumph; deep within the black
Forest of childhood that tree

Was already rising which,
With the length of your body,
Would cast the double shadow.

* * *

The masks by which we knew you
Have been torn from you. Even
Those mirrors, to which always

You must have turned to confide,
Cannot have recognized you,
Stripped, as you were, finally.

At the end of your shadow
There sat another, waiting,
Whose back was always to us.

* * *

When the last door had been closed,
You watched, inwardly raging,
For the first glimpse of your selves
Approaching, jangling their keys.

Musicians of the black keys,
At last you compose yourselves.
We hear the music raging
Under the lids we have closed.

-Donald Justice

J0hn D., Tuesday, 4 March 2008 06:50 (5 years ago) Permalink

what are you, like emo gershy?

sanskrit, Wednesday, 5 March 2008 01:13 (5 years ago) Permalink

Is there a universe where that is considered a good poem, and if so how do we destroy it?

I really like Ned's first post on this thread, but more because it's so Ned, not so much out of agreement with it.

Casuistry, Wednesday, 5 March 2008 02:01 (5 years ago) Permalink

It is very me, isn't it. The sentiment remains the same, though I'd express it differently now.

Ned Raggett, Wednesday, 5 March 2008 02:04 (5 years ago) Permalink

the best solution for those worried about their impact on the environment is to kill themselves

jaxon, Wednesday, 5 March 2008 02:30 (5 years ago) Permalink

Sitting with my back to the street on top of a 75-story building, revolver placed firmly in mouth.

Pleasant Plains, Wednesday, 5 March 2008 03:14 (5 years ago) Permalink

Is there a universe where that is considered a good poem, and if so how do we destroy it?

i don't think it's bad at all, and donald justice was rather high regarded, so I think you'd have to destroy THIS universe, unfortunately

akm, Wednesday, 5 March 2008 18:11 (5 years ago) Permalink

Ah, Love! Could you and I with Fate conspire
To grasp this sorry Scheme of Things entire,
Would we not shatter it to bits - and then
Re-mould it nearer to the Heart's Desire!

(for Casuistry)

Aimless, Wednesday, 5 March 2008 18:54 (5 years ago) Permalink

Is there a universe where that is considered a good poem, and if so how do we destroy it?

you smug piece of shit

bug, Sunday, 9 March 2008 12:30 (5 years ago) Permalink

RIP big man

Dom Passantino, Sunday, 9 March 2008 12:32 (5 years ago) Permalink

I'm with Ned here, but if I had no firearm access and had to off myself, I'd take a massive heroin OD.

libcrypt, Sunday, 9 March 2008 14:49 (5 years ago) Permalink

wow, Casuistry. I posted a poem that's incredibly moving to me, one by universally respected American poet only recently deceased, and you zinged it. Fuck you, die slow.

J0hn D., Sunday, 9 March 2008 15:54 (5 years ago) Permalink

35

The Reverend, Sunday, 9 March 2008 15:57 (5 years ago) Permalink

the collateral damage of criticism

omar little, Sunday, 9 March 2008 18:37 (5 years ago) Permalink

how has dorothy parker not been quoted on this thread?

Gukbe, Sunday, 9 March 2008 18:40 (5 years ago) Permalink

Guns aren't lawful, nooses give, gas smells awful, you might as well live?

kate78, Sunday, 9 March 2008 18:47 (5 years ago) Permalink

I had a dream that the Suicide thread was resurrected! ILM wins.

Bimble, Sunday, 9 March 2008 19:20 (5 years ago) Permalink

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CwQwqxgsybw

gershy, Sunday, 9 March 2008 19:31 (5 years ago) Permalink

J0hn, whatever sadness you've felt that led you to post that -- I (obviously, I should hope) was not trying to zing that.

But sure, de gustibus non disputandum and all that, so I should have just let it pass.

But I'll remember that J0hn thinks that a "universally respected" poet had damn well better stay "universally respected".

(Also, of course, Donald Justice was not in any way "universally respected". Like most poets, he was "generally ignored". I don't hang out with the sorts of poets who would consider him to have been on the map of the world of poetry -- not because they're bad people, just because that's not the world of poetry that I live in. And what little I've seen about him didn't seem especially interested or engaged, but that's all I can go on.)

Casuistry, Sunday, 9 March 2008 19:34 (5 years ago) Permalink

5 months pass...

according to this INFOGRAPHIC there will be more than twice as many suicides as homicides in the US this year.

Intially I thought "That's prepostourous!", but then i realised i knew 2 people who had committed suicide but i don't know anyone who has been murdered.

Slumpman, Sunday, 17 August 2008 23:08 (4 years ago) Permalink

Other things that struck me as odd:

More deaths from lightning than fireworks, spiders and sharks combined, challenging my view of a lightning strike as a rare, unlucky event.

Also, only 270 deaths a year from alcohol poisoning? What are all the alcoholics dying of?

Slumpman, Sunday, 17 August 2008 23:12 (4 years ago) Permalink

What are all the alcoholics dying of?

liver disease, kidney failure, complications from diabetes, dui accidents, etc. etc.

alcohol poisoning is acute, alcoholism is chronic. only a fucking amateur would die of alcohol poisoning.

chicago kevin, Sunday, 17 August 2008 23:16 (4 years ago) Permalink

that infographic is for men, not all people in the US

harbl, Sunday, 17 August 2008 23:21 (4 years ago) Permalink

not trying to be a pedant or anything! but i would like to know the suicide:homicide ratio for women too, now.

harbl, Sunday, 17 August 2008 23:26 (4 years ago) Permalink

More die from foreign object left behind during surgery than shark attack.

libcrypt, Monday, 18 August 2008 06:00 (4 years ago) Permalink

as opposed to being the foreign object left in the shark, as it were.

darraghmac, Monday, 18 August 2008 14:22 (4 years ago) Permalink

you actually made that joke

Just got offed, Monday, 18 August 2008 14:23 (4 years ago) Permalink

when? oh.

darraghmac, Monday, 18 August 2008 14:26 (4 years ago) Permalink

In 2004, the female suicide death rate among those aged 15 years and older was 5.7 per 100,000 females, compared to a rate of 22.4 per 100,000 males.

In countries like Australia, Canada and the US - about 3-4 men kill themselves as compared to 1 woman.

I can't find any homicide-victim rates that are divided by gender.

Abbott, Monday, 18 August 2008 18:05 (4 years ago) Permalink

More men are raped then women if prison rape is counted :(

Catsupppppppppppppp dude 茄蕃, Monday, 18 August 2008 18:09 (4 years ago) Permalink

7 months pass...

My old best friend from high school just TEXTED me about how he tried to commit suicide last Wednesday.

What's fucked up is that our best friend killed himself in high school, and he KNOWS how intensely sad that was for all of us, his family, his friends.

WHO THE FUCK TEXTS ABOUT THIS

I f'd up the word rear (Z S), Saturday, 28 March 2009 05:21 (4 years ago) Permalink

I immediately call him, and he says "Now's not a good time, I'm about to go onstage", because I guess his band is about to play somewhere. I hate this. Every time with him, he's just drunk, but if I don't call him back or answer his call, I would never forgive myself if he went through with it.

I f'd up the word rear (Z S), Saturday, 28 March 2009 05:24 (4 years ago) Permalink

What a thread for a Friday night.

If someone is going through with it, their call won't come at a time it could be answered. You won't be the only person called if there is still hope.

It isn't somebody else's fault. Not anybody that could do anythign about it.

10 out of 10 for the rich dry tatse (james k polk), Saturday, 28 March 2009 06:06 (4 years ago) Permalink

OTOH if he is bothering to call, generally it means he does want to be heard. Not that I'm saying you should blame yourself if you miss a certain opportunity, but it does matter. Then again, I hate drunks, so fuck it.

Nhex, Saturday, 28 March 2009 06:13 (4 years ago) Permalink

If people are going to do it, they will call when it's too late (as in phone to say bye and hang up) or leave a note.

not_goodwin, Saturday, 28 March 2009 06:17 (4 years ago) Permalink

Why the fuck are there so many people with emotional health problems and the like here? Not just this thread, but ILX in general. It's enough to make a person nervous.
― Josh

velko, Saturday, 28 March 2009 06:29 (4 years ago) Permalink

I don't know. Why aren't there decent responses to people who are seriously depressed? Ever try calling a suicide hotline? They blow.

It just doesn't seem like (American) society is serious about people's health, mental or physical.

u s steel, Saturday, 28 March 2009 10:24 (4 years ago) Permalink

Oh you get that feeling too?

tits akimbo (kenan), Saturday, 28 March 2009 10:30 (4 years ago) Permalink

As weird as American health care is in general, mental health is the red-headed stepchhild. Don't get me started. Just... don't.

tits akimbo (kenan), Saturday, 28 March 2009 10:31 (4 years ago) Permalink

I don't think it's that much better here (in Belgium). The problem is that mental health is such a "vague" thing, difficult to diagnose, difficult to treat, and psychology is still regarded to many (here) as,well, not part of science. "Failed doctors" is what my friend calls'em. Actually many people here think it's better in the US (the way it's approached, not the health care, am I making myself clear?)

The whole "bc they called, means they're not gonna do it" is a crap line. Because you tend to... trivialize it all - well, they're not really serious about it. Do not consider it as though it's only a cry for help. Treat it seriously, as though they will do it.

What's fucked up is that our best friend killed himself in high school, and he KNOWS how intensely sad that was for all of us, his family, his friends.

So he has to keep living because you all felt crap? What about him? This line won't really work. He's in deep shit, depressed. I know you mean well, but you gotta stop thinking from your standpoint if you wanna get through him: he's in a world where he only sees himself (in a deeply shitty situation).

My old best friend from high school just TEXTED me about how he tried to commit suicide last Wednesday.

Would a pigeon have worked better? Text message is... easier. When I feel extremely shitty and want to express myself then I usually prefer to chat. Yes, CHAT. Because otherwise I start crying 'n' shit and I find it humiliating. Also, I can express myself better through the written/typed word. (haha -> Still, can't really write well though. hahah)

the tip of the tongue taking a trip tralalala (stevienixed), Saturday, 28 March 2009 13:21 (4 years ago) Permalink

^^^^^^ very otm. less personal the medium, easier it is to say stuff.

iatee, Saturday, 28 March 2009 19:26 (4 years ago) Permalink


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