Should suicide discussion forums be banned on net?

 

Okay, bear with me here.  I just came across this article in the Guardian on line – I didn’t search for it, it was one of those daily headlines you can have pop up in your browser from different papers each day.

Apparently a guy, aged 35, and another woman, got in touch on the internet on a forum that allows people to appeal for ‘suicide partners’, like some sort of macabre dating ad I suppose??

In any case, they met up two weeks later and followed through with their plans.  In this article it’s the father of the man involved who is saying these websites should be banned.  An understandable point of view for someone suffering a recent loss of a loved one, especially as he says his son hadn’t shown signs of depression or other issues.

I’m just a bit shocked, really.  I thought I was reasonably conversant with mental health on the internet, but I haven’t heard of this one before.  Putting aside the ethics of such a website, why would people want a suicide partner?  I mean, I can see why a tiny minority of suicidal people might prefer not to die alone.  I can see why they might think doing it with another person could reduce the chance of something going wrong.  Well, sort of.  But even so, there’s a leap between thinking it’d be nicer to die with someone else, to actually seeking out a website like that and fixing it up with a stranger.  Am I missing something?  This is odd, right?

Moving away from my reaction, though, what about the other issues raised?  Let’s take the legal side first – it’s much less thorny than the ethical debate.  The article states,

Helping others kill themselves is illegal under British law. Following growing concern about misuse of the internet to promote suicide methods, it is now an offence to undertake an act “capable of encouraging or assisting the suicide or attempted suicide of another person with the intention to so encourage or assist”.

The person committing the offence does not need to know the other person.

So, the law is pretty clear, then.  I’m going to assume the offence only relates to actually aiding a person physically.  I mean they would have to meet up with the person (as these two did), procure something for the person and/or be present at the attempt, to break the law.  If I’m wrong let me know, but from that paragraph quoted, I can’t see how merely posting on such a website would fall under the category of an “act”.

Apparently a website is only forced to remove illegal material, under European law, when it has been notified of the illegality of the content.  But that’s another issue.

My first inclination, when I thought about whether a suicide discussion forum should be banned, was OF COURSE NOT.  We have no right to stop people talking about whatever subject they wish.  It would be as silly as commanding patients in a psychiatric ward never to discuss suicide (whether inside or when they leave the ward) and prohibiting them from making suicide pacts with one another.  I mean, just the idea of bringing that up as a not-to-do seems absurdly self-defeating.

My gut feeling is that people will get information, if they really want it.  If they go to the trouble of creating an on-line identity, finding a site which caters to their desires, then are you really telling me that they couldn’t have done that anyway?  In terms of discussion of ‘what works best’ for suicide methods, if we didn’t have the internet, we’d still have libraries.  A brief look in the medical/psychiatric section of the library would probably furnish a determined person with the information they require.

I’m ready to be told I’m wrong, if I am.  If there are statistics showing that the internet has considerably increased successful suicides then I can understand why a call to ban them might be suggested.  I don’t think the internet can be censored this way though, even if we want to.  As long as responsible mental health sites exist in greater quantity than these odd offshoots then I would think splashing an article about them in a national newspaper would make the situation worse.  Just my thoughts there…

Things I wish I’d known sooner

 

1. It’s best to find out if you have sensitive teeth BEFORE you knock back your first Slush Puppy. It feels like ramming your funny (nothing ‘funny’ about it) bone against a brick wall. Repeatedly.

2. Life will not ‘work itself out’. Affirmative action is required. Nothing works itself out without some effort; this is as true of life as it is of constipation.

3. The things which instigate an incidence of mental ill-health are not the things which perpetuate it.

4. There is no easy way out of a depressive episode. There are ways to make it easier though.

5. When the chips are down ignore them. Eat wedges instead. Or curly fries.

6. Another issue with Slush Puppies: brain freeze. Do not drink without an experienced ‘partner’ to guide you through the pitfalls.

7. Perfecting perfectionism will get you into a lot of trouble.

8. The grass isn’t always greener on the other side, but the curious cat who gingerly checked it out didn’t actually die. That’s just a myth to stop overpopulation in greener areas.

Diary

 

Not feeling great today.  I feel cotton-woolly, a bit like I’m sleepwalking through the day.  Amitryptiline tastes like soap, by the way.  Starting a craft class today – can’t say I’m revved about it, but maybe it’ll help me…

Is this where the crazies are?

 

I’ve had a bit of a cold for a few days.  I was supposed to go on a second date with this bloke, but decided I was a bit too rough to go ahead, so cancelled.  I hope he doesn’t think I’m not worth the effort – I do have an unfortunate tendency to cancel plans with my ups and downs healthwise.

I haven’t anything very interesting to say, just wanted to check in.  I was supposed to be going to a pottery taster session, arranged via mental health services in my area, in conjunction with the adult education/library centre.

They lied.

Since I’d decided the date would be too much with my sniffly nose and lack of sparkle, I decided to show up to the pottery session (much more local).  I arrived, late, as usual, and entered a room of people sat in a circle.  I was sure this couldn’t be the right group.  Even when I was told it was “the pottery group” and I was given a seat, I had grave doubts.  Where the f%$k was the clay, the tables, the evidence that any kind of pottery had taken place in this room… ever?  It was one of those plain meeting rooms, adaptable in terms of tables, OPs and so on, but nothing else.

A woman, young, brunette, was talking as I came in and sat down.  She was talking about rice.  Rice?  I felt like I’d walked in halfway through a movie or had blacked out and missed the context of what the hell was happening.  I took a little time to check out the company.

Three or four grizzly looking middle-aged men.  A couple of elderly ladies.  A young boy and girl on my left and several other unremarkable people.  I knew that the group I was supposed to be in were all referrals from the local mental health resource centre.  So I tried to play “guess the MH condition” with the faces.  Could these people all be ill?

This is a very unfair game and one should only play it in the confines of one’s own brain.  Stereotypes tend to be employed in the guessing.  Nevertheless, we all do it, and, given that I was trying to assess whether these people could be mentally ill and therefore that this could be the right group…The lady talking didn’t help at all, since she was talking about grains of rice and some sort of history of rice???

So, the people.  The grizzly middle-aged men.  My guess – alcoholics.  Okay, who else?  The young guy and girl next to me gave nothing away.  Their body language seemed ‘normal’, they looked ‘normal’.  No guess there.  Moving round a guy in my peripheral vision tap-tap-tapping his foot.  Aha!  Could be anxiety?  Or a medication side-effect?  Good.  I’m a detective.  Who else?  Elderly lady.  Hmm.  Difficult.  Make-up applied, well-groomed.  No giveaways.  

After the rice talk, we were taken up to the gallery exhibit.  This was piles of rice with labels to identify what the quantities represented. 

The pottery is next week.  I haven’t decided if I’ll go back.

Addendum:  Okay, I didn’t really ‘get’ the point of the rice thing.  I found it dull, lifeless and not my cup of tea.  I wanted to make pots.  However, in the spirit of giving it a chance, I’ve now looked up some information on the exhibit, which has been round different countries as an art installation.  It’s called Stan’s Cafe and this is a quote from the website:

Of All The People In All The World (UK) uses grains of rice to bring formally abstract statistics to startling and powerful life.

Each grain of rice = one person and you are invited to compare the one grain that is you to the millions that are not.
Over a period of days a team of performers carefully weigh out quantities of rice to represent a host of human statistics

- the populations of towns and cities
- the number of doctors, the number of soldiers
- the number of people born each day, the number who die
- all the people who have walked on the moon
- deaths in the holocaust.

The statistics are arranged in labelled piles creating an ever changing landscape of rice. The statistics and their juxtapositions can be moving, shocking, celebratory, witty and thought provoking.

Can I talk to you?

 

Feeling really upset today.  Getting a lot of fatigued feelings and a few physical bits of CFS/M.E. also.  My sinuses are really pressured; it makes me feel like I’m in a vice.  I am closing my eyes every five minutes and writing this is laborious.

I feel isolated.  I haven’t had much support for a while from either mental health or CFS professionals.  There are things I’ve put in place that I’m waiting to come through, appointments and dates for groups etc.

That’s the thing with mental health and CFS/M.E. stuff – there’s a time lag in between recognizing you need some support and being referred.  Then there’s another time lag between being referred and being seen and yet another break between the first assessment and the start of whatever help it is you’re trying to access.  In my case, I’m waiting for a health and well-being group (with local MH services) and a managing CFS group (with not-so-local CFS services).

I think I know what my body can and cannot do, but really it’s all hit and miss.  I went to the gym earlier and feel tired, emotional and sorry for myself now, partly because I always hope that I’ll have energy to spare, but the reality is post-gym I’m getting physical CFS/M.E. symptoms along with a weird upset/tired feeling.

A Life, unsorted

 

I’m pushing forward when I feel able.  I’m pushing against a gust of wind or a steel container that is heavy, cumbersome.  Some days are easier.

I had a mis-spent youth.  It was mis-spent trying to be practically perfect in every way.  I had few friends, stunted emotional development, but bloody fantastic grades.  I’ve been trying to make up for my mis-spent youth ever since the age of 22.

When my twenties ended, amidst much hysterical life-assessment, I vowed I would try to get myself out of this hole I’m in.  This involves change.  Change is scary.  So, I vowed to start with easier tasks.

Firstly, I thought it absolutely paramount that I start smoking.

..Okay, let me put some hair on that bald statement, which, if left hanging there, looks like a bit of a lunatic scheme.  To clarify, I thought it paramount that I start doing things which I’ve not done before, through lack of opportunity or lack of the correct amount of teen rebellion.

So, I bought ten cigs from the supermarket and smoked them.  It took about three weeks to get through them, but it ticked off one of my ‘not done it before’ tasks.  I have dragged on cigarettes whilst drunk, but never ‘learnt’ to smoke.  Cue much coughing, failed lighting attempts, soggy filters and proclamations that “I’m crap at this smoking lark!”  Got the hang of it by the tenth, though.

Also, been on the date previously mentioned.  Haven’t had a boyfriend for a couple of years – I find men scary, and dates, therefore, feel like I’m voluntarily strapping myself into a chair, whilst watching a tornado heading straight in my direction, as thousands of right-minded, screaming people run in the opposite direction.  Some might think I’m a little phobic…

The date seemed to go okay and we’ve had a phone conversation since, which, again, seemed to go okay.  You can never tell though, can you?  I am sooo rubbish at just relaxing into a phone conversation without dissecting what the other person’s thinking.  No wonder I find them exhausting.  We have arranged a second date – I have thus far studiously avoided the use of the word ‘date’ in conversation/texts with this man, but that is what it is – so all I can do is try to relax about it as much as possible.

I think I need to go on loads of dates just to get this date phobia out of my system.  But I don’t know how to find lots of people willing to ask me out on dates so I can practice getting less stressed. 

Anyhoo, relationships only one side of a many-sided polygon.  I also need to address my health, my spiritual disharmony, my living arrangements, my wealth deficit and my intellectual boredom.  No small task is it.  I’ll update if anything major occurs. 

Be well xx