to feel even less sympathy for the Australian DJs after watching their interview?

[miamibeach]

Especially the guy.

The woman said she hopes the public respect the privacy of the nurses family.

Shame she didn't show the same respect of Kate's privacy.

[wannaBe]

I don't know though everlong. I think tbh we (as a collective) are selective about where we opportion sympathy and where we don't, iyswim. In theory, suicide is always a desperate step on the part of anyone. But it ruins lives - the lives of the people who are affected by it either directly or indirectly. And we make our judgements based on individual circumstances. If we make a stark comparison:

On Friday a man walked into a Newtown school with a gun and shot and killed 27 innocent people. He then turned the gun on himself. Technically, his suicide was an act of desperation because no rational-thinking person kills themselves. But do we have sympathy for him? On the whole I think no, because of all the lives he destroyed before taking his own. And yet he can't have been thinking rationally, can he? Should we not feel some sympathy for that?

Contrast that with Jacintha Saldanha (sp?) who, following a badly thought out prank, decided to end her life. We don't know any more than that. But she has left notes behind naming individuals as being essentially to blame for her death. Individuals she had never dealt with before that day. By doing that, she has destroyed their lives. And that's before we get to the lives of her inocent children she left behind. We can have sympathy for the fact she felt desperate enough to kill herself, but did she have the right to destroy the lives of others by naming them, purely because she was, to be blunt, too gullible to see through their prank?

The two situations are not comparrible in their brutality, but in terms of the fact that liveswill have been knowingly destroyed by both is a fact. So how do we base our sympathy?

[PumpkinPositive]

The Newtown tragedy was a godsend in terms of timing for that radio station. They'll be hoping the JH story gets buried below the sadness and soul searching coming out of the States.

[wannaBe]

actually, I think the Newtown tragedy just shows how much this particular story has been blown out of all proportion. In fact I said that exactly on my blog when I wrote about it on Friday.

[AmberLeaf]

I think leaving letters blaming specific individuals is pretty despicable actually. And I don't think that being dead makes that less so. This woman chose to take her own life. She may have felt that certain events were the catelist to her doing so, but ultimately the choice was her's. To put in writing that the blame should lie with other people is pretty selfish IMO. They weren't to blame. Suicide could never ever have been foreseen

Agree.

Good posts wannaBe

[wannaBe]

The issue though is that it couldn't have been foreseen. Actions often have reactions, but it doesn't make someone to blame iyswim.

Of course the children were entirely blameless, my point was more to do with the level of sympathy we direct at the suicidal person based on what we know before they committed suicide iyswim. Adam Lanza destroyed the lives of 27 innocent people and the lives of their friends and family who are left to pick up the pieces. But he still committed suicide. Does this fact make him deserving of some sympathy?


Jacintha Saldanha has named individuals (and other than the DJ's we don't as yet know who else she has named) as being too blame for her actions. It's easy to level blame at the DJ's because we have physical evidence of their involvement prior to the suicide. But what if she has named individuals who aren't actually involved in this? Are they to blame because she believes they are?

[wannaBe]

it could be argued that Adam Lanza's mother is partly to blame for his actions. Nurotic woman, anxious about the apocalypse, house full of guns. And yet society is as yet not laying the blame at her door, yet it could be argued that she is also partly culpable in the deaths of those children. Or could it?

[wannaBe]

it's a very dangerous game to play, the blame game.

[PumpkinPositive]

And yet society is as yet not laying the blame at her door

The Daily Mail is leading the charge as we speak.

As an aside, it's rather sad that no-one has as yet claimed his or his mother's bodies. I hope the family step forward sooner rather than later.

[HoneyMurcott]

What DoILook, Hoolio and and Solola said. Also think the head of the radio station could have been more fulsome in his apology. He seemed more pissed off than remorseful.

Damage limitation v true sincerity.

[SusannahL]

Well I for one hope that the DJs gain some comfort from learning that they weren't the only ones she blamed.

Otherwise what a terrible burden it would have been for them to live with for the rest of their lives.

[wannaBe]

tbh I'm not sure it's fair to make it into a contest about who will feel the worst and why etc etc.

This notion of action vs reaction makes me deeply uncomfortable. After all where do we draw the line at that?

I don't think anyone is in any doubt that the two DJ's could never have foreseen that someone would commit suicide following their prank. No-one could have foreseen that. And yet there are plenty of people saying that they should in some way be held accountable for her death, that they are partly to blame.

But let's look at it in a slightly different light. I used to know a woman who, before I knew her, went out with a guy. For whatever reason, the relationship ran its course and she ended it. When she did, the guy told her that if she left him he would kill himself. She left him, and he killed himself. By the theory of action verses reaction, she was in fact to blame for his death. And unlike the DJ's, she knew the consequences of leaving this man could be that he might commit suicide, but she left him anyway, and he carried out his threat. Should she be held responsible? Should she have stayed in the relationship? After all, if she had, he would still be alive, surely?

If someone came on mn and said their partner was threatening to commit suicide because they wanted to end the relationship, would people advise them to stay? Or would they blame them if he then carried out the threat? especially as they would have known this might happen?

You see, it's a very very dangerous road to start down, this idea of opportioning blame. Because once you start blaming one person, you then have to start blaming others. someone who leaves a relationship knowing the ex has threatened to kill themselves is culpable if they carry out their threat because they knew what the consequences of their actions might be. Yet no-one would seek to blame them, well perhaps the close family might, but on the whole society wouldn't. Yet these DJ's couldn't have foreseen what the consequences of their actions might be, and yet they should be blamed for a woman's death? How does that work?

Suicide is a senseless and entirely selfish act. But it is also an act of personal choice. The individual who commits suicide may feel they have no choice, but they do actively choose to end their own life. You cannot opportion blame for that to anyone except the individual who goes through with it.

[Animation]

"Suicide is a senseless and entirely selfish act. But it is also an act of personal choice. The individual who commits suicide may feel they have no choice, but they do actively choose to end their own life. You cannot opportion blame for that to anyone except the individual who goes through with it."

I completely agree wannaBe.

[wannaBe]

but the "if it were your child," argument is entirely irrelevant, because it isn't. In the same way as we react to any number of situations differently if it's a member of your family vs someone we only know about iyswim.

It is entirely possible that her family may blame the DJ's. But just because they blame the DJ's doesn't mean the dj's are to blame. Iyswim.

In my situation mentioned above, the woman's family blamed her for her ex's death on the basis he had told her that was what he was going to do and she left him anyway. Was she to blame? And if not, why not?

[Animation]

"The dj's did something that hurt her."

I don't think that makes them responsible or to blame for her choosing to take her life. In life things happen and people upset us - that's all part of life. We are still responsible for our own feelings - and to be honest I think her actions and condemning notes are quite harmful and destructive themselves.

[echt]

Finding it hard to believe the blaming of the victim here.

Suicide is not senseless, not to the person doing it. Patronising twaddle. It makes complete sense to them. The effect on loved ones is quite different. The use of selfish as a blanket criticism is unhelpful. Suicide is essentially self-ish in that it's about the self, but not necessarily nasty, except for the blackmailing kind.

[Animation]

echt - the djs may be responsible for upsetting her - but they're not responsible for her choice to take her own life. It's a responsibility issue that's being discussed - not a blaming of the victim.

[AmberLeaf]

The notes have been mentioned in the press.