U.S. Army issues a “stand down” to focus on suicide awareness and prevention
22 replies, posted
Source:[url]http://www.twloha.com/news.php?nid=465[/url] [QUOTE=twloha] U.S. Army “Stand Down” Dedicated to Suicide Awareness and Prevention. Today, September 27, the U.S. army has issued that soldiers “stand down” from their usual posts to devote their day to discussion of suicide prevention (excluding select soldiers serving in Afghanistan, who will have the same training on a different date). This particular branch of the military has seen the highest number of suicides. In 2011, there were 167 recorded cases of active-duty soldiers taking their own lives. This year there have been 116, and if deaths by suicide continue at this rate, the projected number will reach 200 by the new year. Though the military invests in mental health beginning as early as boot camp and is bringing in more mental health professionals, they have continued to see an increase in the amount of active-duty suicides, as well as PTSD. Sgt. Maj. Raymond Chandler had this to say of the continuing challenge: "The nation has asked our soldiers to carry a heavy load over the last 11 years, and they have not failed, but suicide is an enemy we have yet to defeat." The overall tone going into the stand down is optimistic. The schedule will be spent informing soldiers on the array of treatment that is available to them and reducing the stigmas that surround these issues. The hope at the end of the day is that the soldiers will know it is OK to struggle, but remember that hope and healing are available to them. [/QUOTE] Oh god, I've tried to format the quote three times now and it just wont take.
Perhaps the best way to prevent soldiers from killing themselves is, I dunno, not sending them to Afghanistan to fight a pointless, eternal war?
[QUOTE=Used Car Salesman;37834522]Perhaps the best way to prevent soldiers from killing themselves is, I dunno, not sending them to Afghanistan to fight a pointless, eternal war?[/QUOTE]
Don't start this, please.
Why not? It's not like the war is for an ideal or even towards a single goal, it's an endless police action.
[QUOTE=MrBob1337;37834673]Why not? It's not like the war is for an ideal or even towards a single goal, it's an endless police action.[/QUOTE]
Yeah, well I'm sure arguing on the Internet will change that.
[QUOTE=Used Car Salesman;37834522]Perhaps the best way to prevent soldiers from killing themselves is, I dunno, not sending them to Afghanistan to fight a pointless, eternal war?[/QUOTE]
Because obviously the most traumatic thing a soldier has on his mind is why he was there.
[QUOTE=DinoJesus;37834739]Yeah, well I'm sure arguing on the Internet will change that.[/QUOTE]
It can help inform people who are clueless or ignorant to the situation. Just because he has an opinion doesn't mean he's arguing either, it means he's stating a very sound and logical point.
[editline]28th September 2012[/editline]
[QUOTE=CabooseRvB;37834825]Because every single soldier that killed themselves did it because they were sent over the ocean.[/QUOTE]
A pretty big amount of soldiers that commit suicide were either serving their time over seas at war, or were suffering from PTSD after returning home.
Soldiers aren't drolling, war hungry assholes. They're humans that are effects by what they see. Some handle it different than others. I imagine some have pretty strong walls they put up, but after a while, it really gets to them.
"You can't say things unless I agree with them!!!"
News Section, 2012.
[QUOTE=DinoJesus;37834739]Yeah, well I'm sure arguing on the Internet will change that.[/QUOTE]
First sentence I've ever seen that applies to itself.
Holy shit they're actually doing something about it? Good on them
[QUOTE=CabooseRvB;37834825]Because obviously the most traumatic thing a soldier has on his mind is why he was there.[/QUOTE]
Yes. Wouldn't it hurt so much more to know you've been killing people for no real reason?
I'm not here to bitch about the war though.
The problem is the shitbag S/NCO's who don't bother to address issue they see in their men or who instead of assisting those men berate them. At least that's what I see on my side of the picture.
[QUOTE=Medevilae;37834979]It's irrelevant to the subject of the thread, unless you're really grasping at straws to make a political statement...[/QUOTE]
How is it irrelevant? The best way to stop (some) soldiers from becoming depressed is to not send them into an environment where they are going to have to kill people, accidentally kill people, and lose their buddies. And if the war is rooted in extremely shallow reasoning, maybe it's time to seriously consider the "benefits" and consequences of the war. It's not like we're fighting the Nazi's here. At least with that war, there was something to get behind. This war is veiled behind reasoning that we have to stop the "terrorists" and that we have to retaliate for something that was done 11 years ago. We have lost a little more than double the amount of people to the "War on Terror" than we did to 9/11, with no end in sight. The amount of collateral damage and the balance of power has now been fucked so much that it's extremely likely that it will NEVER end. So instead of dumping lives (and money) onto an already raging fire, we should scale back the bullshit, and seriously ask ourselves if all this is worth it.
Im not sure the taliban will reason with them. Most of them are pretty dead set on suicide when they blow themselves up.
Don't think it has anything to do that we are fighting people who mine roads, strap bombs to themselves, innocents (including children)? That perhaps we are fighting people who can win with psychological warfare because they don't need to follow rules and also because they have a virtually limitless supply of people provided by illiterate conservative Muslim factions across the region and not just from Afghanistan?
Even if we were there for a "right" reason you don't think [B]any[/B] of that has anything to do with this?
Obongo orders US Army to surrender
[QUOTE=CabooseRvB;37834825]Because obviously the most traumatic thing a soldier has on his mind is why he was there.[/QUOTE]
You don't think it's a huge factor? They're not just dumb grunts, every one of them is thinking about why they're even there and what good their sacrifices are actually doing. You don't think they're thinking about how the very people they're supposed to be training and "helping" have a tendency to shoot them in the back? You don't think they're thinking about how things in that country aren't any better after their second, third, or fourth tour of duty?
From their position it must look like an endless, pointless waste of life, which is exactly what that war is. Maybe they could stand the stresses of war a little better if they actually felt like they had a good reason to be there fighting.
I guarantee that if we ended the war tomorrow and flew everyone home, the suicide rate would plummet overnight.
You're wrong about it being the war, there are other reasons that suicide is prevalent.
One I have experienced is being in a relationship where he is stuck on the other side of world, away from me, his family and all of his friends plus his father being sickly.
The Army has refused to bring him back to the states, instead of reassigning him back to the states after he went through all the nessary paperwork to get transferred for a compassionate reassignment.
They send him further into Europe doing a job completely different from what he and the recruiters agreed on. The paperwork he sent in was Bs'd and thrown away.
He knows of at least four people on his last base that committed suicide and honestly, I see why.
Trust me. War isn't the only thing that makes people in the military kill themselves. I'm in the Air Force and we always hear about people who kill themselves because the job is too stressful, family problems, or financial problems.
[QUOTE=choco cookie;37837541]Trust me. War isn't the only thing that makes people in the military kill themselves. I'm in the Air Force and we always hear about people who kill themselves because the job is too stressful, family problems, or financial problems.[/QUOTE]
Kinda silly things to kill yourself about. I've tried killing myself for even sillier things.. such as (blushes) a lich ritual.. i was 13 and already quite batshit back then.
I aproove of any kind of suicide awareness. My girlfriend comitted suicide on an institution after getting raped.. My mom apparently contemplated jumping in front of a train too, once.
Its not nice.
