Do Suicide Hotlines actually do anything?

[Space_Dandy]

I heard one employee complain that they were on a 15 minute average handle time metric. It sounds like they treat this just like any other customer service where the goal is to get people off of the phone as quickly as possible.

But aside from that, suicidal ideation is a real bitch to deal with. If someone feels hopeless and depressed, I don't see that there's a lot that a stranger who doesn't know anything about them could say to change the way they think. Such comforting notions as 'people love you, people will miss you' will likely fall flat to the person who feels lonely and forgotten, and rejected by everyone they care about. People don't become suicidal after one bad day, it's after years of rejection and failure.

 

[Monkey Shoulder]

If you’re not disabled in anyway and live in a first world country you have no reason for considering suicide.

Gay

 

[Doji]

If you’re not disabled in anyway and live in a first world country you have no reason for considering suicide.

There's always a reason to consider suicide, just being alive is enough. Actually going through with is another matter.

 

[Popper Whiting]

Most suicide hotlines are a fucking scam IMO. They get charitable funding to set up an answering machine, for someone to call back and recommend the person got to mental health services. Skip the suicide hotline and just go get help. Maybe a case of TMI but when I was doing my undergrad the University's suicide and mental health hotline was run by two faggots who were way into puppy play, fart fetishism and watersports (not even joking I can give the names if requested of the two) and they ended up having to flee interstate on charges of fraud. Since then I've googled these hotlines and scams and there are a lot of (admittedly anecdotal) stories of them being a rip off. You're better off calling emergency services or just going into a hospital.

 

[Skitarii]

Wait, you mean you guys don't hit on the lady on the other side?

 

[Doji]

Most suicide hotlines are a fucking scam IMO. They get charitable funding to set up and answering machine, for someone to call back and recommend the person got to mental health services. Skip the suicide hotline and just go get help. Maybe a case of TMI but when I was doing my undergrad the University's suicide and mental health hotline was run by two faggots who were way into puppy play, fart fetishism and watersports (not even joking I can give the names if requested of the two) and they ended up having to flee interstate on charges of fraud. Since then I've googled these hotlines and scams and there are a lot of (admittedly anecdotal) stories of them being a rip off. You're better off calling emergency services or just going into a hospital.

That's something I've never considered, you don't really even know who the hell you're sharing your problems with. I mean, you never really know but when it's such a low bar job you really get no quality filter.

And yeah all things involving human weakness of mind easily become scams. What a world.

 

[TerrorSperg99]

There's always a reason to consider suicide, just being alive is enough. Actually going through with is another matter.

Most problems in life can be overcome if you’re young and healthy.

 

[Exigent Circumcisions]

When you're that fucked up it really can help to be told simple things that are obvious to mentally sound people.

 

[Apochrypha]

I stopped being suicidal when I called a hotline and they put me on a waitlist.

It made me realize that nobody will ever care about you the way they care about a paycheck. It's better to live just to spite everyone than to kill yourself and have people not bat an eye.

 

[A Very Big Fish]

Do you ever call the authorities over it? I believe I once heard that if someone sounds super suicidal the police gets called and they're put under suicide watch or something? This in turn makes calling the hotline less desirable.

I'm not stating this as a fact it's more like something I heard once.

You would tell the person that you were calling. And you only called if they did something that would cause imminent harm. Like I wouldn't call emergency services if you said you were suicidal, but if you said "I just swallowed a whole bottle of bills" than I would call emergency services and give them as much info on you as I have.

If I don't have enough, I'd try and convince you to give me that info, and stay with you on the phone until emergency services arrived. Hundreds of calls, and I never had to do this.

 

[Doji]

Most problems in life can be overcome if you’re young and healthy.

I agree, I meant it more like being alive is enough of a case to think about not being alive, just philosophy shit. The human condition and such.

 

[TerrorSperg99]

I stopped being suicidal when I called a hotline and they put me on a waitlist.

It made me realize that nobody will ever care about you the way they care about a paycheck. It's better to live just to spite everyone than to kill yourself and have people not bat an eye.

Aren’t you a woman at least you can find someone it’s men society doesn’t care about

 

[Apochrypha]

Aren’t you a woman at least you can find someone it’s men society doesn’t care about

Aw, bless your cotton socks.

 

[Feefee81093]

It's probably just nice to have someone to talk to. Just listening can be as important as saying anything. They can see the corner they're backed in from another perspective and potentially give them advice on how they can proceed.

 

[Popper Whiting]

That's something I've never considered, you don't really even know who the hell you're sharing your problems with. I mean, you never really know but when it's such a low bar job you really get no quality filter.

And yeah all things involving human weakness of mind easily become scams. What a world.

The story is even darker as these two used information they'd recorded of someone who was having mental health information to blackmail them into stepping down from student elections. Atleast if you go to a hospital with mental health services what you tell them (especially if you are suicidal) is going to be bound by patient confidentiality. It's why I tell people not to use BetterHelp, as the service (when I looked into it) was run out of one of the Indian nations in the Mid-West where there were't any laws prohibiting the sharing of patient information, meaning the company could sell your information on to pharma, research, marketers etc.

The problem is there are still a lot of people embarrassed about having mental health issues, which means they want to do things as discretely and anonymously as possible, which sets them up perfectly for exploitation from scam lines and companies like BetterHelp, which ofcourse will worsen a person's mental health if they found out and possibly trigger off a suicide attempt. Truth is everybody is fucked up to some degree, some of the things we have to deal with are hard to process mentally and emotionally, and there really isn't any harm in owning that and getting help.

Also, for any suicidal Kiwis, look at the likes of Ethan Ralph, Chris Chan, Patrick Tomlinson and so many others on here and ask yourself the question "Am I really as mentally and morally fucked up as these people?". The answer is going to be no. Things can always get worse, and often will if you let an issue go unaddressed.