And now for something completely different...Suici

[Van [down by the river]]

Smackie, if you're drawing a line between degrees then okay, I'll go with your definition, especially since you highlighted my typo...

To take your idea a bit further, it could still be argued that it's all relative. My father committed suicide, and he was no higher than the lowest end of middle class on the American household income scale.

He was a bit of a rarity in America, in terms of suicide demographics, from what I've learned.

However, if you were to compare him and the financial werewithal of our family compared to the vast majority of the rest of the world we were fabulously wealthy.


By that standard, since suicide isn't nearly as prevalent in poorer countries as it is here, I'd revert back to "almost exclusively", and I'd even spell it correctly...

[Smackie Chan]

Dammit Van! Almost anyone but you, and I wouldn't have any guilt about bustin' out the "If you were MY son..." smack. But I'll save it in this instance.

For all I know, you might be exactly right. I don't know what the statistics show, but I'd never heard anyone advance the notion that suicide followed socioeconomic trends. If you have a link or some figures to share, that'd be swell.

Could shrinks play a part in this? While those in poverty can't afford to see an analyst, a tinge of sadness in a member of high society might be diagnosed as depression, leading to prescriptions of anti-depressants, leading to drug dependence, and ending with the thought that the best way out is to end it all. Just a thought.

[Dinsdale_Piranha]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size=2 face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">quote:</font><table border="0" width="90%" bgcolor="#333333" cellspacing="1" cellpadding="0"><tr><td width="100%"><table border="0" width="100%" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" bgcolor="#FF9900"><tr><td width="100%" bgcolor="#DDDDDD"><font size=2 face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Originally posted by Van:

poor people die more frequently than wealthy people</font></td></tr></table></td></tr></table></BLOCKQUOTE>


This is undisputably true. I once knew this poor guy that died like 14 times one year........

[Van [down by the river]]

Rack Dindsdale, for starters, and I can't believe none of you ingrates aren't racking the corn filled shit outta R.C. for his "Shemp face" masturbation line!!

SoCal, maybe by your peer's standards you weren't well off but I keep coming back to relativity. Compared to most of the world and even quite a bit of America (the vast majority of whom are not thinking of offing themselves) you were very well off.

American teenagers, the most privileged kids on earth, are very Heathers...

[Dinsdale_Piranha]

Yeah, better RACK R.C.

Very funny.

[DC Smackmaster]

For my entire adult life I've had constant suicidal obsessions. Sometimes they go away for weeks, other times they fukk with me throughout my day. At it's worst I see objects and see my death in them ie, telephone wires I can hang from, trees I can run into, etc...I am manic though, as anyone who has spent time reading these boards should already know without my admission. So, sometimes, I'm the freakin life of the party and unstoppable at anything I put my mind to. Hasn't been easy but its who i am. Medicines have never worked for me, one almost killed me cause i couldnt afford it and the sudden stoppage of it basically put me out of my mind with withdrawels for two weeks. I've been homeless, without hope, and closer to killing myself more times than I can count. It's only been two thing that have kept me going in those rough ass times, knowing my mom would die along with me and also an extreme fear of Gods judgement (hell!)

My family was on welfare during my childhood, and as an adult I've always been just a red cunt hair beyond broke. It aint about money at all. Not to say that circumstance isn't the cause for many people. I know in mine it must be genetics.

Luckily the older I get the easier it gets. my coping mechanisms are honed to a point that i can control thought processes much better than when i was younger. Drugs have never helped my situation either, but thankfully I seem to be winning that war currently.

I am grateful that of the many many people that seem to harbor ill will and even wish destruction on others, that my mind concentrates those emotions on myself. Gotta count your blessings.

No reason for posting this other than enough of you have known me long enough to know some things about me that you didn't 5 minutes ago.

Glad you got off the tracks Van, even though I hate you...

See you guys at the troll stop...dont worry, I've got a travel straight jacket, just dont get me DRUNK!!!!

WAR HI ROGER...*snap*

[Python]

That's very sobering, DC. I really don't know what to say.

Peace.

[DC Smackmaster]

Thaks Python, I know you mean it. These boards have been a great escape at times thanks to guys like yourself.

Me and my dad found my grandma in her closet after she nixed herself and he tried many times himself, though "trying" to commit suicide is pretty pathetic, if you want the job done you CAN do it. I wont end up like that, no fukkin way. I dont even talk to my dad anymore because of his repeated attempts to convince me that we're identical and that my life will be as rough as his. Fukk that thinking!

Break out the crazy smack bitches!

[Uncle Fester]

Obviously there are biological and circumstantial causes for suicide including depression, terminal illness, drug addiction, alcoholism, financial trouble, etc.

Once you get past the obvious stuff, you get into that mucky stuff that's harder to explain. Nihilism. The meaning of life. Why we medicate ourselves with booze. Why we watch TV every night, especially when there's nothing on but old reruns of "Mama's Family." Why we step outside with a guy named "Tiny" at any bar in Redneckville, USA.

What is worse, dying before you achieve your goals? Or achieving your goals and finding them wanting?

Mark Twain wrote in "The Mysterious Stranger" that human beings are never happy, no matter what they do or how much they have. Was he right?

Bruce Springsteen said the American dream is not about fame and fortune, but about having "life without complications." Was he right?

Why does a millionaire basketball player like Jayson Williams play with guns and kill somebody? Why is Mike Tyson, for all his fame and fortune, a raving lunatic? Why does Winona Ryder get busted for shoplifting? Why did Anson "Potsy" Williams of Happy Days fame bugger Elgrandepeehole in the shower at the Burbank YMCA?

I always think back to a scene from the movie "Deliverance" (No, El, not THAT scene). The John Voight character is talking to Burt in the canoe:

Ed: Well, the system's done all right by me.
Lewis: Oh yeah. You gotta nice job, you gotta a nice house, a nice wife, a nice kid.
Ed: You make that sound rather shitty, Lewis.
Lewis: Why do you go on these trips with me, Ed?
Ed: I like my life, Lewis.
Lewis: Yeah, but why do you go on these trips with me?
Ed: You know, sometimes I wonder about that.

Which poses the question, from what are they really seeking deliverance, the mountain men or the average American suburb?

My advice to Van is to roll with the punches, go for the ying and yang, blend in a life full of sex, love, exercise, the outdoors, kids, good deeds, adrenaline, madness, money, music, wine, literature, art, internet message boards, Adams Family reruns, trees, bird houses, late night swims in gale force waves, shooting off rockets on the 4th of July...

-and staying away from fukking trains.

[gbg]

This is an excellent topic, and I have to rack Sniper and DC first off before I forget.

IB, I have to state that not all meds are a mask. If you know anyone who has been diagnosed as bi-polar or a manic depressive, they require meds probably for the rest of their life.

(DC, dont give up on the meds, find the right one for you, its a hit and miss game)

Some ppl go through periods in their life when they require the meds to keep them even keel. If not then suicide is a likely avenue that they will head down.

Depression is a mental illness. Make no mistakes about it. Unless you have been down that road, or have someone in your life that falls under these categories, you have no idea what it is like living with this desease.

Its not something that goes away on its own, and there is no band aid cure for it.

Sure there are some attention seekers that call out the suicide card to get sympathy, but those ones are easy to spot. Its the ones who remain silent. You know they are depressed, you can see it, but one day they wake up happy, and then the next boom they are gone. Studies have shown that when a depressed person decides to off themselves, they prepare for it. They start to give away things that are of sentimental and monotary value, and become suddenly at peace with themselves.