This morning I posted a little thingy about a report that army suicide rates have gone up. One comment to that said it was at the suicide rate of the rest of the population, so it's just a stupid press thing - with the press giving no honest context.
I don't think so.
People get to where they kill themselves for lots of reasons. Lonely old people are at high risk. Drug addicts are at high risk. Gay teens in Republican homes, and people who are just clinically chronically "sad" are at a higher risk. People who are financially ruined sometimes kill themselves. People who get chronic diseases and have no health care sometimes kill themselves.
I don't think the army is taking people who are otherwise the type of people who kill themselves. To say the army suicide rate is the same as everybody else is really scary - it suggests then that they're taking on people who are unsound to being with - that they are taking in a regular sampling of the mental health problems of the population.
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Comments: 18
If the military is already "weeding" out people with unstable mental histories, one can only assume that the crushing weight of being in this war is driving otherwise sane soldiers to their own, personal breaking point. And that frightens me.
I've been battling depression, anxiety, and suicidal tendancies for over 20 years. I know how difficult it can be to diagnose. My brother-in-law and my nephew are both bi-polar. My brother-in-law was in the Navy when his symptoms started to manifest, which is why he was asked to NOT re-enlist in 1995. My nephew was diagnosed at age 10.
As for me, I'm a successful business owner, college graduate, and mother to 4 incredibly special daughters.
Please don't patronize me. I know how it works.
You make a very good point about the army. They do conduct psychological tests of all recruits before they are admitted into the armed services. It is despicable that the suicide rate should mirror the rest of society.
Depression is a serious illness and should not be taken lightly by anyone.
Army= small number of people
population= any one.
If you have 10 people in one group and 1000000 in another, and the prevalence rate for suicide are the same. . . something is going awack with the smaller number, because statistically they should have a lesser amount.
ehoh I'm sounding like my stats professor 0_o