Inside Tumblr’s teen suicide epidemic

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2015/02/24/inside-tumblrs-teen-suicide-epidemic/

by Libertatea • 11 years ago

42 63 11 years ago

briandoll• 11 years ago

Maybe focus on addressing critical societal issues instead of blaming a blog platform? This narrative is insane.

When there is a mass shooting and the media covers it extensively and gratuitously they significantly increase the chance of additional shootings in the following weeks.

When someone commits suicide and it gets a lot of attention there is an increase in suicides in the following weeks.

That's worth talking about.

joshstrange6• 11 years ago

Ok, so if mainstream news still hasn't figured out how to handle this why do we expect Tumblr to be on top of it? Mainstream news sets a TERRIBLE example of how to handle tragedies like this. I agree with briandoll, let's stop blaming Tumblr for doing nothing wrong (They aren't using this in marketing or as a way to get more users/eyeballs) and focus on the flaws in society that lead to these kids taking their lives.

When the news covers shoots (or stories like this) they ARE trying to attract more viewer, it's a very different thing IMHO to just leaving up posts and allowing users to share. I see Tumblr taking down posts extremely disrespectful to the deceased. Let's not pretend a blogging platform is to blame, instead let's blame the real people at fault: the parents and the communities that drove these kids to what they saw as their only option.

anigbrowl4• 11 years ago

Suicide contagion is a known phenomenon, and mentioned in the article. Is it rational? No, but neither are suicidal people. Teens are at particular risk because of unfamiliar hormonal loading.

It's not the sort of problem where you can easily engineer away the underlying causes so it makes sense to deal with the social manifestations. some social causes can be engineered away, but in many respects suicide is a radical political act that's at odds with deeply ingrained societal ideology (eg the extremely attenuated legal rights of juveniles in the US) which are a) not amenable to short-term change, and b) not so simply causal that change will automatically lower suicide rates.

rhino369• 11 years ago

The blog platform is part of society and it is very much a part of their sub-society. Suicide contagion is a real phenomenon and Tumblr societies seem to be glorifying it.

This might just be my privilege leaking, but I also wonder if spending so much time documenting and discussing injustice depresses people and makes them feel hopeless. There is a very strong contingent on Tumblr that exists to find something to be outraged about every single day.

I don't mean we should whitewash discrimination and injustice, but I seriously doubt wallowing in it helps.

fragsworth• 11 years ago

What is it about Tumblr that makes it so appealing to radical subcultures? And what is it that makes those subcultures thrive so well in that community?

wldcordeiro2• 11 years ago

Pseudonymity is a big one and the relative lack of censoring (aside from self-censoring to fit into the prevalent group-think.)

mrec• 11 years ago

Pseudonymity cuts both ways in this context. You couldn't have something like Reddit's /r/suicidewatch without it.

timdaub2• 11 years ago

Disclaimer: Only my gf uses tumblr, I don't.

I think it's the bubble-ish environment that gets created not only by your followership but also by the fact that tumblr blogs rarely get feedback from outside.

Once you've build a sufficient followership around you, every thought you express in that bubble gets some how discussed, accepted and developed.

That's why for once tumblr blogs react so harsh to bubble-out-side topics (/r/shittumblrsays) and secondly why I believe it is such a good place for discussion of "radical subcultures".

monksy• 11 years ago

I was just about to mention the whole filter bubble deal. Reddit on the other hand will subject your posts to criticisms and possible trolls. Radicals tend not to like people disagreeing with them.

ohkine4• 11 years ago

Being trans is not a 'radical subculture'

igorgue2• 11 years ago

I think he's referring to "people who commit suicide virally" not just Transgenders.

adamnemecek• 11 years ago

killing yourself is a pretty radical solution though.

timdaub2• 11 years ago

I think he never intended to say that, still his statement right. Tumblr as well as like reddit are good discussion platforms for subcultures.

reubenmorais• 11 years ago

I don't know how it came to be this way, but what happens today is that Tumblr (or a good chunk of it) has a very strong culture of acceptance of everyone and everything, and of rallying to shut down people who try to disturb that safe haven. This applies to all sorts of things, from gender issues to things like self-harm and eating disorders like the article mentions. It's one of the very few places on the Internet where someone who identifies with _any_ radical subculture can expect to be accepted instead of ridiculed.

mintplant• 11 years ago

Off the top of my head,

* Users can self-organize into hashtags, which are easier to navigate and more cohesive than on Twitter.

* Custom blog designs make it feel more personal / intimate, à la LiveJournal or MySpace.

* Reblogs let content spread quickly. Unlike Twitter, there's more flexibility with what and how long this content is. And unlike retweets, reblogging users can add their own opinions / perspectives to what they share.

* Notes, likes, reblogs, followers... provide a metric for the validation of one's opinions.

* The dashboard and blocking system, plus tools like Missing E, let you narrow down the content you want to see and filter out what you don't.

* Emphasis on images / highly visual content which can quickly disseminate social messages and encourages the liking / sharing reaction -- similar to how image macros or videos can easily go "viral".

* No real name policy, and you can easily change your name / switch your blog URL if need be.

* Strong traction in the various fandom communities, which are subcultures in and of themselves and tend to be more receptive to "radical" ideas, as you put it.

Disclaimer: I'm not a Tumblr user; just interested in how internet communities work.

pconner• 11 years ago

It's also worth noting that misinformation can spread very quickly. It takes no effort to click "reblog" and then forget about a post forever. On other platforms with this weakness (such as Reddit), there is incentive to discredit incorrect information (you get a lot of comment karma if you do this on Reddit), but there is little incentive to do so on tumblr. Any commentary on a post is not inherently tied to future reblogs of the post, and users can edit the content of reblogs to make it look like that content was written by the post's original author.

striking2• 11 years ago

Additionally: you don't have to read what people say about you. You can turn off notifications for reblogs (yes, reblogs are the only way to comment on something) and in fact, commenting on something that you disagree with will make it still louder. A reblog causes the number of Notes to increase even if you disagree with the content. So there's no good way to express your disapproval of something.

Tumblr is mathematically biased to prevent feedback from the outside. People who use it rarely change their opinions because of this.

pnathan• 11 years ago

The medium is the message, and that is something to consider at length here.

intortus3• 11 years ago

Calling these cultures "radical subcultures" is dismissive. What you're seeing is a more complete expression of humanity. Past media have generally filtered out much of the diversity and angst inherent in human lives, and that tradition has been carried forward to varying degrees by many social media networks.

Suicide is everywhere. Trans people are everywhere. Minorities are everywhere. Tumblr just isn't sweeping it under the rug as much as some other sites.

anigbrowl4• 11 years ago

How is it dismissive? 'Radical subculture' just seems descriptive to me. 'Radical' is synonymous with fundamental, and gender identity definitely seems fundamental to peoples' subjective identity. 'Subculture' just indicates a distinct subset of a larger culture.

The fact that subcultures can be voluntary, whimsical, or ephemeral doesn't mean they have to be, and I certainly don't assume any lack of seriousness or significance to the notion that someone is a member of this or that subculture.

Crito3• 11 years ago

What isn't everywhere is making fan-art of suicide victims. I think it is fair to assert that there is a distinct subculture here.

Furthermore, I reject the idea that identifying a subculture means that you are dismissing that subculture.

angersock2• 11 years ago

Trans people are everywhere.

[citation needed]

EDIT:

Reason I ask is that, when fighting for the cause of minority groups, it doesn't help to make claims that are easily shown to be false--it hurts your credibility, and by association, theirs.

The "x are everywhere" is what, for example, brought us the Iraq War and the TSA and all the rest...just good marketing whipping people up into a frenzy.

EDIT2:

Fine, for the downvoters, here's some citations (because apparently that's too much to ask):

Various studies show a rate of between 0.1-0.5% of people identifying as trans ( http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/why-we-dont-know-the-siz... ).

A 2011 study by the UCLA Williams Institute found there to be around 700,000 trans people ( http://williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu/research/census-lgbt-d... ).

mullingitover• 11 years ago

When you have a publishing platform that's wide open and unmoderated, two things always dominate: activism and porn.

Torgo2• 11 years ago

The site is a first-class citizen on mobile, mobile is a primary platform for many less-privileged classes. Same with Twitter.

DanBC2• 11 years ago

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachm...

The national suicide prevention strategy has recognised social media as something to be aware of. This concern is reflected in some local strategies - it's possibly going to be in Gloucestershire's suicide prevention strategy.

People worked hard to get media outlets to develop guidelines that balance freedom of speech with reducing harm. The national union of journalists has pretty good guidelines.

https://www.nuj.org.uk/news/guidelines-on-reporting-on-menta...

Perhaps the social media industry could set up some meta group to draw up guidelines around social responsibility? Many sites have rules that ban pro-anorexia information.

joshstrange6• 11 years ago

Is there a similar document for US-news (Covering responsible reporting for situations like this)?

ZoFreX• 11 years ago

Is three teens in two months really an epidemic? If these notes were passed around on paper, would they be blaming paper?

I think all the effort of this misguided article would be much better spent tackling transphobia rather than advocating we curtail free speech.

Crito3• 11 years ago

You are right in a way. Three teens from one highschool would probably make the local news (it did at my highschool, though there wasn't much going on in that town to report on), but not much more.

There is more going on than just three dead teens though. There is also the entire social movement surrounding these three people. Seemingly thousands of people talking about those three deaths. That is much more notable.

blueflow2• 11 years ago

The generic problem on Tumblr still exists. Like those posts about romanticizing her suicide. Hate & Shame posts are still happen regularly, and people seeing gender issues in everything is something why people outside tumblr make fun of it.

Its not only about transphobia, its about how youngsters use tumblr.

Torgo2• 11 years ago

Caitlin Dewey's articles tend to be provocative and simplistic. It is worth doing independent checking before assuming this article is on to anything.

krick• 11 years ago

Anything can be epidemic to journalist, when he doesn't know what else to write about.

psychometry• 11 years ago

Is there really an epidemic? Are there any stats on this?

stevenmays• 11 years ago

Shouldn't this have a trigger warning on it?

In all seriousness, many communities on Tumblr exist to find stuff on the internet to get outraged about. "The constantly outraged are locked in a desperate struggle to find meaning in things that do not impact their lives."

Tumblr communities also seems to idolize victimhood. Nothing demonstrates your level of victimhood quite like suicide. So, if you take generally marginalized groups (body size, sexuality, etc), run around searching for things to get angry about, and celebrate their status as societies scapegoats and victims it does not surprise me that Tumblr would have high suicide rates.

auganov• 11 years ago

Tumblr is mostly about nice looking pictures. Architecture, food, fashion etc. People don't really talk or socialize on there too much. I feel like it's just by correlation that tumblr users might be more likely to have or express issues. It seems like "blogging" platforms always had that demographic. Most people would just use them as digital diaries. So unsuprisingly you'd find diaries of depressed people. Because, well, some people just are. Tumblr is just the latest, most mainstream iteration of the phenomenon.

otakucode• 11 years ago

If you wish to prevent teen suicide, your task really isn't as difficult as you might think. You might be totally unwilling to do it, though.

How about making it so teens lives don't suck ass? How about helping them instead of actively trying to hurt them with good intentions? It's not like adolescence is some new thing that just popped up, but society has gotten progressively worse at dealing with it for a long time. We know that in cultures that empower adolescents and expect them to join the adult world, there is no such creature as the 'angsty teen'. We create that creature when we insist on treating them like children simply because we don't know what else to do with them with our current social structure - a structure derived from the needs of factory owners around the beginning of the Industrial Revolution and little-changed since.

Do you want to stop teen suicide if it means respecting them as human beings? What if you have to let them make the decisions that control their lives instead of you? Are you willing to admit that you have talked about adolescents the way racists used to talk about minorities, and the way men used to talk about women? Are you ready to admit that you've wronged a part of humanity, even though you had to pass through that class yourself? What you want and what needs to be done to accomplish it are not always things you can live with. Demanding that you should be able to have your desires met without having to pay the price is very immature. If you want teen suicide to go away but you still get to rob them of their autonomy and denigrate them, you are doing exactly this.

anigbrowl4• 11 years ago

We know that in cultures that empower adolescents and expect them to join the adult world, there is no such creature as the 'angsty teen'.

This sort of argument is best backed up with examples of what you have in mind.

bhayden• 11 years ago

This issue with letting a teen do whatever he or she wants is that a parent is legally responsible for them. If my teenager son destroys thousands of dollars worth of property, guess who pays for it? There needs to be a some level of control over teenagers, and the level needs to be less than that given to an adult.

james-bronze• 11 years ago

As some who is in the thick of the "social justice" part of tumblr, or whatever you want to call it, I thought I'd put my two cents in. I actually saw this article on Tumblr, I follow the Hacker News bot. This article was ignorant, jumped to conclusions, and not very well informed in general. It quoted a bunch of "experts" who didn't seam to understand what tumblr is. They think that by talking about Leehla and Zander we are glorifying them, and therefor suicide, as appose to remembering them for who they wanted to be, and trying to make a safe and excepting environment for trans* kids.

I guess I'm just tired of adults reading one or two things and thinking they know better simply because of seniority. The reporter, the white, middle aged Caitlin Dewey, has a reputation for being facile and provocative. She's probably never been on Tumblr. They expert's she quotes, while educated, are still probably out of their depth. While some glorifying type blogs do exist (you can't generalize tumblr; there are more than 221 million blogs) the majority of blogs about mental illness, feminism, minority rights, etc, are based on trying to educate people and provide them with resources and a safe, understanding place. How about adults stop pointing fingers at the big scary internet and put time and effort into, I don't know, making safe spaces for teens so they aren't suicidal in the first place? That's what people on tumblr are trying to do when they "martyrize" Leehla Alcorn. They're putting a face on their movement. Not a movement to glorify suicide. A movement to outlaw trans* conversion therapy, and get proper sex ed in schools. A movement to try and stop teen's lives from being a living hell, a movement to stop teens from being pushed to suicide. A movement that many adults can't seem to be bothered with--but oh no! The teenagers are obviously trying to get each other to kill themselves because it's "cool".

Inside Tumblr’s teen suicide epidemic

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