Why do men have higher rates of suicide?

[DuskEngine]

1. There are more men in the population

No there aren't.

 

[DuckSucker]

I think girls attempt suicide more often out of attention. They don't really want to die, they just want to feel better, and have people rush to their side when they feel lonely.

Guys aren't "like that" when it comes to attention-seeking methods. When guys try to kill themselves, they really want to die.

The "traditional masculinity" bullshit (for better and for worse) --the way men have to be, the stigma around being a man, I posted earlier in this thread and that sort of issue is what I was trying to hint at.

Even though this thread is inherently "about gender" I dont really want to seem like I'm sperging about "who has it worse", and I dont think people often ACTUALLY attempt suicide for attention but when a woman "cries out" over any issue, there is going to be someone there. If a woman has a mark on her body, a bruise, a scar, self-harm wounds, people identify that and immediately say "Oh what's wrong? What happened? Are you okay?" If a man has a mark on his body, a scar, a burn mark, it's manly, tough and cool (I'm guilty of this). If a man has, self harm wounds, the initial reaction is not "Oh what's wrong? Are you okay?" The reaction is more tempered and ranges from "oh, whatever" to "what's this dude's problem? Hes fucking insane." It may not even be anything, and this person just got a mark in their day-to-day life, but it's about interpretation.

I think you could equally ask the question, "Why do women ATTEMPT suicide more often than men?" It's just as much of an issue; nobody attempts suicide just for attention, they always really do want to die for one reason or another. But I think a part of it is just that: when a woman attempts suicide, people pick up on what's going on, they interpret the signs more clearly, they care and are aware. A man's (subconscious) attempt at suicide can be just as easily chalked up to "dumb men", "boys will be boys", recklessness, poor decisions, picking fights, irrationality, any number of other things. When women drink to excess it's because theyre vulnerable and masking a problem. When men drink to excess, it's lazy losers who do it because they're alcoholics and think that's just super fun. That's the type of different interpretation Im talking about, although people generally do try and make each judgement call in its own context. We help them both, but there is a bit more shame cast on one group than the other ("You did this to yourself. You deserve this."). There are more failed men than failed women.

It's a scarlet letter. In particular, since this is a thread about suicide, I'll say all self harm wounds are a red flag, and a warning sign. But when a man has those signs, the red flag isn't interpreted as a signal for help or attention, or whatever, it's interpreted as a huge warning signal to stay hands off of the dude. Is he going to lash out, is he mentally sane, can the dude cope? Is he going to rape someone, murder someone? Does the dude start fights? Did this man deserve these marks? It's always the quiet ones who snap, is there any reason to bother with this dude? Sorts of issues like that. On top of that, there is the stigma of being a "weak man". Nobody wants to bring it up, it's awkward to bring it up, you dont really know how to fix it; it might not even be anything, the dude might not want you to get involved, and you might not even pick up on it being anything different.

A lot of times, it isn't anything, but my point is that it's not necessarily down to expectations, it's not necessarily that people expect women to be more fragile and vulnerable while men should be stoic and emotionless, it's that people genuinely care. The signs are interpreted differently, in a subtle way, and I do think people care more about women (and that concern carries plenty of negative issues with it), which isn't wrong, I don't want to change that, I just state it as something you subconsciously notice. I'll stand by the disposable men thing because it's true--even biologically so.

No there aren't.

Men are born at a way higher rate, like 2 to 1, but women live longer. So statistically it evens out and slightly leans towards more women being alive if you look at overall population, but up until the 50-60 age group, there are a lot more men than women in most age groups.

 

[Sailor_Jupiter]

Because more is expected of them.

 

[Mariposa Electrique]

Most people know that men commit suicide more than women. Some people are ignorant and assume that since depression and self harm are higher in women, then they must commit more suicide as well.

This trend is seen across the entire world across almost every culture.

Why are men more likely to commit suicide? Is it because in the majority of societies want men to repress their feelings? Is it because men are more efficient at it? What are the thoughts of kiwis?

Men are more likely to commit violent acts of suicide while women are more likely to commit reversible and non-violent acts of suicide. Men are more likely to shoot themselves in the mouth women take a pill...see the difference. Men that commit suicide actually want to kill themselves.

 

[Brandobaris]

Most men are taught not to show weakness in front of others since they're young. It has its merits but it also has it's obvious downfalls.

I'm interested in this theory. Because I don't believe that the "don't show weakness" behaviour is an entirely learned behaviour. Similar to the story about the Teacher that gave Candy to the children to share, first the girls, and then the boys.

The girls doled out the Candy to their "favored" boys in the class, while the rest of the boys got nothing, so about 20% of the boys ended up with almost half the Candy.

When the Boys had control of the Candy, they distributed it amongst all the girls, even the ones that weren't liked in class. So it seems at a young age, Boys tend to think in terms of whats best for the group as a whole, rather than what will benefit them personally.

 

[TsumTsum]

I legit just did a paper on suicide and women are 3 times as likely to attempt suicide while men are 4 times as likely to succeed. This is due to women opting into less messy suicide methods such as pills/slitting wrists to preserve their body and reduce percieved clean up stress for those that find them. While men just don't give a fuck and often shoot/hang themselves.

People tend to reach out more to women when they are suffering and not men because men are expected to "suck it up". In addition, in general women show more emotion than men so it's easier to spot the woman who is gonna pop off. People get scared of visibily upset men while feel sympathy for a visibly upset woman.

tl;dr female priviledge

 

[Mariposa Electrique]

I legit just did a paper on suicide and women are 3 times as likely to attempt suicide while men are 4 times as likely to succeed. This is due to women opting into less messy suicide methods such as pills/slitting wrists to preserve their body and reduce percieved clean up stress for those that find them. While men just don't give a fuck and often shoot/hang themselves.

People tend to reach out more to women when they are suffering and not men because men are expected to "suck it up". In addition, in general women show more emotion than men so it's easier to spot the woman who is gonna pop off. People get scared of visibily upset men while feel sympathy for a visibly upset woman.

tl;dr female priviledge

I think that the ratio of "suicide" is still the same between genders, but a lot of women tend try to commit suicide as a cry for help after feeling cornered.

 

[Beaniebon]

Men tend to be told to suck it up when they reach out for help. Depression and suicidal thoughts are seen as weak and unmanly. It's pretty fucked up honestly.

That and as others have said about how men and women go about suicide (pills vs shooting and shit).

 

[ICametoLurk]

That's only half true. Women attempt suicide more than men. Men commit suicide more than women.

I guess you can say that men have the balls to kill themselves.

 

[DNJACK]

women kill themselves less, so men have to kill more women than women kill men to compensate.

Killing is a man's job.

 

[Club Sandwich]

i've had to deal with 9 different suicides during my life so far. for the men involved, it was a long desperate struggle that they saw no other solution to. out reaches for help were either not attempted (to preserve some measure of pride) or completely ignored (by their friends and family because it was out of character or inappropriate for a man to ask for help with depression or anxiety or fear).

for the women, all of them had long bouts of depression and episodes of "mania" where they deeply regret their actions and their outreach was entertained for a while but eventually a combination of lack of access to resources (time/money to get therapy for example while working poor and full time) and lack of a social network to rely on (some gave into drugs and sex, others pushed away their friends by relying on them "too much") pushed them over the edge seemingly.

the outcomes of all nine were the same: self inflicted death. most of the men chose very violent methods nearly guaranteeing death (jumping off a bridge onto rocks, hanging by belt, hand grenade under the chin) while the women with one exception, chose more peaceful methods, usually painkillers and alcohol. one woman opted to kill her children and husband prior to killing herself.

most of the women tended to leave more of a "papertrail" with posts on facebook or myspace, a diary, a file on a computer, a letter sent to someone or left near the body. men all left no such thing and often their possessions were either sold off or given away.

i'm not fit to comment one way or the other, but in my small sample, it's a combination of factors and the lack for judgement-free trustworthy social support that left them with little other option in their mind of what could be done to end their suffering.

 

[Unseemly and Feral]

I'm sure this goes without saying but I think this is the most depressing thread here I've ever seen.
I personally think men resort to suicide more because it's so hard to ask for help. Saying to somebody "I'm not strong right now, I'm weak and I need somebody else to help me" are 16 words that contradict everything we strive to be and appear as in front of people. When I ended up dropping an algebra course in college about halfway through I couldn't even bring myself to admit I needed a tutor.

 

[waffle]

[QUOTE="ZeCommissar, post: 1910764, member: 10492" Is it because in the majority of societies want men to repress their feelings? Is it because men are more efficient at it? [/QUOTE]
Those are two of the big ones, but I think other important factors are that men are supposed to be providers and failure is not tolerated as a man.

 

[OGRE]

Def. lack of support. Same with domestic abuse hotlines focusing towards women.

That's only half true. Women attempt suicide more than men. Men commit suicide more than women.

Women may "attempt" "suicide" for attention purposes, men do it to kill themselves.

 

[Dumpsterfire]

Women seem to be easier to get into the ER for psych if they're suicidal, their admissions tend to be "voluntary" (meaning they said okay instead of fighting with the doctor to just let them die) A lot of men won't even go to to ER for psych unless they're dragged there by police. (saying that as someone who worked admissions for a hospital with an emergency psych ward)

Another thing is that there is a lot less stigma for women to be seeing a therapist and on antidepressants. A lot of women see it as normal and almost every female I know has been on an antidepressant at least once. Comparitively, I know very few men who have despite people and medical professionals telling them they should. There's a lot of unfair bullshit around men asking for or accepting any kind of help and it's killing people.

Another issue is medication compliance. Men don't seem to take their medication as regularly and sometimes just quit taking it because of that stigma I mentioned earlier. (also because men aren't used to daily medication taking like most women on birth control pills)


tl;dr men aren't as compliant with medical professionals and sometimes won't get help because people suck.

 

[ZeCommissar]

I'm sure this goes without saying but I think this is the most depressing thread here I've ever seen.

Oh man are you in for a treat!

 

[Damocles_Sword]

It's because men actually have to face reality. Men attempt suicide because because everything's been stripped from them, or they've been made to do some terrible shit, there's no support network, and are conditioned not to seek help even on the rare occasion when it's available, and even when a man does go in for psych help, the entire system is designed to treat women and so isn't very effective at treating men.

 

[ZeCommissar]

So if we revised the system, started trying to change society to where we say to younger boys "It's okay to seek help it's not un-manly", and change the pysch system to where it helps men.

Do you think the suicide rate would lower? Would it be substantial? IS there a way to help lower it?

 

[DNJACK]

you can just imagine you can change a culture like that. people trying to force young men to think its ok to seek help will divide men into pussies and hardcore men. guess how it will end...
yep,one part bullied people and another part people even more afraid to seek help.

 

[Bassomatic]

you can just imagine you can change a culture like that. people trying to force young men to think its ok to seek help will divide men into pussies and hardcore men. guess how it will end...
yep,one part bullied people and another part people even more afraid to seek help.

This is already happening, and I think another hold up we have is one of the many issues with our health care and mental health is issues you run into if you get help.

Sure it's illegal to fire people because of it, but it happens, I've seen it. Guy who was part of my old team at a very profitable well paying bank job (at a bank that anyone US based will know so no fly by night corp) got cut for no reason... around water cooler we all know his daughter had medical issues.

Start going to a shrink your employer will find out, again it's not legal but .... these things happen, and had I not seen it first hand I wouldn't buy it myself so, I don't at all get upset if someone feels my story was far fetched.

The other issue is if you are on the brink and get committed, lots of stuff haunts you. If I'm really upset and on the edge of a bridge and know stepping down I'll lose my career, guns, maybe vote etc... what's really saying step back down?

With out being sexist just a simple statistic, men have more important jobs over all, so the risk of loss of earnings is a lot more. I've never done the research, but there are some loop holes where those whom take their life can have people collect. This gets into a grey area, morally but if you take the saving lives is most important. Someone who's gonna lose the house ashamed and knows he can't provide, won't feel the urge to get a check out of his ending.