Internet Again Blamed For Suicides
from the ignoring-the-real-issue dept
Northern Ireland’s health minister has apparently met with social-networking site Bebo, mobile phone operator Vodafone and Google to ask them what they’re going to do to help stop the growing number of teen suicides there. He says the suicide rate in Northern Ireland has grown significantly over the last year, and “the internet has been cited as a contributory factor in some cases.” Certainly a growth in teen suicides deserves some action, but a more prudent step to take would be to examine the root causes of the problem, rather than taking the easy way out and blaming the internet. It’s not clear what the minister wants of Vodafone, but it would seem pretty safe to assume he wants Bebo and Google to try and block or limit posts and information about suicide, as has been done before. Again, this seems rather pointless and a way to just distract people from the real, underlying issues that are causing suicides. Furthermore, some people think that trying to force suicide-related content offline can actually lead to more suicides. Blaming the internet for suicides, then working to get suicide-related content offline, is nothing more than attempting to gloss over the problem — and shouldn’t be mistaken for actually doing anything about it.
Filed Under: internet, suicides
Companies: bebo, google, vodafone
Comments on “Internet Again Blamed For Suicides”
I guess politicians are the same in Ireland as here in the USA.
We need a catchy name for them. How about “vote pimps”?
Not to mention another nail in the coffin of personal responsibility.
“Oooooh look, something nasty has happened, can’t possibly be my fault, let’s look around for a scapegoat ……”
I’m convinced that the Internet is responsible for the fact that I’m losing my hair and growing older!
Why can’t some of these politicians commit suicide?
Well, it’s kind of difficult to blame the person who committed suicide, they’re dead, so there’s really no one to be punished. How dare these suicide committers skirt the law by being dead!
Re: Re:
Not hard to find a guilty party, obviously it’s the people who bullied him who are to blame. But i guess politicians are psychologically repressing their memories about the kid bullies that tantalized THEM in school.
This isn’t at all about preventing suicides. It’s just a handy way to pretend they aren’t happening anymore.
I suppose the thought process is something like this: “Look, there haven’t been any suicidal teens that posted on Myspace recently, I guess it must not be happening. I must have solved the problem!”
http://www.encyclopediadramatica.com/index.php/An_hero
Mitchell Henderson, a stupid child who killed himself because somebody bullied him and he lost his ipod. Personally I think if the suicide rate is going up it’s a good thing. People dumb enough to kill themselves don’t belong in human society anyway.
Re: sicko
i take it u have never been bullied then?well these people have no way out or someone to talk to,half of these people are just crying for help and i DO NOT THINK YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO SPEAK ILL OF THE DEAD CALLING THEM STUPID this boy is no longer here but it is the family who are suffering and keep asking them selfs why didnt i know there was something wrong the kids nowadays wont talk to anyone as they will be accused of being called a pussy or a mummys boy so please wind your neck in and have some respect as it may be ur child one day
Re: Re: sicko
Speaking as one who has had my ass kicked multiple times throughout elementary school, and has been bullied into high school…. I’d say feeling martyred about being bullied is somewhat… arrogant.
Beliving that your problems are worse then those of others is arrogant. I know people who have dead parents, and were raised by single parents because of it. I know people who have been abused by parents too.
Bullying? Just some jerk calling you fat or something. Jeasus, I know the pen is mightier then the sword, but it’s just words, and if they actually hit you then you’ve got the right to get the police involved.
I’ve got other problems then just bullying, and I’m no emo-goth suicider. I’m a physics major at a U with a mother who has not been able to walk since I was three. And never once have I concidered suicide seriously… so really, get over yourselves. And I know I’m being arrogant too but…
Everything is fine...
A high suicide rate is indicative of a problem with a society. Is it any wonder then those at the helm would want to hide the problem so they can pretend everything is fine?
For every suicide a politician should be executed
It is politicians that have destroyed society and made it unlivable for many men, particularly young men.
Isn't it obvious?
“It’s not clear what the minister wants of Vodafone”
But stop the internet, of course!
I think that social networking sites like Bebo can certainly help prevent suicides, by setting up easy-access suicide chatlines and such. The telephone suicide-hotlines may be unaccessible for younger children, because they’re afraid of their parents finding out or because they’re not allowed to use the phone. Perhaps governments can help fund these chatlines?
I can imagine it:
“Oh life is so painful, pointless and lonely but I didn’t commit suicide because I didn’t have access to how-to
guides on the internet.”
Another scapegoat
Let’s play a mutliple choice game:
Johnny comitted suicide because…
1) He listened to too much hard rock music which glorified Satan worship.
2) He found some information on Google.
3) He saw a video on YouTube.
4) He was going through the usual physical and pyschological changes that occur when someone matures from a child to a teenager and he became mentally ill to the point where he believed suicide was a valid option to ending his real or imagined problems. He also must believed he had no “support system” on which he could rely on to talk about his problems.
Nah, it can’t be option #4. That’s too complicated of an issue to solve. Let’s just blame the Internet and get a law passed to ban Google.
im sure that the people who commit suicide were just fine till they bought a computer
Hm.
“This is ingenious, guys- OBVIOUSLY adolescents are so emotionally disturbed after reading something on google or seeing a video on youtube or seeing something on ED that offends them even in the slightest, they are therefore prompted to commit suicide on the spot! See, this will work, because everyone KNOWS that children are too hardy to let stalkers, surpressed memories of rape, murder, or otherwise, physical abuse, peer pressure, and not to mention drugs within their school (but that never happens anyway, so that’s pretty much a moot point) cause the prospect of suicide to even cross their minds! So now that we have a BS excuse to shut down the internets, we can finally resume our pretentious denial of society’s real and very serious flaws!”