Why Death by suicide is a challenge ........

Directions: In this section, you have a few short passages. After each passage, you will find some items based on the passage. First, read a passage and answer the items based on it. You are required to select your answers based on the contents of the passage and the opinion of the author only.

It is not surprising that the unfortunate death by suicide of a young actor has stirred the nation, and with good reason. Sadly, the haranguing of disconcerted individuals on television and ugly exchanges on social media have evoked strong reactions in some of us who live and work with persons with experiences of distress and mental ill-health. If foul play was indeed the reason behind the death of Sushant Singh Rajput, then justice must be served. However, the manner in which we see events unravel today are unsavoury and detrimental to many. Flippant associations between weakness and depression, erraticism and bipolar disorder are shame-inducing and counterproductive to the larger narrative of seeking help, ensuring justice and promoting social cohesion and wellbeing. More so, when these opinions are emphatically asserted by ‘celebrities’. What lies beneath? Death by suicide is a public health challenge, a cause for social concern and a philosophical question. It is tethered, amongst other talking points, to existentialism, meaning-making and sociality, and is a cause of moral and social panic. The sociologist Emile Durkheim attributed ‘anomie’, or feelings of alienation and social isolation, to a breakdown in social equilibrium, which he theorised increased the propensity for one to die by suicide. Thomas Joiner’s framework that places the experience of thwarted belongingness, perceived burdensomeness combined with an “acquired capability” to self-harm, owing to a range of factors that include childhood trauma, resonates with us.

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