Discussion What would you like to see changed in the public perspective and research community?

[psychopomp]

Besides euthanasia and/or physician assisted suicide (baby steps now), what would you like to see changed in terms of the perception and behavior of the public and suicidology/academic community?

To get things started:

1. No more bullshit platitudes (public)
2. More qualitative research. Top 3 Suicidology journals in US only have like 5-6% qualitative studies (research)
3. More empathy, understanding, and allowance of vulnerability (everybody)
4. People to finally take an honest look in the societal mirror and see that imposing life on any human whom we cannot ever fully protect and whom we don't necessarily go out of our ways to provide for is akin to torture. In other words, scarce resources, life is naturally imbalanced, and humans are naturally driven towards their own pursuits for the most part. Which I take with no bitterness. It's just animal/human nature. We also can't feel each other's pain all the time. (Everybody)
5. Academia using reductionist methods and frameworks that only get at a slice of suicidality and fails to encompass the complexity, interplexity, and infinite combinations of people. Aka make research less shitty. (Research)
6. Reductionist diagnosis and treatments that fail to be truly holisitic or as they would say "biopsychosocial" (everybody)
7. Lack of funding. But let's be real, the money isn't coming and it never will (everybody. Also see #4)
8. Accept that people are going to suffer in some of the cruelest ways and there is little we can do to stop it even if we had a Minority Report crime system (everybody). (Granted the default should always be helping people to live, but not forcefully. Regardless most people suffer from the ignorance is bliss and/or bystander effect or are drowning themselves so can't help others let alone themselves).
9. More honesty discussion and acceptance of death and loss in general. (Everybody)
10. No more profiting off of suffering by prophets who get books and speeches and clout by doing nothing more than being a glorified mouth piece (everybody).

 

[TAW122]

11. Do away with involuntary commitment, coercion, forced therapy, locking up people against their will unless they are a danger to other people (which in that case, they would have already broken a law - so let them get punished via the legal system instead.).

 

[psychopomp]

11. Do away with involuntary commitment, coercion, forced therapy, locking up people against their will unless they are a danger to other people (which in that case, they would have already broken a law - so let them get punished via the legal system instead.).

Forgot about this obvious one. I'm not sure if you are familiar but check out "Soteria" and Western Mass (Massachussets) RLC. There's also a similar place in California, Alaska, and internationally. Another UK example:

http://www.maytree.org.uk/

All of these places are called "Peer Respites". I like the model despite some complications but I think it's a great alternative to hospitalization and it's a very non-coercive environment. The problem is, scalability and funding.

Plus some conditions do require more medical stabilization (this falls more so under harm to others).

I don't think they should be punished in the legal system. In the US recidivism rates are 70% (percentage of people that go out and come back), and it's what happens with a lot of people who have schizophrenia who ultimately end up homeless. However, to help and support proper structures, once again it takes a lot of money and human capital.

 

[Xerxes]

You can't qualify research using quantitative analysis. You can't put a number on how a person's feeling and consider it valid. It needs verbal input and then using a common factor method to figure the cause of suicide and what's best to treat it. They also need to stop treating us like guinea pigs or rats. Just because you got a PH.d in Psychology doesn't mean you have to demean the people as uneducated or not normal.

 

[psychopomp]

You can't qualify research using quantitative analysis. You can't put a number on how a person's feeling and consider it valid. It needs verbal input and then using a common factor method to figure the cause of suicide and what's best to treat it. They also need to stop treating us like guinea pigs or rats. Just because you got a PH.d in Psychology doesn't mean you have to demean the people as uneducated or not normal.

Very much agree. I have some good examples of research. The qualitative analysis is thematic or a phenomenological approach.

But even then there are times they take qualitative experience and try to "quantify" it. I hope to see this changed.

 

[Lra888]

Definitely agree with #4. Even when completely honest with a therapist or doctor the answer is always "just stay alive" no matter the circumstance. People who live with chronic mental illness, pain, sickness may not have any support system or the ability to work in order to have proper shelter, food, etc. It's still like "that's your problem, take some meds to endure this".

 

[psychopomp]

Definitely agree with #4. Even when completely honest with a therapist or doctor the answer is always "just stay alive" no matter the circumstance. People who live with chronic mental illness, pain, sickness may not have any support system or the ability to work in order to have proper shelter, food, etc. It's still like "that's your problem, take some meds to endure this".

Yes it is a sad state of affairs. I think a lot of it has to do with self-guilt and agency and desire to be virtuous and good. Like the trolley problem, people do not want to feel like they were complicit in someone's death or that they did everything they could. No human likes "liability". This subtle messiah/savior complex that has arguably developed through our cultural stories (passed through any medium).

I like that it is the default to help people. But it comes at a cost when there is a lack of self awareness and self inspection.

Furthermore, by egotistically not wanting to be complicit in one's death, many times we become complicit in one's prolongation of suffering.

 

[Xerxes]

Reminds me of the time when doctors kept a Japanese citizen alive against his own will to test the effects of radiation on the human body. He was irradiated with a lethal dose and his skin was sloughing off since the cells were disintegrating rapidly. His name was Ouchi if you want to google it.

 

[ron_g]

There's so much you could add to the list.

Ethics and self-determination shouldn't just be buzzwords that psychiatrists love to use in public discourse or their PR.

Speaking of ethics, mental health professionals shouldn't treat patients worse than they would like to be treated. Specifically, they shouldn't subject a suicidal to coercion if they considered suicide themselves given that patient's situation.

When dealing with suicidals, completely false incentives are effective. If you manage to force a suicidal person to continue their life for many more years and if that amounts to years of suffering, you can still praise yourself for being a life-saver, and pretty much everyone will be happy about the outcome. Why care about the suicidal's pain when it's not yours?

Suicidals shouldn't be treated like a persecuted minority. Suicidals are compulsively pathologized, silenced, isolated, locked up in camps, brainwashed (intellectually sloppy and dishonest pro-life talk therapy) and in some jurisdictions forcibly drugged or electroshocked. So long as psychiatrists have power without accountability, they don't even need to care whether the suicidal is rational.

If you want to prevent suicides, do more towards changing how society makes people suicidal instead of pathologizing and stigmatizing individuals.

 

[ron_g]

I forgot, for suicidals who want help, we need pro-choice crisis teams, if possible, made up of people with lived experience. Pro-lifers: note that I'm not asking for pro-death crisis teams.

 

[psychopomp]

Reminds me of the time when doctors kept a Japanese citizen alive against his own will to test the effects of radiation on the human body. He was irradiated with a lethal dose and his skin was sloughing off since the cells were disintegrating rapidly. His name was Ouchi if you want to google it.

Thanks for the info. To expand on the perspective, this is a research article for people who purposely starved to see what the negative effects are.

https://academic.oup.com/jn/article/135/6/1347/4663828

This to me shows how embracing the realities of life and giving people pro-choice and consensual agreement in matters can result in great discoveries and changes.

 

[Red star]

Number 3 for me and that goes for every type of person not just ones we would relate with. I try and remind myself to do this with people that have opposing views. Understanding why people are the way they are. If they are disrespectful however that's another thing.