Guest Column on Alexi Pappas' Memoir Bravey: How Bravey Could Have Been Braver

usernameoftheyear wrote:

I struggled to get through Kate Raphael's review/opinion, honestly. The main reason, though, is that there is something about narrowing in on and criticizing the way that someone speaks about losing a loved that makes me feel uncomfortable. As the above quote says, a memoir is to give an honest account of personal experience. Harping on this aspect of book just seems a bit much to me. If Alexi wants to speak of her mother's suicide in this way, I don't really think that deserves criticism. I may be in the minority I dont think it is Alexi's responsibility to be "PC" when speaking about her experience with her mother. Now if you want to criticize the book for being boring/poorly written/overly verbose/trite/unrelatable, etc, I think that is fair. Full disclosure- I have not read the book so I don't know if it is any of those things; just giving an example.

High Fidelity wrote:

rojo wrote:

I mainly feel like the "death by suicide" take is just flat out wrong and potentially very dangerous itself. Yes, suicide is often the result mental illness. Yes, after it happens, there is no point to shame the deceased. But the reality is it takes a self-inflicted act to die by suicide. I feel like the more graphic we can be in acknowledging this, the more likely we are to reduce suicide.

This is ignorant. Have you had a close friend of family member die by suicide? I have. If you did, you would know how hurtful the phrase "so and so killed herself" can be to friends and family.

I used to use the phrase "kill oneself." Then I learned otherwise and changed my behavior. Will you?

Also, depicting suicide as a graphic act IS NOT the answer! Where are you getting this from?

Do you think it's helpful to ANYONE to hear in graphic detail how my friend put a gun in his mouth and pulled the trigger? What is helpful is EMPATHY, resources, mental health awareness, reducing shame.

Please educate yourself.

America's fury wrote:

High Fidelity wrote:

This is ignorant. Have you had a close friend of family member die by suicide? I have. If you did, you would know how hurtful the phrase "so and so killed herself" can be to friends and family.

I used to use the phrase "kill oneself." Then I learned otherwise and changed my behavior. Will you?

Also, depicting suicide as a graphic act IS NOT the answer! Where are you getting this from?

Do you think it's helpful to ANYONE to hear in graphic detail how my friend put a gun in his mouth and pulled the trigger? What is helpful is EMPATHY, resources, mental health awareness, reducing shame.

Please educate yourself.

I registered solely to endorse this post. rojo, your statement is dangerously ignorant. Of course i know you won't retract your words, but know that this is just one of many reasons why your anxieties about being cancelled are justified.

Now please ban me as usual.

High Fidelity wrote:

rojo wrote:

I mainly feel like the "death by suicide" take is just flat out wrong and potentially very dangerous itself. Yes, suicide is often the result mental illness. Yes, after it happens, there is no point to shame the deceased. But the reality is it takes a self-inflicted act to die by suicide. I feel like the more graphic we can be in acknowledging this, the more likely we are to reduce suicide.

This is ignorant. Have you had a close friend of family member die by suicide? I have. If you did, you would know how hurtful the phrase "so and so killed herself" can be to friends and family.

I used to use the phrase "kill oneself." Then I learned otherwise and changed my behavior. Will you?

Also, depicting suicide as a graphic act IS NOT the answer! Where are you getting this from?

Do you think it's helpful to ANYONE to hear in graphic detail how my friend put a gun in his mouth and pulled the trigger? What is helpful is EMPATHY, resources, mental health awareness, reducing shame.

Please educate yourself.

GD wrote:

High Fidelity wrote:

This is ignorant. Have you had a close friend of family member die by suicide? I have. If you did, you would know how hurtful the phrase "so and so killed herself" can be to friends and family.

I used to use the phrase "kill oneself." Then I learned otherwise and changed my behavior. Will you?

Also, depicting suicide as a graphic act IS NOT the answer! Where are you getting this from?

Do you think it's helpful to ANYONE to hear in graphic detail how my friend put a gun in his mouth and pulled the trigger? What is helpful is EMPATHY, resources, mental health awareness, reducing shame.

Please educate yourself.

__________________

Anybody who says "educate yourself" is usually woefully uneducated and/or trying to impose their own ideology on others. It is literally a fact that people who die by suicide "kill themselves," and euphemistic language will not change that.

.

Past his prime but still kicking wrote:

Why is it okay for someone to project their personal views onto Alexi Pappas? This is a memoir right? Pappas is simply telling her story as she has experienced it.

1) Pappas' choice of words to describe her mother's suicide is important in understanding who she is. She acknowledges that her mother was a victim of a terrible disease, but she doesn't shy away from the feelings she has regarding this moment. There are repercussions for the people closest to suicide victims. They should be allowed the space to grieve and heal from that event.

2) While accepting the importance of a woman to understand her own sexual identity and desires, understanding that virginity is important to a great many people should not be dismissed. Pappas isn't shaming any women for how they view sex, but simply sharing that to her virginity was important and her initial sexual encounters as she defined them weren't what she would choose for herself now.

3) I do not have a strong objection here to the larger point. But again this is a memoir and at this moment in her life, Pappas likely doesn't know the distinction between these terms either if at all. This was an impactful moment for her and crucial in the woman she has become. She described it in an accessible way that is appropriate for the moment in time.

This opinion piece stands up for certain underrepresented groups, but ignores the identity of the author. We shouldn't dismiss the individuality Pappas displays here. Her flaws both explicit and implicit are what make her human and what makes the book a compelling read.

RunRagged wrote:

High Fidelity wrote:

This is ignorant. Have you had a close friend of family member die by suicide? I have. If you did, you would know how hurtful the phrase "so and so killed herself" can be to friends and family.

I used to use the phrase "kill oneself." Then I learned otherwise and changed my behavior. Will you?

Also, depicting suicide as a graphic act IS NOT the answer! Where are you getting this from?

Do you think it's helpful to ANYONE to hear in graphic detail how my friend put a gun in his mouth and pulled the trigger? What is helpful is EMPATHY, resources, mental health awareness, reducing shame.

Please educate yourself.

I have family and know other people who've died by suicide. I do not believe using the phrase "kill oneself" is offensive or that it indicates lack of empathy, education or understanding.

In 1987, I had a bout of clinical depression severe enough to cause "suicidal ideation" and suicidal urges so severe and unrelenting that I checked myself into a hospital to prevent myself from acting on them. In the past 10 years, I've had other bouts of depression with these features, for which I've found the most effective medical treatment has been IV infusions of ketamine.

Every time I've had "suicidal ideation," what I wanted to do was to kill myself. That's exactly how everyone I've ever met who has suffered the same feelings would describe it. We wanted to kill ourselves, not "die by suicide" or experience/commit "death by suicide."

By imposing a new blanket rule decreeing that suicide now can only be spoken of by using the anodyne and sanitized terminology you and some others prefer, you are prohibiting people who feel suicidal from describing our own thoughts and feelings - and telling others of them - in the authentic, plain-spoken, honest language that comes most naturally to us and which describes our experience and its urgency in the simplest, most straightforward way that we find most appropriate.

By making it verboten to use the term "kill oneself" you are, IMHO, giving suicidal people one more reason to feel shame about what we are going through and not to reach out and get help.

If I had been been prevented from, and shamed for, saying the words "I want to kill myself" and "I am afraid I will kill myself" in 1987 or at various points in the past decade coz such words are "incorrect," "insensitive" and indicative of ignorance, I doubt I would've found the wherewithal to have gotten help as I did. For me and many others, the very words "I want to kill myself" were/are "life lines" we've used to telegraph in the shortest, most succinct way possible just how terrible we felt/feel.

When I was a kid in the 1960s, the rules of "polite society" decreed that talking about suicide should be avoided altogether - but if the topic did have to be dealt with, it should be spoken of only euphemistically. Hence, many women were said to have "died in childbirth" and many men were said to have "died in a hunting accident."

This did not stop anyone from thinking of or committing suicide. Nor did it help any of the people who grew up thinking that their parents died that way.

rojo wrote:

Nemo wrote:

Thank you very much for sharing this.

I'm battling depression for almost 20 years now. And I survived a suicide attempt.

I didn't want to "die by suicide", I wanted to kill myself. It was a conscious decision, not something that happened to me like an accident.

The phrase "death by suicide" denies that decision and basically frames me as a victim.

I find that quite insulting and it actually makes me a bit angry.

I'm finding this thread to be very educational and plan on readin the links people have provided (haven't had time yet), but am glad people like yourself have posted comments like yours in defense of my instinctual (but admittedly non researched ) ake).

The death by suicide language to me is nicer to those that are dead (and their friends and family that are grieving), but insulting to those struggling with the suicidal thoughts themselves. To me, it denies you of your agency in your own life. I'm more interested in preventing one future suicide than helping people feel better about ones that have already happened.