Whenever I imagined the aftermath of my own suicide, I always pictured people (including my family) just shrugging their shoulders and moving on. Maybe that’s why I never went through with it.

There it is. Something like that; a moment not unlike hearing a clatter outside, going to see that the dog has tipped over his food dish, then going back to whatever you were doing.

To me, the big-picture questions Jim is asking aren’t so much trying to chastise Lady Gaga as they are challenging all of us to reflect on our public responses to youth suicide may or may not be helping vulnerable surviving youth. He was just as hard on himself and past coverage at BTB as Gaga.

Let me take a stab at re-framing this a bit.

The loss of a single young person who was struggling with bullying is heartwrenching, a stab to the gut. It’s only humane to mourn, to feel desperate to do something meaningful and immediate. Everyone, from online writers, to non-profit groups, to celebrities, to health care providers, feels the urge to do something which will (a) mourn the loss, and (b) help to prevent the next suicide.

The first — mourning — is always an intimate, personal act. Every person is justified in feeling their own pain, following their own path.

But, what if credible evidence was available that some forms of public mourning by the writers, celebrities, and others had could actually increase the probability of the next suicide, and other forms of public mourning could help prevent it? Wouldn’t that be worth talking about? Everybody can still make their own decisions about how to mourn publicly, but can do so mindfully of likely impacts.

In the case of a celebrity, the public mourning could omit the name, and reach out: I lost a fan today, and I refuse to accept that this is OK. I want all of you to stay with me. If you are struggling, I am struggling with you. If you are hurting, I am hurting, too. Call the Trevor Project. Talk to somebody. Do whatever you have to, but stay with me. It could be an appeal for donations to the Trevor Project, or for fans to check in with vulnerable loved ones to say, how can I help and you matter to me.

There are countless, very individual ways that all of us could frame our public messages to encourage prevention, and some simple guidelines for avoiding the opposite. I’m not trying to censor anyone, but I trust that people who care as deeply as Gaga want to know the difference between what helps and what hurts.

I see your point, but on the other hand I don’t think its appropriate to tell anyone how to mourn. You can’t blame Lady Gaga for doing it her own way anymore than you’d tell a person at his funeral they shouldn’t be there because they’re making a scene.

Jim said “If we want to perpetuate the cycle of torment and death, then the best way to do it is to do exactly what we are doing now: by reinforcing the assumption that suicide is a logical consequence of the kinds of bullying and rejection, that virtually all of us have experienced.”.

I don’t see where Lady Gaga’s act did that. Just because someone mourns publicly it doesn’t mean they think or are saying suicide is a logical consequence of bullying. If someone interprets it that way, that’s their mistake, not Lady Gaga’s.

Priya, you’re correct to point out that suicide can be a rational, carefully considered decision, particularly in the context of terminal illness. While I didn’t qualify the first sentence Jim quoted, I used generally to make it clear in the next that I’m not casting the issues in blacks and whites.

After my partner’s suicide (in his mid 40s) I had to come to terms with the rational component of his decision. He was in great physical health, but his mental health had taken him on a frequently awful multi-decade roller coaster. I don’t believe his decision was entirely rational, but on his most clear-headed, healthy days it was rational for him to acknowledge that the roller coaster would continue: Some of his future days would probably be as excruciating as some of the worst of the days past.

But here, we’re talking about youth. Evidence suggests that, as a group, kids who have died by suicide have had high rates of mental health issues, interfering with their ability to think rationally while making life-or-death decisions.

Deeply thoughtful, beautifully written.

I’m not sure that I agree about Lady Gaga’s dedication, but the greater point is very important.

“The decision to die isn’t the product of a healthy brain doing a cost-benefit analysis. Death is generally preceded by some combination of irrational thinking, severe despair, anxiety, depression and/or other mental illness.”.

That may be true in some cases, but certainly not all. Sometimes it is the product of a healthy brain doing a cost-benefit analysis – sometimes life is so miserable death is preferable, when one has a long drawn out painful and eventually fatal medical problem for instance.