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Suicide “Etiquette”
By ochua1 | November 21, 2008
"CNN is not reporting the teenager’s name."
CNN has the right idea in their article on the 19-year-old who committed suicide live on Justin.tv on Wednesday.
I think voiceofsandiego.org says it best in their article on Coronado Bridge jumpers from May of this year:
Complaints from mental-health professionals about suicide coverage have "made reporters fairly skittish about covering this stuff," said Northwestern University journalism professor Loren Ghiglione, who’s writing a book about the reporting of suicide.
Reporters and editors are especially leery in the wake of studies that have suggested media coverage of high-profile suicides can create a "copycat effect," inspiring others to kill themselves even if they would otherwise not consider suicide. Simply mentioning a suicide victim’s name in print can encourage "those who are vulnerable to feel that they will be noticed in death," warns the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention.
(Emphasis mine.)
As you can see, I was rather shocked when the first sentence I read about the suicide on the NewTeeVee blog contained the victim’s name. This is not how we should be treating suicides.
I was getting ready to reinforce the stereotype that bloggers aren’t "real" journalists because I’ve known about this "unwritten rule" that the mainstream media has had for some time now. But then I saw the Associated Press (AP) article on him where he’s mentioned by name!
Sheesh!
To be fair, though, it happened in front of a lot of people and there’s no way his name was going to stay a secret. It’s a testament to how connected we are. I just hope everyone will do the right thing next time.
Topics: Commentary |
