Something that happened in my town yesterday (1 Viewer)

RetroMcBananaFace

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First day back to school, this 15-year-old kid shoots himself in the head in the parking lot right as everybody is getting there.

He was armed with three guns - two loaded 9 mm's with 46 extra rounds and a .38 with 13 rounds. So clearly he originally intended to hurt more than just himself.

As the story unravels it comes out that this kid had been the subject of a lot of bullying and had unenrolled himself from school right before the holiday break, and apparently a girl had made a suicide pact with him.

Whatever happened, the kid decided not to hurt anybody else and only killed himself. The girl who had made the "suicide pact" with him had done it just as a troll. She ended up filming the whole thing, then taking pictures afterward, and sending them out to all the high school kids via social media, and I guess the kids spent half the morning making jokes and memes out of it until parents and the cops caught on to what was happening.

This is horrendous. How does this happen? I know bullying and suicides are nothing new, there were at least 4 suicides at my high school when I was a kid and that was a tiny school. But this is on another level. How can these kids look at a picture of a dead classmate and their reaction is to make fun of him?

What the hell is going on with our kids?
 
hormones, challenges, social media, parenting, pressures....all of it.

But social media has exacerbated the pressures and challenges. and if you catch a kid in the wrong mindset and wrong time....this a result.

We had similar in our subdivision last year.

Young man...16...Instagramed putting the gun together that would be used to take his own life. Then as he walked to the pool clubhouse...and turned off just before he took his life.

It was all aimed at those that bullied and ridiculed him in person and online.

Kids cannot handle the pressure of both. They dont know how to cope.



I was a pot head in High School.....so i didnt care who thought what about me.
 
I can only imagine....like when I was a kid, if you got bullied at school, at least when you went home for the day/weekend you were safe. Now you can be bullied 24/7. I suppose there is always the choice to not participate in social media but that's only looking at it from an adult perspective, your average teenager might not even see that as an option.

This is so scary. I have a 5-year-old and he's a really sensitive kid and kind of small. I could easily see him becoming the subject of bullying someday. And I'm not sure exactly how the hell you address bullying when it's on the level of ridiculing a kid who just blew his own head off.
 
Ugh- yea I share a lot of the same concerns you have (about kids these days and about having a young child trying to navigate through). Certainly seems like social media has put a new layer onto the bullying, etc.
 
You're kind of in between, but if you grew up in the 1970s starting to understand news with Vietnam fallout, then OPEC, Cold War, the world didn't seem to hold much of a future. Even in a small group of friends more than a few kids or their siblings had "accidents" cleaning guns and such, because the world seemed so dark and if bullied, closeted or suffering from untreated depression eating a bullet didn't seem so bad. I was a happy kid, but saw it happening around me.

I'm guessing there was still a fair amount of personal darkness and suicide when the world brightened for a few decades with Greed/Top Gun, the wall falling, the Clinton economy and the rise of the Internet. Lots to look forward to maybe made it seem a little less dark, but I'm sure the suffering was there.

Now look at the hot mess the future looks like, with older siblings and the people ahead of you on the conveyor belt getting called a generation of colossal failure living at home with parents post college because they can't get jobs or start families. If you're already in a dark place, why not leave? The round the clock worldwide bullying opportunities can't hurt. Then you've seen so many stories of the glory of the loner striking back with a bag of guns and ammo, then you can see why more might contemplate that way out. That latter is still relatively rare to the number of teen suicides overall, but it's understandable why it's become more common. Those stories have been added to the library of dark stories.

We haven't caught Japan, but we're getting there: Tackling the deadliest day for Japanese teenagers - BBC News

_85280580_japan_suicide.jpg


A lot of us get good lives that we love, but the world is dark enough that I'm not going to judge anyone that wants out. I will blame those that take out others, and I'll certainly blame the scum that see it and think it's amusing and want to bully after death. Honestly the most disturbing part about the story is the other kids' reaction. It seems to say worse things about the changes in our society and our perceived future than the bag of guns does.
 
Honestly the most disturbing part about the story is the other kids' reaction. It seems to say worse things about the changes in our society and our perceived future than the bag of guns does.

Absolutely, that's the part that upsets me so much.

Good post, thanks, gives me stuff to think about.
 
I can only imagine....like when I was a kid, if you got bullied at school, at least when you went home for the day/weekend you were safe. Now you can be bullied 24/7. I suppose there is always the choice to not participate in social media but that's only looking at it from an adult perspective, your average teenager might not even see that as an option.

This is so scary. I have a 5-year-old and he's a really sensitive kid and kind of small. I could easily see him becoming the subject of bullying someday. And I'm not sure exactly how the hell you address bullying when it's on the level of ridiculing a kid who just blew his own head off.
Don't be scared. Be aware. Be involved and make sure your child knows he or she can come to you with anything.

Pay attention to behaviors, moods manners etc. They will give you small signals. I think those that are introverted are targets more than extroverts. Having 1 or 2 friends is ok but they should have way more acquaintances.

We have now a 13 yr old and remind her all the time that if you EVER are the subject of this, involve us. If you EVER see someone the subject of it, involve us.

I still shudder at how vicious kids can be, but I'm also confident in my child being strong and her own person. But will still keep wary eye until she an adult and out in the world.




Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G891A using Tapatalk
 
I can only imagine....like when I was a kid, if you got bullied at school, at least when you went home for the day/weekend you were safe. Now you can be bullied 24/7.

i'm usually not on the "kids these days" team, but I do think the 24/7 thing is real
there might be safe guards parents can take to make sure their kids keep communicating with in parents during the pre-adolescent years
but it also might be a crap shoot
this thread is making me even more nervous about my kids growing up
 
Geez.....why is this not in the news?

It is very much news on a local/regional basis and has gotten a whole bunch of attention on Twitter. Today, the school is closed because apparently a group of the dead kid's friends made threats that they were going to come to school and kill a bunch of people.
 
It's sad, some of today's kids don't see death and suffering the way we see it. Seeing death and suffering mean nothing to them.
 
I don't know the full answer. I can only say that from my experience, there was never anything taught on regular basis on how to cope with difficulties of life. This may be changing or have already changed and I've heard a few podcasts which say that social consciousness is the next big thing in education/workplace evolution.

Our current emphasis is simply too corporate and cut throat. Not everyone can be exceptional, just due to it's definition. Pushing that agenda only results in the losers feeling worthless. We need a better understanding of how to find the value in everyone.

Sorry embed fails...

https://www.ted.com/talks/margaret_heffernan_why_it_s_time_to_forget_the_pecking_order_at_work
 
It is very much news on a local/regional basis and has gotten a whole bunch of attention on Twitter. Today, the school is closed because apparently a group of the dead kid's friends made threats that they were going to come to school and kill a bunch of people.

I wouldn't go in guns blazing, but yeah, if I saw some kid laughing over my friend's suicide, I'd knock him the **** out.
 

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