I'm sympathetic to the issue of social equality, but depression resulting in suicide is not a rational process. Addressing class issues will not eradicate this problem. The wealthy become depressed and suicidal too, for example: http://www.ibtimes.com/eric-salvatierra-killed-caltrain-payp...

Yeah, but that just means that those with mental illness -- hi, btw -- probably require more treatment than they've been getting.

A story. Up here in Vancouver, the police recently released a study showing that the thing we did in the nineties -- ending welfare and closing institutions for the severely mentally ill -- actually cost us vastly more, because the police ended up doubling as nurses/counsellors/social workers, and the additional training cost vastly more than the original division of labour.

What is the annual cost of leaving the hurt hanging?

Yes, I agree we do not provide adequate health care as we ought to.

It's a tendency exacerbated in groups by desperate financial situations. For example, the phenomenon of farmer suicides in India.

Exactly hers a roof top bar in the city in London which is notorious for bankers and city types jumping to their deaths.

I find it fascinating that this got downvoted; I'm not taking it personally, but think about this for a second:

- Frank: People keep killing themselves.

- Larry: Put up a wall.

- Frank: Nah, too expensive.

What do you really think of Frank and Larry in this sitch? Be honest.

Now, how is that different from what y'all were saying...?

Cognitive dissonance reaches for the -1. Had you paid slightly more attention to your discomfort, you could have learned something about yourselves.

You don't find it fascinating, you're just being an asshole. You took a general problem and made it about yourself - because for whatever reason you've decided your interpretation of the problem rules above all else, and everyone else is blind uncaring sheeple for thinking otherwise. And now you're playing armchair psychiatrist for everyone who disagreed.

By the way, I think Larry is a genius and a comedian in your situation because what the fuck else can you say to a blanket statement like "People keep killing themselves"?

Is pointing out an ethical blind spot really 'being an asshole'? And yes, I'm playing armchair psychiatrist, because the only alternative is to think less of people. I'd rather understand them than judge. And you?

HN will mature as a platform for discourse when it becomes less of a concentrator of one particular worldview and more of a reactor of many.

- Frank: People keep killing themselves.

- Larry: Put up a wall.

- Frank: Nah, they'll just jump off it

FTFY

Oh, and also? The black humour was intentional. It is charming that you took it to be your discovery, but I will leave the obvious speculations on the table. While furiously glancing at them.

The downvotes are for your assumption that (1) people don't care about addressing underlying causes of suicide, and (2) people only want to fix the problem because it is inconvenient to them, and not for the sake of the people killing themselves.

It seems that you have extrapolated both these things from the fact that someone has proposed a technical solution to suicide, which is completely illogical. There is strong evidence that removing popular, easy methods of suicide actually reduce suicide rates.

No, my response is on evaluating the character of people that immediately leap to a technical solution without asking (a) who the solution benefits (apart from some a dodgy mention of an absent, undocumented statistic) (b) whether there is a technical approach to the problem that might be a bit less Soviet than putting up a wall to keep the jumpers in. For example, better funding for health care.