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Like Romany I too have done time in Crisis Counselling(about 12 years all up).Much of that on the 'Suicide shift' (10pm to 7 am) and on on site 'Personal Intervention Teams' (PIT) (albeit a few years back now).

The way you phrased the question I see two issues. There is some thought that one leads to the other.

I agree with Romany the level of Graphical depictions and presentation of such incidents at best certainly doesn't help the vulnerable. The constant barrage of violence has the effect of escalating the desensitising the public. This tends to lead to the next level of sensationalising of violence and depiction of suicides etc. one manner it glorifies these actions by the nature of their presentation. Namely, it gets widespread coverage...attention. The more attention potentially the greater the appeal for such an extreme action to certain classes of vulnerable people.

The issue of the WA case had little to do with Philip Nitschke per sec it could have been any number of web sites. The real issue was her Post natal depression and the probable failures in treating it.

The Chilean case was a case in fact for unnecessary publication. I can see some emotionally volatile teenager imitating this.

The bit at the bottom was a cynical attempt to not look like ghouls seeking the sensation and wouldn't register with the truly confused/desperate or despondent i.e. the teenager mentioned above. Make no bones about it The wide media is more about sensation to get rating in order to sell advertising and usually nothing to do with real concern because that is unglamourous, and requires hard effort.

In formed discussion about the issue of the right to “end one's life”, “die with dignity” is appropriate what may not be appropriate is discussions on specific identifiable people....consideration for the privacy of the person's friends and rellies. Likewise controlling hysterical/abusive/dogma based responses.

Clearly discussions should be on a generalised level. IMO Specifics of methods etc. should be avoided to protect the vulnerable from precipitous actions.

Romany
Welcome back

Runner obviously believes in the Michael Cain approach...if you put you oar in often enough eventually by the law of averages you have to hit a winner.

Not this time... When Lifeline was still establishing the counselors were all from the parent church their success rate was poor as were the number of volunteers. Then it went to MUST be Christian eventually it came down to must be a caring person AND be able to set aside their personal beliefs.This meant dealing with the clients in a non judgmental terms on their terms...(empathy)and trained skills that have nothing to do with any religion.
Question why?

By the way be careful how he throw around religion and secular in the same context he is are showing his sledge hammer "reasoning" (sic)(prejudices). Which is potentially insultingly WRONG.

No we need to be careful, copy cats exist and the sympathy and horror we show can turn some to trying it.
Far too many have died this way in my workplace, being aware of others feelings, understanding we should take the time to listen helps.
Not doing it, after the event hurts.

How we talk about suicide is as important as if we talk about it.

People are expected to say nice things about the deceased. While this is well intentioned, it can lead to suicide ideation. This happens where other people fantasise about how they could kill themselves and everyone would say such nice things about them and would be soooo sorry for any meanness.

I know that it sounds mean, but when someone kills themself, others need to avoid getting too sentimental about the person who died.

This is very close to the bone for me. My two children attend a Geelong high school that had the unfortunate circumstance of four teenage suicides this year and made the news country wide. Both my children lost classmates and friends and my youngest is only now managing to put a full week together without tears.

This should not have impacted on such young lives, but it has, and as a family and a school community it has been a harrowing time.

The school staff and the students are supporting each other amazingly well but it is not easy. However there is, particularly among these two groups, real anger about the reporting of these tragic circumstances. Some of the media behaved atrociously, approaching bewildered students seeming to offer support but without identifying themselves initially as press. That anger will remain for a long time.

Until recently, I had felt the media, which had a strong and clear set of guidelines on reporting of youth suicide, had been on the whole responsible. These guidelines had been in place since the mid nineties and during that time there had been an over 50% drop in 15 to 19 year old males suicide rates from 19.6 per 100,000 in 1997 to 9.3 in 2007. Female teenager suicide rates dropped from 5.3 to 3.9 over the same period.

I can not claim the press guidelines were the main contributor but certainly the protocols around youth suicide all have combined to save lives.

That this restraint seemed to have been lifted was of deep concern, especially to parents from our school who could not help but feel vulnerable.

Principals of other schools were said to have been very anxious for what the new regime would mean for students in their care. Thankfully, in Geelong at least, the suicide of another youth at a different school received a very muted response in the media.

I am very far from the politics of one Jeff Kennett but his efforts at stopping the 60 minutes program was applauded soundly by many I know.

Let us hope sanity prevails.

CSteele, All.

As a counselor that took heaps of suicide calls, I can tell you that every time a salacious story hit the airwaves the Personal intervention Team had a rugged night not so much with copy cat of methodology but attempts went up.

Odd fact, every time there were a big holiday CHRISTMAS, mothers day etc or the weather went into extremes the phones on the Suicide shift would run hot.

In both instances we rostered on extra personnel to cope.