Yeah, sorry and it won't happen again. Imho I'm just a mere mod though so what I say really doesn't have much more weight than a typical user. Still that's no reason and I apologize for such behavior as it makes everyone else look collectively bad. Btw if they laugh so what, it's not like I really care and I'll never see it anyway since I've blacklisted the likes of reddit, chan boards since a while. So it would be poking fun behind someones back and what purpose does it serve if not to provoke someone?
In fact with that said I admit that I neglected far more reasonable thinking such as this is indeed a problem that resolves itself by ignoring them. They are looking for a reaction and to get a rise out of it, that's the point of it all. Best to deny that satisfaction and stifle their overinflated egos.
@teh_speleegn_polease; Saying "a sane and emotionally stable person wouldn't consider suicide in the first place" is dangerous ground to tread on. I've considered it once or twice, does that make me an insane emotional unstable threat to society? No, it makes me a regular fucking human being, just like everyone else. It doesn't make me special, and it doesn't make me bad or inferior. As a sibling of someone who has taken their own life, I can say that people are very quick to assume on issues like this. I've heard things like "wow this is really a sign that bullying is bad" or some bullshit when that wasn't even near the reason he off'd himself. In the same lieu, people also say "well he did pot, got drunk, and took heroin, that was bound to happen" and there is so much more to his story than a drug-addict fuck up. You can't just throw all suicidal people into a little "insane" or "attention whore" box, you must be more open minded and willing to understand all people and situations are a certain shade of grey.
Spoiler:
and about the whole 4chan thing yeah people are dicks. especially online. I once had a kid message me on Xbox of all places saying 'how's your brother doing, because mine's still alive'. anonymity is directly proportional to douchebaggery. beating up retards won't really change that.
@NFK: Sorry, I guess you're right. I also phrased my statement wrong, because considering suicide does not mean you'll go through with it, so perhaps it would have been better to say "a sane person wouldn't attempt suicide".
I'd also like to say that emotionally unstable does not mean a threat to society. Depression is an instability; it is mostly harmless to anyone but the affected individual, can happen to anyone in the right circumstances, and can also lead to suicide. It's also entirely possible to get out of depression and continue living a completely normal and emotionally stable life.
While it's true that it is possible to commit suicide while being completely "sane" (for lack of a better word), unless you're carrying out a suicide pact or something, you've probably lost all hope if you want to kill yourself. That in and of itself can lead to irrational decisions. And by that, I don't mean that you'll become a raving psychopath; I mean that, for instance, you will let negative comments from anonymous people on 4chan get to you and reinforce your decision.
At least that's my understanding, based on common sense (not experience, thankfully). As someone who has actually considered suicide yourself, would you disagree? (Also, I'm sorry about your brother. Losing such a close family member to suicide must be a tragic experience.)
EDIT:
Irrelevant to the current conversation:
I'm not sure if I should be posting this here while people are still mourning Rachel, but I thought I'd leave it in case anyone cares but still hasn't seen it: http://steamcommunity.com/gid/1035827914...5253244218 Honestly, with all the stuff going on like people expressing dislike about the system being banned and negative criticism on mods being censored, I didn't expect such a prompt resolution (at least for now)
I think, the tragic 'mistake' Rachel made was trusting the people at 4chan. It was the totally wrong place to open up, come out, make yourself vulnerable in such a deep manner.
When I read how the people there talk (just from that one posted thread) it becomes very clear that they have made some kind of über-cynicism their shield against their own vulnerability. Even (or especially) after someone dies after being hurt by their words (even though, of course, it wasn't their words alone that led to it), they make dark fun of it, even celebrate it, instead of holding on for a second to think they might have done something awful there. That's normal behavior, at least for children, because that's their only way to cope with death and responsibility.
It's so very tragic because Rachel obviously felt some kind of bond with these people. She cared about being actually known by them; the way she really was. And thus she trusted them. Unfortunately, she didn't seem to have a place like that in 'real life'.
And then she was disappointed and hurt in the worst way possible.
One of her twitter friends posted about why she died. It definitely sheds a lot of new light on what happened. Even we who worked on the article didn't know all of this.
I still think the way people talked to/about her (before and after her death) was absolutely awful, but I understand her friend wants to not let misinformation rule over it all.
^ Well that clears it up. However the harassment was still very shitty. However lets move on from that now OK?
One thing though..
Quote:They didn't even know her.
True, we might not have known her on a irl personal level. She was still someone we interacted with on the internet everyday, that suddenly and tragically came to a halt. Is it hard to believe that there are people that have the ability to feel connected, have genuine empathy and sympathy and actually *gasp* care about those they know over the internet? In my defense here I feel like I don't even know the majority of my irl friends and value most of my friendships over the WWW higher than my irl friendships. I apologized for my behavior previously and don't know wth I was thinking at the time.
"I'm not sure if I should be posting this here while people are still mourning Rachel"
TBH I'd rather discussion move on to something else and keep mourning to a in memoriam article as to not disrupt the flow of discussion here. I don't like to keep opening this thread and being reminded of this, death or mortality in general. As I said very uncomfortable subject for me.