Black male children ages 5-12 are committing suicide at rates higher than any other racial group
- Thread starter Turk
- Start date
This right here...You don’t hear about this too much tho
I’ve dealt with suicidal thoughts almost my whole life. It sucks. Racism and the awareness of my presence as an underclass in America, also amped my feeling up by a thousand. Call me weak, idgaf. shyt is deep and real.
Being black is painful and being a black boy is hard because society pathologizes and demonizes you before your even able to understand what they’re doing.
Young black men need guidance, love, representation, positive masculine role models who teach them to respect themselves and find meaning and inner peace. Their must be more done to understand and appreciate the black male condition.
I’m working on writing a book or video series about black masculinity, mental health, race, gender and self improvement for Black males.
I feel for the young brehs. This hits home
thanks for sharing your experiences, I just think it's sad and troubling people (especially us as black folks) don't want to acknowledge this or just sweep it under the rug.
This has nothing to do with it.
Being Black in white society and dealing with racism, prejudice, discrimination, and the crux of bearing the weight of it all have more to do with cause and effect than some silly mantra of somehow black people growing up in the suburbs compared to the inner city make one less prone to factors that might lead to suicidal thoughts and depression. This is silly and I know people on here are better than this. Those factors aforementioned transcend class lines.
Here's why...
Op-Ed: Black Children Are Dying By Suicide At An Alarming Rate
Child psychiatrist Dr. Byron Young, MD offers solutions and solace to combat this troubling trend.
Historically, the Black community has never had a high rate of suicide. Despite our troubled and turbulent history in the US, we have generally held the lowest incidence of suicide among all races.
“Being an African-American person is a social identity that comes with a lot of difficulty. There's oppression, the bias of blackness, the history and how it led to poverty,” says Dr. Young, “So we’re a group of people who have had lot of oppression and yet still, suicide was not common among us for a very long time.”
Dr. Young attributes our cultural resilience to the strong bonds most of us share with extended family, aunts, uncles, cousins and grandparents who remain connected and close.
A 2013 study that examined extended family found the Black community has more “fictive kin” networks than white people.
These are the “cousins” who aren't’ really cousins, but come to all the family events or the “auntie” that’s really your mother’s best friend, but is a constant at every graduation or major life event.
However, things are starting to change for us.
Now, with the rise of our dependence on the internet, our communities tend to be formed online. And more than half of two-parent families are also households in which both parents work.
Currently, Black children represent the highest percentage of children being raised in single-parent households (65% compared to 25% of white children). So more kids are getting themselves home after school and occupying their time without parental guidance.
“We’re a bit more secular than we use to be as a community,” Dr. Young explains, “So now, because of technology, [they] get all kinds of extra influences and the protective factors that [they] would have maybe gotten from Grandma aren’t present as much.”
As oppression, racism and stereotypes continue to weigh down on this new generation, the same as it has for previous generations, it is also coupled with a diminished extended family structure and an increased opportunity to ruminate over self-harm.
Suicide is also being normalized through the support of online communities that provide affirmation instead of discouragement or mental health resources
Op-Ed: Black Children Are Dying By Suicide At An Alarming Rate
Child psychiatrist Dr. Byron Young, MD offers solutions and solace to combat this troubling trend.
Historically, the Black community has never had a high rate of suicide. Despite our troubled and turbulent history in the US, we have generally held the lowest incidence of suicide among all races.
“Being an African-American person is a social identity that comes with a lot of difficulty. There's oppression, the bias of blackness, the history and how it led to poverty,” says Dr. Young, “So we’re a group of people who have had lot of oppression and yet still, suicide was not common among us for a very long time.”
Dr. Young attributes our cultural resilience to the strong bonds most of us share with extended family, aunts, uncles, cousins and grandparents who remain connected and close.
A 2013 study that examined extended family found the Black community has more “fictive kin” networks than white people.
These are the “cousins” who aren't’ really cousins, but come to all the family events or the “auntie” that’s really your mother’s best friend, but is a constant at every graduation or major life event.
However, things are starting to change for us.
Now, with the rise of our dependence on the internet, our communities tend to be formed online. And more than half of two-parent families are also households in which both parents work.
Currently, Black children represent the highest percentage of children being raised in single-parent households (65% compared to 25% of white children). So more kids are getting themselves home after school and occupying their time without parental guidance.
“We’re a bit more secular than we use to be as a community,” Dr. Young explains, “So now, because of technology, [they] get all kinds of extra influences and the protective factors that [they] would have maybe gotten from Grandma aren’t present as much.”
As oppression, racism and stereotypes continue to weigh down on this new generation, the same as it has for previous generations, it is also coupled with a diminished extended family structure and an increased opportunity to ruminate over self-harm.
Suicide is also being normalized through the support of online communities that provide affirmation instead of discouragement or mental health resources
This scares me so much for my son. I hate reading stuff like this.
Could we really blame this on "psycho moms and absent fathers" though?Psycho moms and absent fathers
Every day of being black in this country is just fukking like bizarro world.
Having to wade through spaces where the majority of people don't look like you...and they already view you as the enemy or an undesirable and the fact that no matter how hard they deny it, all white people being racist or harboring micro to macro levels of racism just by the way they are socialized in this society
Having to deal with racism and prejudice from micro to macro levels
Society automatically views blackness as negative and whiteness as a positive no matter how much fukking dirt white people do and no matter who they screw over, we just have to accept it, it's just the way this society is...and that's fukking bullshyt
Having to see black death on a loop with seemingly a new black man or black woman that's slain by police and never gets justice
Or another black man, black woman, or black child stigmatized and demonized for existing while black in this racist white supremacist society.
I could only speak for straight black men, but imagine the added crux of being black AND gay, lesbian, transgender, bi, etc...dealing with racism and homophobia.
Sometimes I even wonder where we even fit in this society where people hate us and champion us at the same damn time...our presence is welcomed, and not at the same time. They want us to assimilate but they actively stop us from assimiliating.
And look at the centuries of torment black peopel have faced globally, slavery, colonization, redlining, jim crow laws, lynching laws, etc....the fact we even still alive is a blessing, but I understand how and why young black folks could get depressed dealing with all this crap...especially when our peers tend to view us being depressed or anxious or having suicidal thoughts as a flaw...that we're supposed to be tough, constantly turning lemons into lemonade, not showing any emotions, having to be everything to everyone at any moment...if we show any sign of pain from this society that hurts us incessantly somehow we make people uncomfortable.
I mean, trying to comparmentalize all of this to just simple answers is foolish...
Last edited:
This was by design. Black communities and black people were targeted since god knows when. Destroy the black family and you eventually destroy the minds and the self esteem of young black boys and young black girls. This was done since slavery. Centuries of this.The demonization and destruction of the black image.
That's why I don't give a fukk about white people and their issues or their problems with depression. They got it easy. Chin the fukk up and enjoy that racial privilege you a$$holes, that's why you fukked over every other race of people right? So you can enjoy your white supremacy, white privilege and starbucks? Don't complain to me about shyt cracker. Meanwhile, y'all stay destroying us in so many ways and want us to accept it, while they refuse to give a fukk about us and our issues, but want us to care about their damn kids shooting up schools and killing themselves over words on a phone or laptop screen.
Fukwatutalkinwatisaylaw
Superstar
People gone look over this but it's tha truth.. Instead of facing ur bullies and fighting they teaching these kids to run and be punks... I was neva bullied cuz win loose or draw I would throw hands at the drop of a hat and if I think I would loose i'mma punch u in tha mouth while u talkin shyt.. I neva wanted to kill myself.. And that homo shyt is even worse on young impressionable minds
Nah despite all of that we've had historically a far lower suicide rate than white ppl. I remember reading this paper about it
In fact, black children suicide rate is 50% of whites after adolescence. This is a recent trend
Agree heavily with this
True.... it is recent... it used to be whites that were known to commit suicide. My friends brother committed suicide, my mom did too. It’s becoming more of thing in our community. But I struggled with it from childhood and on. It was taboo back when I was struggling with it. It’s scary to see this... is it social media and technology? That’s the only thing I can think of that’s different from other generations and decades. Single parenting has been an issue in the black community for decades now... but technology has become a huge part of society since the early 2000’s... The difference now is that kids have more access to it than previous generations. I think it’s that, and processed food. Gut is connected to the mental health. They’re loading food up with all kind of shyt these days.
Lifejennings
Superstar
They were raised by the we are the world, racism is in the past, coddle generation, so this was bound to happen.