At first I was stunned to the point of LOL.
The Globe and Mail is running a story claiming “Asking teens about suicide does more good than harm: study”.
This study suggests that talking to your kids about suicide might not be a bad idea.
Man, next they’ll be telling us we should talk to our kids about sex and drugs.
Not for the first time I am driven mad by the sparseness of factual detail. Surely we didn’t need a government-funded study to tell us this?
So I googled the study’s author, and found this:
A study of New York high school kids conducted by Madelyn Gould, a researcher at Columbia University and New York Psychiatric Institute, bears out the prevalent theory that “media coverage of suicides has been shown to significantly increase the rate of suicide, and the magnitude of the increase is related to the amount, duration, and prominence of coverage.” She calls the phenomenon Suicide Contagion, or suicide clusters.
In the National Academies Press article that the above quote is taken from, Suicide Prevention and Intervention: Summary of a Workshop (2001), Gould says that while the media’s coverage of suicides has a direct effect, propagating the suicide rate, the answer is not to stifle coverage:
“According to Dr. Gould, the majority of studies on contagion in the United States and other countries indicate that media coverage of suicides significantly increases the rate of suicide. This poses an essential conflict for the media between producing compelling stories and avoiding contagion. (The code of ethics of the Society of Professional Journalists is Seek truth in reporting and minimize harm). One response of the media to contagion has been to cease reporting on suicide, but this is not the best option, according to Dr. Gould, since silence on the subject can foster shame and hinder help-seeking by those at risk. Instead, Dr. Gould calls for reporting that is informed by the data, and building alliances between the health and media communities to balance needs of the media and public health as discussed below. Dr. Gould pointed out that not all media presentations of suicides have a negative impact. Some are neutral, and some have a positive effect providing a powerful opportunity for reducing suicide.”
And this brings me back to the article in the Globe and Mail. I think Gould is bang on the money, almost. The last thing we want to do is add any glamorous lustre to suicide. It’s bad enough they think smoking will make them cool. It’s not like kids aren’t doing it. They will keep on doing it, and they need look no further than Romeo & Juliet for inspiration. Or Pump Up The Volume or The Virgin Suicides or even Kurt Cobain.
Any attempt to pretend it ain’t happening will send us back to the days of “oh I shouldn’t get involved. It’s none of my business.”
That brings me to my point:
Why does it take yet another study to statistically prove what we should already know?
TALK TO YOUR KIDS! THEY NEED YOUR UNCONDITIONAL LOVE, SUPPORT AND UNDERSTANDING! THEY NEED YOUR GUIDANCE, YOU STUPID, BLIGHTED, BLIND, SELFISH TWENTY-SOMETHING CHILD!
Listen to me. Seriously. If your kids turn out rotten it is your fault. You cannot blame society or tv or the neighbours’ kids or the latest craze in medicated conditions because YOU are who they look to first for a role model. YOU. They need to be taught, and school won’t cut it. You can’t expect a teacher to raise 35 kids a year. They’ve got kids of their own.
You saw fit to bring life into this world. Deal with it. Teach them. It’s not these kids that are failing and flailing. It’s you. You no longer have the luxury of selfishness. You are two.
You don’t need a million random studies and how-to books to tell you to be patient, listen to your kids and talk to them. And remember how intelligent you were– they are far smarter than you give them credit for. Just take the time. Lots of it.
You’ll never work harder for a friendship but it seems to me the reward is worth it. And you don’t need a study to tell you that.
Well put DJ. All except the part about friendship. As a parent you should never be your childs friend. You are more than that, and you should never put yourself on the level of a friend because of the exact reasons you stated. They look up to you, you need to teach them, and you will always need to be there for them, if only to listen as only a loving parent could. I’m not saying that as your children grow, that you shouldn’t enjoy each other, and like each other, as well as love each other, but you must always hold the role of parent. But that’s just me ranting. My father tried to be my friend, and well DJ, you know how that turned out. Kids need their parents to be parents, not that you can’t be cool, but they need to know there is someone out there who loves them enough to put rules up for them. I’m glad you are touching on the suicide topic, I know how much it has affected you in your life. Suicide is soooo stupid, and communication with your children is the best step.
ps How come your commenty thingy won’t let me use the word , huh, it won’t even let me spell it with spaces. Let me try it with x’s in between the letters … nope not that either, wierd I’ll email you the word… very strange, it’s not even remotely dirty.