Discussion How suicide is misrepresented in the media (SPOILERS - Al-Rawabi Girls School S2)

[qualityOV3Rquantity]

Season 2 of the Jordanian TV show Al-Rawabi School for Girls concludes with one of the characters committing suicide after being bullied and humiliated in front of the rest of the girls at the school. While I understand the writers of the show were trying to push a good message (don't bully people, you don't know what other people have going on in their heads, etc.) this final scene portrays the character's suicide in a highly inaccurate way.

After being humiliated in front of her classmates, Farah leaves the room and goes to the bathroom alone. Another girl, Hiba (one of the bullies) follows her a few minutes later, perhaps wanting to apologize for her cruelty, but sees Farah laying dead on the floor, her wrists cut.

Essentially, what the director wants us to believe is that Farah manages to kill herself by cutting her wrists and arms - not just being in critical condition from blood loss, but actually dead - within the 5-10 minutes before Hiba found her.

This is also confusing because Farah is never shown prior to have any blades or razors for self-harm, nor is self-harm referenced. Her suicide seems to be impulsive, so where would she get a sharp tool? And it goes without saying that cutting one's wrists is incredibly unlikely to result in death, and even if it does, certainly not within minutes.

It would all make much more sense if Farah hanged herself, which is something she could actually realistically do in a school bathroom. But I'm guessing that the writers of the show simply didn't want to portray this, because it may give impressionable depressed viewers (most of whom I think are young women) ideas about a more effective means of suicide.

I don't know what point I'm making here, I just want to talk about this lol

 

[jexixa]

i too agree that ways to ctb that would be effective are often times not shown in media.

one time i saw this magical girl manga called "suicide girl" that i found to be really surprising

ill just mention the part that surprised me, in which the main char was trying to ctb and to my surprise she was actually utilizing a partial hanging method, which i don't see often in media likely because of its effectiveness. she even mentioned the whole "losing consciousness by squeezing her carotid arteries" in the manga when the method failed for story reasons (she was cursed to not die and fight monsters)

it was refreshing to see.

 

[ScaredOfMachines]

Honestly, I think that writers just don't do research, or just focus on the drama. Almost every suicide I see on TV or a videogame is someone taking pills or slitting their wrists. I feel like they want to focus more on the spectacle of it, somebody slitting their wrists and sending blood flying everywhere or forcing themselves to choke down a bunch of pills is much more dramatic than them peacefully dying by partial hanging. It's something I've been using to judge whether something is a good-faith representation of the suicidal or just something used to boost ratings recently.

 

[ijustwishtodie]

That isn't surprising at all. After all, the actual suicidal people in this world aren't allowed to talk about their suicide experiences without any restrictions or pressures to say that they regret the attempt since saying that they wish they could attempt again would probably detach them. I think that censoring suicidal people from saying their true feelings is what contributes to people thinking that suicide is as easy and as simple as cutting oneself or overdosing. I think that this might also be why you tend to have idiots that say that suicide methods are easy and accessible and that anybody who doesn't attempt these methods secretly want to live. It sucks at how media like this only reinforces this cycle of people seeing media, thinking that suicide is easy, people making more media reflecting that view and so forth

 

[Forever Sleep]

I've seen this a lot. Making suicide appear easily accessible and easy to succeed in. More commonly, I've seen programes (mostly TV,) where the person just grabs a handful of pills. Like they're likely to have anything that lethal hanging around. Like they took antiemetics before. Like it worked in a few minutes.

It's actually so irresponsible really. Both cutting and OD's are notoriously unreliable or maybe like you say- they are perfectly ok with people following the example but just maiming themselves.

 

[EvisceratedJester]

Oh, I remember that. Yeah, a lot of writers don't bother to do any research before writing suicide scenes. They generally care more about aesthetics and shock value over accuracy.

Slightly unrelated, but I found season 2 to not be anywhere near as good as the first season. I wish we got to follow the characters from the first season and explore how they were all coping with Layan's death instead of whatever the hell was going on in season 2. I don't hate season 2, I just think that it pales in comparison to the first season.