Websites That Kill?
from the calm-down... dept
While it is very sad that a young man killed himself recently, the fact that the coroner is blaming the internet for the guy's death is pretty pointless. Apparently, the guy had visited a page that described methods for committing suicide, and proceeded to use one of them (he hung himself). It's easy, therefore, to blame the website for this -- but that makes the somewhat ridiculous assumption that if this website didn't exist, the guy never would have found another such website, a different source entirely, or simply figured out how to kill himself on his own. It's not the website that was the problem, and getting rid of it wouldn't have changed anything. This was, obviously, a very troubled individual, and focusing on the website as the cause of his suicide means that less attention will be paid towards looking at the root causes of depression and what makes people want to kill themselves.Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
Suicide and the modern man.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Suicide and the modern man.
In fact, I don't think ANYONE ever died, committed suicide, stole music, built bombs, saw naked people or even HAD sex prior to 1992 or so.
We MUST shut down the internet!!! We MUCH
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Even worse
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
The rope is for ...
The Coroner told the court: "It is the height of irresponsibility to publish a site which could encourage someone to be tipped over the edge. The internet is there to educate and improve life, not destroy it."
Now, let's rewrite this paragraph to ban OTHER THINGS:
The Coroner told the court: "It is the height of irresponsibility to grow a tree which could then be turned into a door, from which you can attach a hook and then rope, allowing someone to be tipped over the edge. Doors there to be opened and closed and improve life, not destroy it."
The internet seems especially useful in determining which coroners can't think further than the nose on their face.
Let's shut down the libraries, and ban the printed word while we're at it.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
something else to ban
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
idiots these days
[ link to this | view in chronology ]