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    [OC] The Gender Paradox of Suicide: women attempt more, but men die 3-4x times more
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    [OC] The Gender Paradox of Suicide: women attempt more, but men die 3-4x times more

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    42 Comments

    1. Frogophile on

      For women, it is a plea for help. For men, it is a permanent solution for a temporary problem.

    6. PossumNews on

      Men tend to do it more violently (firearms, hanging) which are generally effective and permanent, while women do pills generally which is either ineffective (not enough) or reversible (stomach pumping).

    7. gretafour on

      I’ve heard that women are more likely to attempt overdosing on pills, while men are likely to use a gun. That said, men’s mental health is still something that our culture doesn’t really know how to address while toxic masculinity reigns supreme.

    8. ShadowBannedAugustus on

      This data visualization is horrible. The axes (one of them not even starting at 0), the different chart types, the units. My god. This should go to r/dataishorrendous.

    10. ben121frank on

      There’s no “paradox” statistically. Men die more bc they are statistically more likely to choose methods with higher fatality rates such as firearms, compared to women who are statistically more likely to choose methods with lower fatality rates such as drug overdosing. There is undoubtedly a lot of discussion to be had around WHY that is, but the numbers are pretty clear on what is happening

    12. Danskoesterreich on

      I have female patients who come into the ED twice a week for paracetamol poisoning. Always in good overall condition. I have only ever seen men come in after hanging themselves sucessfully.

    13. H0vis on

      Men also more likely to die doing dumb shit for no reason. We’re often just not *that* invested in sticking around.

    15. Watermelon_Salesman on

      The supposed “attempts” mean nothing. At all. They’re cries for help.

      When men cry for help no one gives a fuck. When they “attempt” they usually succeed.

      Misandry ia disgusting.

    16. cliff99 on

      My understanding is that most of the people who are serious about killing themselves succeed, most of the ones that fail were looking for attention of some kind.

    19. Atomic_ad on

      What is considered an “attempted suicide”?  I can see that category being genuine attemps on life, or any kind of self harm.  WHO doesn’t have  standard definition, in some instances it includes acts where not injury is done to a person, or even suicidal ideation, which may contribute heavily to the differences.

    20. ThisPlaceIsNiice on

      As for women attempting more: Many people point out correct facts (men tend to choose more violent and effective methods, for whatever reason that may be), but what I have not seen pointed out is that the dead can’t re-attempt. Women tend to choose less effective means, therefore get saved much more often, and are able to re-attempt, some several times.

    21. freedomfightre on

      women want attention, men want results

      that’s why we get paid more, we get the job done /s

    22. LogicalJudgement on

      Methodology. Men tend to choose methods that are more effective where as women tend to choose methods that are “gentler.” This means men usually sustain damage too great to survive whereas women may not do enough damage to be fatal.

    25. aesthetician- on

      Unpopular opinion: Men die more because more men than women live fucked up shitty lives and when they commit suicide they mean it, not for attention.

    26. MattV0 on

      This chart is so annoying. Left you have per 100.000 and right per 100. Ok, but then you look at 15-24yo male and think, oh one per 1000 attempts is completed (which seems actually pretty low) and you notice, not even the numbers match. This makes both charts hard to compare.

    28. hartshornd on

      I remember in school my teacher had the saying “boys are dirty, violent, and don’t care about cleaning up. Girls are clean, proper and care about the mess they make” grim but rememberable.

    31. humanlvl1 on

      I’ve been thinking about the gendered nature of suicide rates a lot. One thing that is not included in these statistics is people (usually men) engaging in highly risky activities because of a death wish. I once got into motorbike Instagram reels and lead me to dudes bombing through dense traffic at speeds north of 150 mph mark. When they crash, their deaths aren’t recorded as suicide. Guys going on massive drug and booze binges who die from an overdose, or get stabbed when starting an argument don’t get recorded as suicide either, but can also be driven by a death wish. Men are both much more likely to OD and be victims of violent crime.

      I don’t actually know what construes for an attempted suicide, and I’m too lazy to check right now, but I have a feeling that the numbers of men dying of their own hands is even higher.

    32. crelt7 on

      Mixing per 100,000 and %, having both a bar graph and a line graph. How much worse can it get?

    33. 1ndomitablespirit on

      I wonder if women are more likely to attempt suicide as a cry for help, where most men assume they won’t get help anyway, so they use something that is more likely to do the job the first time?

    34. ShankThatSnitch on

      Mostly, women don’t really mean it. They do it as a cry for help, so they use methods that have a less likely chance to succeed. When men break, they have fully broken and intend to die.

    35. SeasonOfSpice on

      The real story here is how successful old people are at committing suicide compared to young people.

    38. SwissLeprechaun on

      Are men less likely to attempt to commit suicide, or are they less likely to admit that they attempted to commit suicide?

      I haven’t dug enough into the research to answer this question, but my suspicion leads me to believe that data on suicides is much more accurate than data on suicide attempts. But admitting this would require us to ask difficult questions about why we treat men so horribly.

    40. Confirmed_AM_EGINEER on

      I don’t think it is a paradox at all, I think there is something very simple at the core of this in a traditional western culture, in my example, the USA.

      Men see and deal with death all of the time even in regular jobs. Women, generally speaking, have an attempt made to shield them from such things and the men are the ones doing it.

      I would be interested to see whatever segment of this graph that is comprised of combat vets. I have a couple of friends and family that are in and we’re in there marines and army and saw multiple deployments. They all have had friends in the service kill themselves and as far as I know none of them failed.

      I would postulate that proximity to death, dealing out death, and a general knowledge of what makes people tick makes your suicide more effective because you know what really turns the lights off. I have a friend who was a medic and was deployed from 2012-2014 and he jokes in that kind of way medics do. “When I take myself out it’s gonna be with a grenade in each hand on both sides of my head.” Hard to say that wouldnt work….

    41. FlyingFakirr on

      Pretty sure this reversed in East Asian societies, or at least it did last time I checked. Also very subject to the vagaries of reporting bias and similar issues on tracking of attempts that are not successful

    42. WirelessZombie on

      Important to note that a lot of suicide data doesn’t differentiate intentionality. Parasuicide is “suicide attempts or gestures and self-harm where there is no actual intention to die” and in the broader context where women are more likely to self harm it makes sense to differentiate some suicide attempts as parasuicide, more a meshing of self harm and suicide.

      Obviously all attempts are very serious but in terms of data having a group that’s potentially repeatedly attempting suicide with low intentionality is an important nuance. While method is often cited as the difference, even when adjusting for the same kind of method there is a significant gender gap in results that reflect a difference in intentionality.