On The Internet’s Desensitization To Suicide
A little bit of backstory here: I’m autistic. I’ve been on the internet since age 3, and quickly (for a toddler) grew my technological skills, able to circumvent all parental controls my family tried to put on to protect me. I struggle with severe health issues and, as a result, the internet has been my main social sphere since then, because I’m unable to really leave the house due to my disabilities. I’ve been on SSDI since 2022, I’ve dropped out of school 3 times. I really only have the internet, and that doesn’t seem to be changing any time soon.
I grew up on the internet, so I’ve seen a lot. The internet certainly has never been a nice place overall, because it is very easy to hide your identity online and there are very little direct consequences, in most cases, for cyberbullying. The internet has always given people an odd audacity that most would never have in real life circumstances. But I don’t remember it always being this bad. I don’t know, I could be wrong or remembering it differently due to my youth at the time… but as far as I can recall, back ten or so years ago, “kill yourself” was an abhorrent thing to say, even to the bad people.
I’ve attempted twice, been hospitalized for ideation 4 times, and prepared to commit suicide without going through with the attempt.. let’s see.. 9 times. I’ve lost family members to suicide. I firmly believe that no one should be told to commit suicide—there are bad people in this world, but I feel like we can say other things to them, things that don’t make light of a horrible tragedy. It isn’t hurting the person you're targeting, but it might hurt the suicidal person reading it who sees it as a sign, or the person who recently lost someone to suicide and can’t bear the topic, or the person in recovery who is trying so hard not to slip back into those thoughts. It’s just not a kind thing to say at all.
I’ve been told this stance makes me “an apologist”, “too soft”, “problematic”, whatever. The suicide baiting common on social media in the 2020s is part of why I began to develop a presence in the small web; as someone who is never not suicidal, it is not an attitude I want in my sphere. I’ve been dealing with treatment resistant depression for 19 years and I’m only 23. Why am I expected to swallow my discomfort and traumas around the topic of suicide just because you want to dunk on someone you perceive to be a “freak” on the internet? I think we need to treat people with more sympathy.
“It’s easy to forget there’s a human behind the screen” gets said a lot, and it’s not a line I personally can relate to anymore. I absolutely can recognize the humanity of those around me, even those I am in opposition to. In fact, I am of the belief that dehumanizing bigots is harmful in the sense that when we make bigots other than human, we perceive them as Unlike Us and, therefore, we could never be Like That, thus leading to an inability to self-criticize when we do end up having harmful beliefs/actions. This belief does not mean that I support or desire to defend bigots; me being against suicide baiting has nothing to do with their feelings, and everything to do with how low of a blow it is. There are many other, more mature ways to fight bigotry.
I do understand the feeling. I do understand that some people are too terrible for the world, and have no intention of changing. However, the majority of “kill yourself”s I see are not being directed towards those people, but rather being flung around during disagreements over, say, someone liking a villainous fictional character or having an unpopular opinion on a television show. I also think it is mainly children and very young adults doing this, so I do have some grace with those individuals, but honestly…. if you’re over the age of 20 and telling people to commit suicide over internet disagreements, I’m going to assume that you lack any and all emotional maturity and conclude that I shouldn’t take you seriously as a person. If you cannot take one of the most tragic topics possible seriously, I do not think you should be taken seriously by anyone.
When I hear “kill yourself lol” I think of my cousin who never recovered from her mother’s death, traumatized to this day. I think of the time I saw my grandfather cry after my first attempt, telling me he’d be lost if I died, my mother telling me she couldn’t live without me. Is this dramatic? Maybe, but I’d rather be “overly dramatic” and “too sensitive” than be the kind of person who makes light of a trauma that haunts so many people across the world.