WEB REVIEW

Suicide

Survivors of Bereavement by Suicide (SOBS)

http://www.uk-sobs.org.uk/

Suicide Grief

http://www.suicidegrief.com/

Suicide Prevention Help

http://www.suicidepreventionhelp.com/

Suicide Forum

http://www.suicideforum.com

Assisted Suicide

http://www.assistedsuicide.org/

alt.suicide.bus.stop/ alt.suicide.holiday/ alt.suicide.methods

http://ashbusstop.org/home.html

This is a topic which has been at the forefront of the news recently due to the spate of

suicides in Bridgend and there have also been reports from Japan about fears of a suicide

epidemic among professionals in their thirties1. In America, a current test case involving the

suicide of a teenage girl as a result of cyber-bullying is making headlines. Testimony to the

power of the internet, very soon after it happened, the personal details of the alleged

perpetrator were flying around the world via all kinds of chat rooms and forums.

It follows that, just as with other emotional and contentious topics, there will be many

pages on the internet devoted to suicide. During the searches I performed, I found sites

which fell into three loose categories: support sites for the bereaved, support sites for those

with suicidal feelings, and finally, forums and pages which could be identified as ‘‘pro-

suicide’’. The following is a cross-section of websites from all categories.

Bereavement by suicide is confusing and complex for the people left behind. As well as the

grief, survivors are often left with unanswerable questions: why did they do it, what could I

have done? Two sites which deal specifically with this question are Survivors of Bereavement

by Suicide (SOBS), a UK-based website and Suicide Grief from the US, both of which offer

help and support in different ways.

SOBS is a self-help organization dedicated to offering support and information for the

bereaved via online and print media as well as support groups. They also work to raise public

Journal of Mental Health,

April 2009; 18(2): 188–191

ISSN 0963-8237 print/ISSN 1360-0567 online � Shadowfax Publishing and Informa Healthcare USA, Inc.

DOI: 10.1080/09638230802370696

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awareness about the issue of suicide. The website is divided into several sections, audio-

visual materials which include a video and radio interview, book reviews, help and support

for different people and who exactly they have lost, whether parents, children or siblings.

There are general information leaflets, selections of poetry and prose from survivors and a

newsletter section which contains links to each of the issues. There are also testimonies from

those who have survived the loss of a relative, and a final section which contains links to

other useful websites. The organization also offers a helpline which is staffed from 9 am until

9 pm every day as well as email support, one-day conferences and group sessions. The site

itself is organized simply but effectively, and all the information, from leaflets to testimonies,

is available as freely downloadable word documents. There is no direct interactivity, but it is

actively encouraging of anybody who has been bereaved by suicide to get in touch for

support and advice.

By contrast, Suicide Grief offers more informal support through a series of message boards.

Set up in 2002, its stated aim is to ‘‘provide information and support to anyone whose life

has been touched by suicide’’, but it is not a crisis organization per se. What it does offer is a

more informal, interactive kind of support by using online forums to bring people together

who are experiencing similar things. This forum is very detailed with specific boards for all

the kinds of issues one might expect in this area. There are separate sections for

remembering teenagers, for remembering sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, partners

and parents. There is a board for the newly bereaved, advice on coping, a space where

people can vent their anger or grief and a special section for those affected by ‘‘murder-

suicides’’. Parts of the boards are also set aside for information on prevention and

awareness, and for users to post any research or educational articles they find. The forums

are well-populated with the majority of last posts having been made within the last week. It is

perhaps a more unofficial way of seeking support but one which makes it easy to

communicate with other people who can help based on their own experiences.

The same is true of sites set up specifically for the support of those suffering with suicidal

feelings. Suicide Prevention was set up by Kenneth Hemmerick in 2006 as a gateway to all

sorts of resources and information on suicide and suicide prevention. There are a large

number of web resources collated under various headings such as Statistics, Personal

Testimonies, Depression, Mental Health and At Risk Groups to name a few, and these will

be enormously useful for anyone searching for answers about their condition and daunted

by the volume of information available online. The site owner also provide a link to his blog

with contains site updates, current information on suicide prevention and control and which

pages are most in use.

As well as this site, I also came across the Suicide Forum which offers interactive support

for people with suicidal feelings. The forum covers all sorts of issues from surviving suicide

attempts to domestic trauma, sexual and physical abuse, substance abuse disorders and

eating disorders. The majority of the boards are for members only which increases the sense

of protection these forums can lend their users. There are other parts of the forums for book

reviews, health and fitness and general chat which are available to view without registering

and overall this forum seems to have been set up with great care; the more sensitive boards

clearly labelled where the content may have a triggering effect upon users.

Kenneth Hemmerick states that he began his work in suicide prevention after coming

across ‘‘pro-suicide’’ sites which actively encourage users to pursue their ‘‘right to die’’ and

often will give them the tools and advice needed to carry this out. At the current time, there

are a collection of well known websites which are specifically concerned with the right to

commit suicide without being terminally ill. alt.suicide.bus.stop (ASBS) is an actual website

which is an offshoot of the news groups alt.suicide.holiday (ASH) and alt.suicide.methods

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(ASM). ASH in particular has already been blamed for several deaths, among them the

suicide of Suzy Gonzales in 2003 which made headline news.2 The front page of

alt.suicide.bus.stop (seemingly named for the cross-group euphemism for suicide – ‘‘catching

the bus’’) contains information about the group, the history between the user groups and

provides links to FAQs which describe in detail the ethos of the groups.

The ASH group was originally formed in 1989 to discuss the rise in suicides during the

holiday season, but from this beginning a pro-suicide subculture developed. From the

FAQ section, they make clear that they do not exist to persuade people to take their own

lives, but, believing in the ‘‘right to suicide’’ they will not attempt to dissuade them either.

In their own terms, they are not pro-suicide but pro-choice.3 The FAQs also make it clear

that they strongly discourage posts which unequivocally urge users to end their life and

deliberately egg them on: repeat offenders are carefully monitored to avoid online

predators trawling the message boards for victims. The front page of ASBS also contains a

link to the forum which unreachable to any unregistered user, and some background

information on suicide in general, legal issues, the history of suicide and religious

implications. There is also a ‘How to’ section which contains information on posting, and

potential dangers involved, a very detailed essay on how to make the decision to commit

suicide and what to take into account, advice on exploring life as an alternate choice to

suicide, tying up loose ends (deleting computer accounts, paying bills etc), leaving notes,

including how to create time-delayed emails. The section entitled ‘‘Methods’’ contains a

discussion about the morality of hosting easily accessible suicide methods, and also a link

to the Lethality-Time-Agony method calculator which looks at the timing, efficacy and

pain factors of most methods of suicide.

The posts on ASH and ASM are archived by Google and so relatively easy to locate.

A look through several pages of postings on each forum reveals that for the most part,

these groups appear to be a forum where people talk about their suicidal feelings, and

receive attention and support from other users in similar situations. The darker side to

this is seeing users post about their intentions to commit suicide and discussing in details

the methods they have chosen. On ASM, there are detailed discussions about dosages

and equipment and several times posters were warned not to display details of their

chosen suicide date in case of ‘‘do-gooders’’ patrolling the groups. Of most concern was

what could be termed the ‘‘triggering’’ content of messages and how easy it is to access

information about suicide methods: ASM is entirely devoted to sharing supplier

information and providing advice about dosage, preparation, where to go to get drugs

and other equipment and many other practical tips. It is certainly true, from looking at

internet archives, that Suzy Gonzales was able to organize her own death using advice

lifted directly from the user groups.

It is very easy to make assumptions about these sites and the problems they can cause,

and certainly I came across some disturbing material during my searches. However, as

with the pro-eating disorder sites, there is also a real sense that users find the support and

acceptance which they have been unable to find elsewhere, which is just as difficult to

ignore as the more shocking content of the groups. For every warning about ‘‘do-

gooders’’, I also found posts encouraging desperate users to try and seek help before

turning to suicide, advice which I had not expected to see in that environment. The issue

with these sites seems to be a little greyer than one might assume; they appear to cause

damage and offer help in equal measure.

The above websites are a small sample of what is available on the internet from both ends

of the spectrum: formal organizations and charities to unofficial advice pages and forums

covering a variety of issues. The rapid growth of the Internet means that there is a wealth of

190 Web Review

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information available which is easily accessible for anyone seeking help, advice and support,

whether they are experiencing suicidal feelings or whether they themselves have been

bereaved by suicide. The other side of the coin, of course is that the ‘‘pro-choice’’

subculture, although not as immediately visible, is just as easy to locate.

Notes

1. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article4170649.ece

2. http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f¼/c/a/2003/06/08/MN114902.DTL

3. http://ashbusstop.org/intro.html

SONYA LIPCZYNSKA

Institute of Psychiatry, Library,

De Crespigny Park, London, UK

Sonia.Lipczynska@iop.kcl.ac.uk

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