Stigma: A major barrier to Suicide Prevention

Yesterday was World Suicide Prevention Day. And I feel weird to know that an online friend of mine felt so dejected and hopeless that he took his own life. He was depressed and could not see any point in continuing. He posted many times about his abusive father, and this week, after being physically assaulted, called police on him. However, that was not fruitful either. I do not know what transpired between the police and him. All I know is that he wasn't helped when he needed.

I never met him in real, only interacted online. According to him, his therapist had not called him for weeks. So, he mostly relied on friends. For, expecting support from his family was useless. It is not only sad, but cruel on so many levels.

May he rest in peace now. Away from the cycle of abuse, helplessness and dejection. Away from doctors like Shazia Nawaz, who cannot stop abusing someone with mental health problems. I wonder what kind of a doctor would say this on the Facebook wall of a person, who died only a few hours ago?

How many doctors are out there who tell their patients they are just pretending? And how many doctors tell their patients that they need to live for 'abusive parents'. I quote Dr Shazia Nawaz here: "World does not remember USELESS DEPRESSED people." World can do well without doctors like you Shazia Nawaz, I hope her license gets canceled.

If you thought that was moronic, please see our enlightened doctor comparing suicide with murder. Basically as per the 'doctor' a person who kills someone else and a person who kills 'self' is the same.

There are many reasons people with suicide ideation do not get timely help. Including doctors like Shazia Nawaz and others who say shit like 'attention seeker', 'weak', 'drama queen', etc. Criminalization of suicide is not much help either.

International Association for Suicide Prevention (IASP) and WHO cosponsored World Suicide Prevention Day on September 10. The theme was “Stigma: A Major Barrier for Suicide Prevention.” Nearly a million people die of suicides a year. The figures do not include the number of 'attempts' people make to commit suicide.

I feel awful and weird. He posted his picture with a rope, before he hung himself. Perhaps the final cry of a helpless being, stuck in limbo.


Note: The name has not been mentioned, so people like Shazia do not abuse him further.

Cruelty threshold can only increase

As humans, our threshold for negativity keeps increasing every day. Be it cruelty against animals, women, children or the society as a whole; verbal, physical abuse or our capacity and threshold to react to what we see around us. What is meant here is that in any given society, there is a certain limit of what people as a whole or as individuals can endure. And that limit is constantly pushed forward.

For example, if 9/11 had happened in Pakistan, would there have been this much affect on people’s psyche? It is not like there would have been no affects, but that the affect would have been limited and far different, because within the Pakistani context, such things are almost a norm. Similarly, if someone throws acid on a woman’s face in the US, the shock would be tenfold compared to it happening in Pakistan, or let’s say Afghanistan and Iran. However, if the same thing keeps happening in the US too, the reaction to such news or information would start to wane. In other words, repetition of violence decreases our sensitivity towards violent acts.

On an individual level, it is the same for things like drugs, let us assume a person in the early stages smoked one joint of weed a day, but with time, it changed to two joints, then three and later the person moved on to cocaine, heroin or some other more potent drug. This happens because we are all the time pushing our limits to greater extremes. Now when this happens for positive things, like a free diver holding his or her breath under water; or achieving better grades; better photography results or even buying something more expensive, it is not negative.

This whole concept takes a totally new meaning when it happens towards a negative end or while pushing limits of enduring abuse, torture etc. Porn is also one such negative aspect of our society which keeps deteriorating and getting worse. Especially in the way it depicts women. A comparison between vintage porn and contemporary porn reveals that vintage porn was not this violent. For those times, it might have been, however in our current times, it is far more disgusting, graphic and demeaning for women then it was in the past.

If there is a way out of this quagmire of extremities is uncertain. It does exist though and hence we come across more and more brutal things and extremes when it comes to entertainment, media, crime, murders, drugs et al.