Conference quark::mennotes-v1

    
    I think there have been scientific studies which have looked into men
    and women who attempt suicide.  I recall the reason more men succeed is
    the methods they use are move impervious to resuscitation or rescue. 
    You can't recall a bullet once it's shot.
    
    I've read that women are more likely to use less violent, less certain
    means, be found at the brink of death, and revived.  I'm not sure what
    the statistics on how many men or women tried to kill themselves to
    begin with, but I do remember more men succeeded due to method/location
    (lack of rescue possibility).
    
    -Jody
    

    .0 & .1 Your assuming. This all takes place across the Atlantic pond.

    There was a recent study, conducted by the US gov. (and subsequently
    suppressed) that indicated approx. one third of teen suicides in the
    US are the result of conflicts involving sexual orienation.  [my
    reading of this: a large number of teens are so despondent over the
    idea they might be gay that they kill themselves.]
    
    I assume the study was broken down into men and women victims (is
    'victim' the right word to use for someone who commits suicide?)
    but I don't recall reading any detailed info about that aspect of
    the data.
    
    Social attitudes about gays in the US & the UK seem similar.  I
    don't know much about UK attitudes about suicide, though. 
    
    In my experience, men seem to have a more difficult time accepting
    their homosexuality than do women.
    
    So, given the above, I could speculate that one possible reason 
    for the three-to-one difference is that more men than women who think 
    they might be gay are killing themselves.
    
    This may be (and probably is) only a part of the explanation, but 
    one worth mentioning IMO.
    
    /Greg

    re .3, that is so sad.  Our society puts such pressure on men to be
    macho, John Wayne types that, apparently,  many teenage boys can't live 
    with the prospect of not living up that expectation.
    This is so unnecessary and it sickens me that society does this to
    people.
    
    Lorna
    

    
    	which brings me to the question....
    	was it a REAL suicide??? among the men?
    
    	::LIONEL...
    	this makes a wonderful segway for that question you wouldn't
    	let me put in here last year.

    I think that greater conflict about homosexuality is likely to
    contribute -if at all- in a very minor way for adult men.
    
    If we stipulate that "unsuccesful suicide attempts" are a much greater
    percentage of female suicide attempts than male suicide attempts;
    then I wonder whether some of the difference can be explained by
    thinking that women are much more likely to cry for help than men are. 
    

    .1  I have read the same things... that the reason men succeed at
    suicide more often than women is because men tend to use guns vs.
    pills... its more difficult to 'fix' a gunshot wound to the head than
    pump someones stomach.
    
    Teenagers are under ENORMOUS peer pressure on the proper ways to behave
    with sexuality at the heart of it.  Society is so intolerent of any
    type of sexual orientation other than heterosexual its no wonder many
    kill themselves over that issue.  Society in many ways is still in the
    stone age when it comes to compassion and understanding others,
    expecially when sexuality is involved.

    I think it is also the case that only a small percentage of the male
    suicides are 'twixt twelve and twenty'
    
    				herb

    
    	there's a percentage in there (male & female suicide rate) where
    	the death was called a suicide but was, after a more thorough
    	investigation, deemed an accidental death...its a small
    	lunatic fringe that engages in this ....but the rate for 
    	suicides after re-investigation have been again proven to be
    	*accidental deaths*.
    
    	this was from an article in the globe about 3 yrs. ago giving
    	rise in a new form of sexual perversion.

    geesh,
    ok you decrement it by a small number and the following argument
    increments it by a much more substantial number.
    
    people who die of emphysema or cirrhosis of the liver, or cancer of the
    lung, or as a result of an accident while driving drunk have committed
    suicide (because they didn't stop smoking/drinking.) even after knowing
    the likely outcome (sort of like Russian Roulette)

  .7>    .1  I have read the same things... that the reason men succeed at
  .7>    suicide more often than women is because men tend to use guns vs.
  .7>    pills... 

    These figures are from the UK...the vast majority of people here don't 
    have a gun (thank goodness).

    At least according to one study The persence or absence of guns ha no
    bearing on sucides.
    
    A study was done comparing two areas relitively near each other but one
    in Canada which has Strict controls on firearms and one in Washington 
    state with few controls.
    
    				Suicides
    				1985-1987
    
    		Kings County State of Washington USA     Vancouver,Canada
    
    Total Suicides            618                             644
    Rifles $ Shotguns                 Same for both
    Handguns                  179                              32
    Hanging                     0                             140
    Others, Poison, Pills, Falls, Single car crashes accounted for the
    rest.
    
    It seems at least from this study that Hanging replaces Firearms as the
    preferred method when firearms are not available, But suicides do not
    decrease as firearms become less available.
                                                 

    
    thats a rather broad statement to make based on a single data point..

    The 1st sentence of .12 started with ...
    "at least according to one study"

    Do the two areas have comparable populations?
    
    
    					- Vick

    re .15
    
    Yes, the populations are similar size.  I think the population for King
    County (Seattle and surrounding suburbs) is about a million.  I *think*
    Vancouver B.C. is about the same size.  Any other Pacific
    Northwesterners reading that can verify this?
    
    Karen

    I take it that "Domestic gas" is commonly available in England and
    Wales?
    
    ed

    I think that the reason more men than woman kill themselves is because
    men just plain have less hope for getting help. The chances of someone
    else helping out to make things better are better for women than for
    men. Men are told from an early age to be self reliant and to help
    women. Women, for the most part, are not told that they have to be self
    reliant. In fact many are told the opposite. So when things get bad for
    a woman she may easily hope/expect that someone will help her. BTW, it
    is widely believed that many people who try and fail to commit suicide
    are not "serious" about dying. They are doing it as an attention
    getting device. The percentage of women who fail at a suicide attempt
    is much higher then for men. Many believe that this is because men who
    try really want to die but many women who try really want the
    attention. This is logical if you assume that a woman has more hope of
    help than a man.

    People do not commit suicide if they have hope. It is the ultimate
    expression of helplessness and hopelessness.

    			Alfred

    re .20

    yup, c.f. .6
    
    
    				herb

re domestic gas:

Known (in England at least) as "sticking one's head in the oven."
Maybe there are more electric ovens in the U.S.

    Re head-in-the-oven: I read something recently that stated that the
    type of gas originally used for ovens was changed in recent decades;
    prior to the change, the gas itself was toxic, and the head-in-the-oven
    trick was a fairly effective method of suicide. Since the change it has
    become more difficult to commit suicide in this way, as one would have
    to get the concentration of gas high enough to cause suffocation.
    
    -b

re .23:

Until natural gas was discovered under the North Sea, the British used
coal gas.  I have no idea if coal gas is more toxic than natural gas.

Of course, if it's natural, it's got to be good for you, right?  And
it's organic too!

    Suicide? A Lotta ta-do over the death of Buddy Holly......:)

.25> Until natural gas was discovered under the North Sea, the British used
.25> coal gas.  I have no idea if coal gas is more toxic than natural gas.

    It's not a case of being _more_ toxic. As .23 said, natural gas is 
    _not_ toxic, coal gas is. You could still kill yourself with natural 
    gas, but you would die from lack of oxygen rather than poisoning.

I read a Scientific American article some years ago, and (if my memory
is working) it correlated suicide with three factors, which, when found
together in extreme degrees could mean that a person is prone to suicide.

The first two have been described in previous notes as "hopelessness",
and "not knowing how to get help", but the third is interesting:

A perception that one has extremely serious problems
A perception that there is no way out of those problems
and
A trait of taking decisive action in response to problems.

The third is interesting because it implies that people who commit suicide
aren't the wishy-washy type.


Ben

    re .28, rather than pointing out that people who commit suicide are not
    wishy-washy, I think it would be better if men were raised to realize
    that it's okay to ask for help.
    
    Lorna
    

    
    	but....if these people (let's not be gender specific, here) don't
    	realize they need help....how can they know to ask for it?

    re .30, how can somebody whose about to kill themselves not realize
    they need help?  They must know something's wrong.
    
    Lorna
    

    
    mebbe theres nothing wrong with choosing non-existence..

> mebbe theres nothing wrong with choosing non-existence..

Quite possibly.  Yours is one of the most interesting comments in this
string so far, I think.  And since all of our cultural heritage is from
people who were still alive when they wrote, and we're all still on the
same side of the choice, we're rather a biased crew to be debating it.
Not that it isn't impossible to hear from the other side, I merely mean
to observe that we are only hearing from 'this' side, as it stands.  

Still and all, I prefer Camus' thoughts on it; he speculated on the value
of life from the perspective of an immortal, one of the many minor legends
sentenced by the gods to an eternal punishment.  His legend is a normal guy,
sentenced to push a boulder over a hill.  But whenever he gets the boulder
almost all the way up, it slips from his grasp and rolls back down the hill.
What kind of philosophy does Sisyphus derive after a few millenia of that?
I haven't read it recently, but it affirmed life; Camus closes: "One must
imagine Sisyphus happy."  And it made sense to me ;-).

So...mebbe, Bob.  But I think, not.

DougO

    Perhaps they realize they need help and either:
    o	feel they have no right to ask for it
    o	feel that they will not get the help they need
    
    		Andrew.

    Sometimes people think they cannot be helped or are undergoing
    treatment but decide that the only thing they want is to be left alone
    and to be away from their problems forever.
    The decision to commit suicide is not an easy one and usually taken
    alone.
    
    Charles

    
    Extreme stress tends to alter a person's perception of priorities
    and of consequences.  Actually, this starts happening even under
    moderate stress -- I remember talking with someone in the HR dept.
    of another company about work-related stress and burnout.  She
    emphasized that burnout is so insidious because the first thing
    to short out is the person's ability to put problems in perspective.
    The project that's late takes on the look of an insurmountable
    task, and all paths lead to failure and disgrace.  The stress
    shuts down the person's ability to ask for help, because asking
    for help is a recognition of the thing that has come to dominate
    their waking (and dreaming) hours...
    
    I think that's why it's so important for people to be aware of
    changes in behavior in the people close to them in times of
    trouble.  Some urge to survive finds it's way around the inability
    to ask for help directly.
    
    Ron

    RE: -1   Thanks Michelle
    
    

    
    well if camus sez it, it must be true ne ces pas?
    
    all i'm suggesting is that if sisyphus gets tired of 
    the same old boring existence he has as his perogative
    as a free and autonomous being the right to end it.
    
    btw - is the 3 to 1 ratio taking marital/lovelife status
    into account? i can well imagine that lotsa myn would 
    rather be gone than be alone..

Well, in the case of sisyphus, it becomes an interesting point, wherein 
since he's been sentenced to eternity, no I *don't* think he has the right 
to end it.  But that question is akin to angels on pins, since I don't 
*really* think there is any guy anywhere spending eternity pushing said 
rock, nor any gods that told him to do so, neither, just like I don't
think angels cram as many dancing onto pinheads as say, drunken frat boys 
do into volkswagons and phonebooths.  T'aint the way I'd choose to spend
my immortality, see, no matter how many learned theologians think they
make points arguin' it.  I don't dispute the right of a free and autonomous 
being to choose death.  I say that I myself won't; and were I able to share
my understanding of the situation with everybody else, I don't think they
would, neither.  But I can't, and some do, so.

btw, why do you think sisyphus' existence boring?  Pushing the rock, yes.
But imagine, if you will, every time it slips, and rolls past him down the
hill.  He has to walk down to it, n'est-ce pas?  What does he think about?
Perhaps, a way of looking at existence, a philosophy, that makes the chore
of rock pushing less onerous.  Sisyphus has his moments to reflect; and he
has his appointed burdens.  If this is a recipe for disaster, I suggest that
the world would have ended long ago.  Rather, many people come to accept and
enjoy their tasks, the chores of living, the challenges of staying alive, 
the thrills of new recognitions, new thoughts.  People who are bored with
life haven't thought enough about the situation, I think.

DougO

.36>    Extreme stress tends to alter a person's perception of priorities
.36>    and of consequences.  Actually, this starts happening even under
    
    Exactly.
    
    HBO ran ran a special called Suicide Notes a few months ago and when
    you saw the letters these people left behind, it was obvious that they
    were unable to reason and rationalize properly.  And it was also clear
    that they thought they were being quite sensible the whole time.

    re .41, well, if more people cared more about what happens to other
    people, then maybe they would never have reached that point.
    
    It's been my observation that most people are pretty damn heartless and
    really couldn't care less if the people in the cubicles next to them
    did kill themselves over a work project.
    
    Lorna
    

    About caring....
    2 weeks ago a young man got killed when trying to stop another young
    man he met that night at a party from throwing himself in front of a
    train.
    
    Charles

    re .43, well, that's certainly very tragic...
    
    Lorna
    

    
    	i knew someone very close to me, who was going through a 
    	terrible depression (money, wife leaving him, police after
    	him...etc....) it was amazing the train of events that 
    	followed.... he *seemed* to have taken things into his own
    	hands....paid the money he owed, signed the divorce papers,
    	and contacted the police.... he visited his folks and the
    	rest of his family....drove to his inlaws....borrowed the 
    	father-in-law's gun and shot himself....
    	
    	i followed this closely as it happened and honestly BELIEVED
    	he was better (or coming out of it) why did he end up killing
    	himself when he had made amends, so to speak? it still to this
    	day nags at me.

    Robert Pillsbury was a local lawyer, formally of Winer, Pilsbury, and
    Benent of Concord St. Nashua. Guy took his life over a divorce.
    
    As said, guys are into violent was to go. Gun in your mouth is a tuff
    band-aid to fix.

    Many people clean up their acts, settle their accounts, return
    borrowed things, etc, shortly before committing suicide.  
    
    					- Vick

    RE: .48  Denise
    
    >  why?
    
    "Settling accounts" is one of the 'symptoms' of suicidal depression
    that health experts regard most seriously.
    
    It (usually) indicates that the person has made a definite decision
    to commit suicide and is now acting on a list of "things to do"
    before going through with it.  
    
    In suicidal children/teenagers, "settling accounts" usually amounts
    to giving away the person's most prized possessions.

    Why are victims (perpetrators) of suicide often found naked?

    "Because they take their clothes off before they kill themselves." is
    not the answer I'm looking for, either. :-)

I've often heard that they don't want to mess up the clothes - they'll also
take off glasses and make other preparations so that things are as neat
as possible.

			Steve

    Re .50: How often is "often"? I don't recall hearing of many suicides
    being found nude, save perhaps those who died of drug overdoses, and
    then it was often not clear whether it was intentional suicide or an
    accident. (The auto-erotic accidental suicides may also tend to be
    under-dressed.)
    
    Oh, come to think of it, some suicides-by-drowning do, it is reported,
    remove their clothing before going in, but that may be habit - one so
    seldom jumps in the water fully clothed. 
    
    Re "putting things in order": If one is planning to leave this life
    soon - whether by one's own hand, or due to a terminal illness - I can
    imagine wanting to tidy things up as much as possible. Might be to
    spare the survivors any additional work, or it might be to remove
    anything one wouldn't want them to find - or perhaps just as a way of
    convincing one's self that one is still capable of exercising some
    control over one's life...
    
    -b

    
    	well, if they've got opposite sex's underclothes nearby and
    	also any sort of pornography...chances are its not suicide
    	at all, especially if it involves asphyxiation.

re: .49

	"Settling accounts", as I understand it is part of "the plan",
	which also includes the method and instruments involved with
	the person's demise.  Social workers make it a priority to ask
	depressive/suicidal individuals whether or not they have a plan.

	Those individuals with a plan are considered much more likely 
	to commit the act than those without a plan.

	Mark

    re .54, I guess I'm naive, but I don't know what you're talking about.
    
    Lorna
    

    My guess is the victim is found in bed with the lover of a porn kingpin
    and is choked to death by said kingpin or by his hired thug.  Yes? 
    No?

    Re .56: Some people find that restricting their breathing while
    masturbating enhances the experience, and experiment with ropes and
    whatnot, the goal being to either avoid passing out, or to make sure
    that if they do, the pressure will automatically be released. However,
    some people miscalculate, and never wake up: autoerotic strangulation.
    (Most of the victims of this practice are male, but I've read cases of
    women who've done it.)
    
    I've read that some families apparently preferred that the death be
    reported as a suicide, presumably to avoid having to answer "how can
    you accidentally hang yourself" questions...
    
    -b

    There are some people who try to synchronize an orgasm with a brush
    with death by hanging. 
    Sometimes the brush is closer than they want and they die.
    <whatsisname Kellerman> the creator of the 
    serial psychologist Alex Delaware(?)
    in such books as When The Bow Breaks
    wrote about some sickos who did this and also were involved with some
    Satanic Cult.
    Sure sounds like suicide to me

    
    	naaaah! ::NICHOLS...its the thrill and the chill of 
    	TRYING to escape death...and the big O that accompanies
    	it ain't nothing to sneeze at either!
    
    	::HATASHITA...
    	no...but i can give you the details if you like.

    re previous, my, my.  It never ceases to amaze me just how imaginative
    some folks are....  
    
    Lorna
    
    PS - thanks for the explanations, tho.  (now I'll just throw-up in my
    handy office wastebasket, and forget I ever read it!)
    

    I liked my answer better.  It made more sense and was a lot less...
    disturbing.

    <---- For whomever it was who asked way back there....
    
    The population of the Vancouver BC metropolitan area is
    approx. 1.5 million.