# Why are so many Americans killing themselves and others compared to other countries **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [May 26, 2021, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-so-many-americans-killing-themselves-and-others-compared-to-other-countries/942975 "2021-05-26T18:55:24Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![civilis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8c91f0/32.png) [@civilis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/civilis)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2021, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-so-many-americans-killing-themselves-and-others-compared-to-other-countries/942975/1 "2021-05-26T18:55:24Z")
It is at least another order of magnitude. I think it is the worship guns , but it could be the lack effort to support the less fortunate who need it. I’m from Canada, and the help I got from our government during tough times in the past, with financial relief , education and health care sustained me with the hope to carry on. I have always felt that our governments cared about us and our children. All of us. It sure doesn’t seem that way in the states. In Canada , we don’t have food stamps , but we have income support for those who need it. We don’t seem to be too concerned with fraud like Americans wrt the safety net and I think I know why . Some Americans just can’t stand the idea of supporting unemployed black Americans. Our African Canadians comprise a much smaller segment of the population so lets say white Canadians are more amenable to helping each other out and considerate of the whole popuation. This affects unfortunate white Americans as well who don’t get the support they need. Its all because of racism. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2021, 7:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-so-many-americans-killing-themselves-and-others-compared-to-other-countries/942975/2 "2021-05-26T19:53:04Z")
A lot of it has to do with access to guns. Mass killings occurred before guns were invented, and they still occur in places where guns are not easily obtained, but it’s harder to do a MASS killing without a firearm. I keep hearing from my friends who are… let’s call them “gun enthusiasts”… that if everyone was armed this wouldn’t happen, someone would shoot the mass shooter, etc. Except… it never seems to happen that way, does it? The notion that someone with a handgun is going to engage in a shootout with someone already firing is ludicrous. These folks say guns will protect them. Well… seems to me that maybe we should be buying kevlar vests, THOSE will (somewhat) protect you from bullets. As you mention, @civilis, poverty and lack of a safety net are factors as well. There is also the way the nation is currently politically divided, with a segment clearly willing to resort to violence to get their way if they can’t win elections, can’t help but think that might be a factor as well. I am not thinking happy thoughts today, with yet another mass shooting in the news. ---
**Author:** ![Omar\_Little](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omar_little/32/269_2.png) [@Omar\_Little](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omar_Little)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2021, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-so-many-americans-killing-themselves-and-others-compared-to-other-countries/942975/3 "2021-05-26T20:19:45Z")
> [@civilis](#): > > Its all because of racism. So your conclusion is that US suicide rate is high because of racism? According to this recent study: > **[Suicide in America, by the Numbers](https://www.usnews.com/news/healthiest-communities/articles/2019-06-20/suicide-by-race-age-in-the-us)** > > Suicide rates have risen for most groups in the last two decades, but disparities remain. Rates of suicide have risen the most over the last two decades among whites and native americans. ---
**Author:** ![RitterSport](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rittersport/32/6326_2.png) [@RitterSport](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RitterSport)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2021, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-so-many-americans-killing-themselves-and-others-compared-to-other-countries/942975/4 "2021-05-26T20:23:03Z")
I think the point they are making is that we don’t have a good safety net (due to racism) and the lack of safety net may be driving many poor people, including white people, to suicide. That’s something I’ve heard in the past (that racism is a driver of our poor safety net), but I don’t have any cites to back that up. ---
**Author:** ![Omar\_Little](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omar_little/32/269_2.png) [@Omar\_Little](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omar_Little)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2021, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-so-many-americans-killing-themselves-and-others-compared-to-other-countries/942975/5 "2021-05-26T20:28:56Z")
> **[Socioeconomic disparities in suicide: Causation or confounding?](https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0243895)** > > Background Despite an overall reduction in suicide, educational disparities in suicide have not decreased over the last decade. The mechanisms behind educational disparities in suicide, however, remain unclear: low educational status may increase the... Based upon this study there is little causation found between socioeconomic and education factors and suicide rates. ---
**Author:** ![Omar\_Little](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omar_little/32/269_2.png) [@Omar\_Little](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omar_Little)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2021, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-so-many-americans-killing-themselves-and-others-compared-to-other-countries/942975/6 "2021-05-26T20:32:52Z")
> **[The Relationship Between Firearm Availability and Suicide](https://www.rand.org/research/gun-policy/analysis/essays/firearm-availability-suicide.html)** > > Empirical research on the causal effects of firearm availability on the risk of suicide is consistent with the claim that firearms increase suicide risk, but this research cannot yet rule out some other explanations for observed associations between... This study goes on to say, that access to guns makes the success of suicide more likely, as it is an effective way to kill yourself, compared to other means. But there is no correlation between a household having a gun, and that being the cause of the suicide. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2021, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-so-many-americans-killing-themselves-and-others-compared-to-other-countries/942975/7 "2021-05-26T23:39:05Z")
> [@Omar\_Little](#): > > But there is no correlation between a household having a gun, and that being the cause of the suicide. Between the “cause of suicide” as in motivation, or “cause of suicide” as in method? Not trying to argue your or their conclusions, just trying to clear up what looks to me like an ambiguity in the terminology you used. ---
**Author:** ![Bootb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e19b73/32.png) [@Bootb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bootb)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2021, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-so-many-americans-killing-themselves-and-others-compared-to-other-countries/942975/8 "2021-05-26T23:46:27Z")
The OP is starting from the wrong premise. If you take a look at country-by-country numbers, there is no apparent correlation between suicide rate and gun availability. This is a single year, 2005, but it should suffice to make the point. > **[World suicide rates by country](https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/world/suiciderate.html)** > > A country-by-country breakdown of the number of suicides per 100,000 people. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2021, 2:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-so-many-americans-killing-themselves-and-others-compared-to-other-countries/942975/9 "2021-05-27T02:20:03Z")
> [@Bootb](#): > > The OP is starting from the wrong premise. If you take a look at country-by-country numbers, there is no apparent correlation between suicide rate and gun availability. Note that the OP is talking about suicide AND homicide, though, not just suicide. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2021, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-so-many-americans-killing-themselves-and-others-compared-to-other-countries/942975/10 "2021-05-27T02:26:49Z")
> [@Omar\_Little](#): > > > [@civilis](#): > > > > Its all because of racism. > > So your conclusion is that US suicide rate is high because of racism? > > According to this recent study: > [https://www.usnews.com/news/healthiest-communities/articles/2019-06-20/suicide-by-race-age-in-the-us](https://www.usnews.com/news/healthiest-communities/articles/2019-06-20/suicide-by-race-age-in-the-us) > > Rates of suicide have risen the most over the last two decades among whites and native americans. I can’t speak for native americans, but isn’t the issue among whites related to racism? Not in the sense that whites are victims of racism, more that due to institutional racism, whites have this unconscious belief that America will work for them, but minorities do not have that belief the way whites do. I recall reading an article about low wage workers, and it mentioned how there is a rage among the white low wage workers that didn’t exist as much among the non-white ones, who expected the system to be corrupt and screw them over. White people still believe the system is designed to benefit them, when its really designed to benefit a wealthy elite. When that reality hits, it can be psychologically devastating. Whites have further to fall psychologically when reality catches up to them. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2021, 3:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-so-many-americans-killing-themselves-and-others-compared-to-other-countries/942975/11 "2021-05-27T03:06:57Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#): > > Not in the sense that whites are victims of racism, more that due to institutional racism, whites have this unconscious belief that America will work for them, but minorities do not have that belief the way whites do. > > I recall reading an article about low wage workers, and it mentioned how there is a rage among the white low wage workers that didn’t exist as much among the non-white ones, who expected the system to be corrupt and screw them over. White people still believe the system is designed to benefit them, when its really designed to benefit a wealthy elite. When that reality hits, it can be psychologically devastating. > > Whites have further to fall psychologically when reality catches up to them. Why is everything “racism”. My WAG is that racism is more a symptom than a primary cause of depression and other American mental issues. The main reason IMO is American’s worship of and obsession with wealth, power and fame. Or maybe more accurately, it’s from our long tradition of individualism and independence, the ultimate expression of which being a mega-rich asshole able to say and do and act however he or she feels like. What I believe this has led to is an attitude where Americans “believe the money” in the sense that they perceive those with wealth, power, and fame to be “right” (regardless of how stupid they are). And it has also led to a sense that anyone without these things is some sort of “loser” to be avoided, viewed with contempt, even feared (lest their loserness rubs off on you!). So for the Average American with their sights on the “American Dream [sup]TM[/sup]”, they must be intensely competitive working jobs they probably hate that probably serve no real purpose anyway. If they’re lucky. Lots of Americans work jobs that offer no opportunity to advance beyond minimum, or at least very low wages. (Work harder, loser!) ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2021, 4:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-so-many-americans-killing-themselves-and-others-compared-to-other-countries/942975/12 "2021-05-27T04:29:20Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > Why is everything “racism”. Because slavery, and Jim Crow. Duh. Mind you, I’m not claiming (and I don’t think anybody here is trying to claim) that racism is the only cause of all the social and economic stresses in the US. It’s not even the primary cause of some of them. But c’mon, we’re talking about a mindset that for several hundred years hammered home the message to white Americans, who were the overwhelming majority of (recognized) Americans, that they were innately superior to nonwhite people and innately destined for superior power, control and achievement. Even though the white-supremacy system didn’t deliver on its implied promises of power, control and achievement for many non-elite white Americans, at least it ensured that they mostly had more power, control and achievement than black Americans. I’m not saying “oh tsk-tsk what awful people all those white Americans were for believing what their society was assiduously telling them 24/7.” I’m saying that aligning themselves with these white-supremacist narratives tended to fuck them up in their heads. And all that centuries-long legacy of privilege and prejudice didn’t just magically vanish from people’s heads sixty years ago with the Civil Rights movement. You’re not wrong that Americans tend to have a rather subservient attitude towards wealth, power and fame. But that’s not distinct from our history of race relations. One reason that white working-class people in the US have a less skeptical attitude toward wealthy (white) elites than their counterparts in much of Europe do, for example, is that US white elites worked very hard for many decades to encourage attitudes of racial solidarity among white Americans across class differences. (Look at how wealthy, powerful and famous Barack Obama is, for example, and tell me how many Trump-adoring white Americans express admiration for him.) White Americans have been told over and over again, for centuries, that they’re entitled to be at least a few rungs up from the bottom of the ladder simply because they are white, and that the US is fundamentally a country of white culture and white people are the default and dominant group in it, by their very nature. Now they’re coming to terms with the fact that none of that is really true, and a lot of them are feeling alienation and anger. And you can’t separate that out in a nice neat little compartment away from everything else that Americans are experiencing. ---
**Author:** ![DemonTree](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/demontree/32/8646_2.png) [@DemonTree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DemonTree)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2021, 5:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-so-many-americans-killing-themselves-and-others-compared-to-other-countries/942975/13 "2021-05-27T05:19:23Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > Look at how wealthy, powerful and famous Barack Obama is, for example, and tell me how many Trump-adoring white Americans express admiration for him. Do any more of them express admiration for Biden, or Clinton, or Bill Gates? ---
**Author:** ![DemonTree](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/demontree/32/8646_2.png) [@DemonTree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DemonTree)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2021, 5:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-so-many-americans-killing-themselves-and-others-compared-to-other-countries/942975/14 "2021-05-27T05:30:00Z")
Most murders in the US aren’t mass shootings but are related to other crimes, so I’d say the prohibition-like treatment of drugs is a major contributor, funnelling money to gangs. Plus lack of safety-net and lower social cohesion due to being a nation of immigrants. _All_ the countries in the Americas have notably high murder rates. Add easily available guns and you have the current situation. ---
**Author:** ![Odesio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/odesio/32/20003_2.png) [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2021, 5:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-so-many-americans-killing-themselves-and-others-compared-to-other-countries/942975/15 "2021-05-27T05:54:19Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#): > > I recall reading an article about low wage workers, and it mentioned how there is a rage among the white low wage workers that didn’t exist as much among the non-white ones, who expected the system to be corrupt and screw them over. White people still believe the system is designed to benefit them, when its really designed to benefit a wealthy elite. When that reality hits, it can be psychologically devastating. A lot of white people don’t think the system was designed to benefit them and most of the low wage workers you’re talking about didn’t go to college, and those that did, probably didn’t spend a lot of time learning about privilege theory in any of the classes they might have taken. But what they have seen over the last few decades is economic opportunities dry up for them, they’re worse off than their parents, and they don’t expect their children to do any better. That’d probably make anyone angry. For a lot of Americans, a 30 hour a week job at Wal-Mart might literally be the best they can do right now. While I happen to think privilege theory is a valid lens to view things, I imagine the idea that society was designed primarily to benefit those poor whites working at Wal-Mart is at once unbelievable and galling to them. ---
**Author:** ![Odesio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/odesio/32/20003_2.png) [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2021, 5:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-so-many-americans-killing-themselves-and-others-compared-to-other-countries/942975/16 "2021-05-27T05:55:24Z")
Americans have always liked killing one another. Homicides would likely go down if we removed firearms from the equation, but I bet we’d still kill one another at a higher rate than the French, Canadians, or Japanese. ---
**Author:** ![DemonTree](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/demontree/32/8646_2.png) [@DemonTree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DemonTree)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2021, 7:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-so-many-americans-killing-themselves-and-others-compared-to-other-countries/942975/17 "2021-05-27T07:32:13Z")
> [@Odesio](#): > > Homicides would likely go down if we removed firearms from the equation, but I bet we’d still kill one another at a higher rate than the French, Canadians, or Japanese. America’s non-gun homicide rate is about the same as the total homicide rate for France, so yes. The guns don’t help, but they are not the whole story. Japan’s murder rate is much lower, probably because it is a very homogeneous, collectivist society. Kind of the opposite of the US. ---
**Author:** ![Asuka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@Asuka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Asuka)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2021, 9:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-so-many-americans-killing-themselves-and-others-compared-to-other-countries/942975/18 "2021-05-27T09:53:40Z")
This is heavily going off topic but what’s with poorly written posts from Canadians/Australians/New Zealanders that seem to be all over the internet including Reddit and Facebook? I mean look at that original post > I think it is the worship guns And it’s always some weird thing of somebody claiming to be from Canada but then writing like an ESL student and then complaining about the United States. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2021, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-so-many-americans-killing-themselves-and-others-compared-to-other-countries/942975/19 "2021-05-27T13:56:37Z")
> [@Odesio](#): > > > [@Wesley\_Clark](#): > > > > I recall reading an article about low wage workers, and it mentioned how there is a rage among the white low wage workers that didn’t exist as much among the non-white ones, who expected the system to be corrupt and screw them over. White people still believe the system is designed to benefit them, when its really designed to benefit a wealthy elite. When that reality hits, it can be psychologically devastating. > > A lot of white people don’t think the system was designed to benefit them and most of the low wage workers you’re talking about didn’t go to college, and those that did, probably didn’t spend a lot of time learning about privilege theory in any of the classes they might have taken. But what they have seen over the last few decades is economic opportunities dry up for them, they’re worse off than their parents, and they don’t expect their children to do any better. That’d probably make anyone angry. For a lot of Americans, a 30 hour a week job at Wal-Mart might literally be the best they can do right now. While I happen to think privilege theory is a valid lens to view things, I imagine the idea that society was designed primarily to benefit those poor whites working at Wal-Mart is at once unbelievable and galling to them. I don’t think that goes against what I said, if anything it supports it. Maybe they don’t consciously think about these things, but unconsciously there is an assumption that America is theirs and the system is meant to work for them. Then they grow up and can’t make ends meet and it sparks psychological issues that aren’t as common among most non-whites, because those non-whites know the system is stacked against them and was built that way. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2021, 2:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-so-many-americans-killing-themselves-and-others-compared-to-other-countries/942975/20 "2021-05-27T14:27:34Z")
> [@Asuka](#): > > This is heavily going off topic but what’s with poorly written posts from Canadians/Australians/New Zealanders that seem to be all over the internet including Reddit and Facebook? I mean look at that original post > > > I think it is the worship guns > > And it’s always some weird thing of somebody claiming to be from Canada but then writing like an ESL student and then complaining about the United States. I too noticed that glaring (to me at least) error when I read the OP. I don’t deal with Reddit nor TwitFace so I can’t speak to postings there. One thought: A LOT of people now are posting from a phone. Which leads to all sorts of different mistakes as folks won’t proofread and the flakier spell checkers on average do flakier things. Other then the one missing word goof you cite, everything else “wrong” about the OP is punctuation or capitalization errors. Which are very much the prevalent mistakes I make when typing on a phone. Second thought: Plus we have the ever-increasing fraction of people who are speaking their posts. Which adds speech recognition glitches and the different register and style of spoken vs. written English to the mix. Bottom line: I am not convinced our OP is ESL or is non-Canadian. Canada certainly has lots of native-born Quebeckers for whom English _is_ their second language if they speak it at all. And lots of immigrants from everywhere for whom their ESL status is legit, but so is their Canadian-ness. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-so-many-americans-killing-themselves-and-others-compared-to-other-countries/942975.md?page=2)