"Thirteen Reasons Why," and the problem with stories about young suicide

I’ve seen some posts about a new Netflix series based on a novel, “Thirteen Reasons Why.” It’s a young adult story, but it resonates with a lot of adults as well. I want to explain why the premise of this book troubles me. It’s not an isolated theme; I have seen multiple popular books follow this storyline. To be clear, I’m not criticizing anybody who enjoyed the book or the Netflix series. This story moved many people, and you have a right to enjoy whatever you do. Also, I’m not saying the author had no right to write this. I am very wary of artistic censorship and don’t want to discourage creativity. But I believe that in the interest of compassion and good taste, some topics ought to be approached more thoughtfully.

“Thirteen Reasons Why” is about the suicide of a 17-year-old girl named Hannah who was bullied. Shortly beforehand, she recorded a series of thirteen cassette tapes. They were sent to thirteen people, explaining why each of them were responsible for her death. A friend of hers had agreed to anonymously deliver them. The narrative is told through the perspective of Clay, a boy who Hannah addressed on one of the tapes. He has just received them and is listening to her story.

I spotted the book in a store a few months ago and was put off by the premise. Then I learned it was a bestseller and that it’s even on the summer reading list of some high school teachers, intended to help them understand teen bullying and suicide. They facilitate group discussions on this book. I recently watched the first episode of the series on Netflix. Not because I was drawn in, but because I wanted to see if my initial impression would hold up.

The introduction opens with a sketchy animated bicycle, drawn in the style of the animations from Juno. I like that style, but there was something a little jarring. It set the tone for something twee and cute. The first episode begins with a shot of the recently deceased Hannah’s locker, adorned with layers of adoring notes from her classmates. “I love you,” “I miss you,” “You were so beautiful.” There are hearts and paper flowers and a photo of her smiling and gorgeous. She narrates from the first scene, speaking from her cassette tape. This makes it seem like she’s watching and aware of how everyone reacts.

As the episode plays out, there are several issues made apparent. The first is that her suicide, while accurately portrayed as tragic, is romanticized. I get the impression that it’s supposed to be poetic. It sends the message that killing yourself in high school will immortalize you as young and beautiful. It will redeem your own transgressions and leave everyone in awe of you, talking about how wonderful you are. It’ll be a great form of revenge, leaving everyone sorry for any way they’ve done you wrong. You’ll be a high school celebrity preserved in a heart-shaped photograph behind rose tinted glass.

This is the last message that a high schooler struggling with mental health issues needs to absorb. I know because I was one of those kids. If this book had come out when I was fifteen, I would have eaten it up with a spoon. This was partly because of life situations and partly because of innate depression. Some people dismissed it as attention seeking. While I did seek unhealthy attention in my mid-teens, the self destruction was not insincere. It stemmed from genuine distress and genuine crises in my environment. While “Thirteen Reasons Why” would not have influenced me to kill myself, it would have lured me into further fixation with that topic. I would have romanticized it, believing the horrible cliché that suicidal people are “just angels who want to go home.”

Overwhelmingly, people don’t have helpful beliefs about suicide. Many vilify those who do it, saying they are selfish and cowardly. Others will almost canonize those who have made that choice. Although these responses are opposite, both come from the glorification of suffering. 

People who condemn victims of suicide feel that suffering is meaningful, and that you are cutting corners if you end your life to escape. That’s why they call it cowardly. (Some may have been traumatized by a loved one’s suicide and are angry, feeling abandoned. That’s understandable, but becomes harmful when used to condemn everyone who feels suicidal.) On the other hand, people who romanticize suicide victims seem to believe that suffering, in itself, makes you noble. It’s the idea that a person is a hero because they experienced terrible pain. It is true that many of us find meaning in our pain and can use that to develop more empathy. But framing suffering as heroic only encourages people to become stuck in such suffering, and can discourage others from offering help. This shows up in every societal level, from interpersonal relationships to political “bootstrap theory.”

Help needs to be delivered in more than one form. You need friends and social relationships, but friends are not therapists and shouldn’t be placed in that role. Emotional support is distinct from depending on one or several people to solve all our problems. I have made that mistake in the past, and have been on the receiving end as well. It’s a huge weight to hear somebody say, “You’re the only one I can count on” or “You’re the only reason I can get up in the morning.” If you have mental health problems yourself, they can be triggered by that type of emotional drain. At the same time, many people with those problems are afraid to reach out because they think that talking about it at all will be a burden. This is why balance needs to be sought, and more than one type of help is needed. Friendship and therapy can’t replace one another.

In stories like “Thirteen Reasons Why,” the message is that suicide could have been prevented if others reached out, and that unkind treatment drives people to suicide. It’s true that many people have said they decided to continue living because others were helpful. It’s true that social isolation and bullying contribute a great deal to suicide, especially for teenagers. It’s hard to envision a world outside of high school when you’re that young. But in “Thirteen Reasons Why,” Hannah explicitly blames the people on her tapes. Some of the acts committed against her were horrific, while others were petty. The author wanted to communicate that even seemingly trivial things can add up. That’s true, but the kids in the story who committed the less aggressive acts will now spend the rest of their lives shackled to the idea that they made her kill herself, all for getting jealous or gossiping or making a hurtful comment. They did all of these things as kids. This doesn’t mean they weren’t responsible for their behavior, but I don’t think a person should be damned for life because of a shitty thing they once did in high school. The author, Jay Asher, may not have condoned her behavior. But the overall story conveys the idea that these kids were responsible for her death and that suicide is an appropriate act of revenge.

Hannah sends the tapes to Clay and, in the beginning, states that he is one of the reasons she is dead. But then later, in the ninth tape, she apologizes for implicating him in this. She tells him he is the nicest person she ever met and that he didn’t make her feel suicidal. She says she had actually fallen in love with him and wished they had more time together.

I know the audience had to wait to hear Clay’s tape in order to create suspense, and to offer a cliffhanger. But in the context of the story, it was cruel. It came across as manipulation. She knew he had feelings for her and had been a good friend. Hannah initially blamed Clay—knowing full well that he had never harmed her—and then strung him along to make him listen, only to basically say, “Just kidding; it wasn’t your fault.” All of this sounds terrible. And adding that she would have been his girlfriend if she had chosen to live will haunt him for the rest of his life. He will always wonder if he could have prevented this.

It’s relevant to the plot that Hannah is beautiful, which the other characters respond to with jealousy and frustrated attraction. I can see how that would play into the story, but it implies that her death was even more of a loss because she was pretty. I have never found a story about an unattractive girl who died tragically. This isn’t only an issue with “Thirteen Reasons”; it’s an ever-pervasive theme. As it adds up, it drives home the message that pretty girls’ lives are more valuable. Specifically waifish, doe-eyed, white, artsy, indie, middle class or wealthy girls. They are the source of endless fascination, the Manic Pixie Dream Girl whose life came to a tragic end. This is a trope I call “Manic Pixie Dead Girl.”

It’s notable that much of the bullying was slut-shaming. The author may have intended to show that slut-shaming causes damage, but that message was diluted by the fact that Hannah had never done the sexual things she was accused of. It was repeatedly stated that she was “innocent,” that she had never done more with Justin than kiss him. Not only that, but it was her first kiss. The rumors were presented as even worse because they were lies. But why should it matter whether or not it was true? Isn’t it wrong for people to bully others about their sex lives to begin with? How was it anybody’s business if Hannah had hooked up with Justin, or whether it was her first kiss or her fiftieth? The gossip wasn’t bad because it was untrue; it was bad because it was judgment in the first place.

I’ve heard a lot of people say they liked this story, including some who have been bullied and have been suicidal. Jay Asher has said that numerous teens have reached out to him to thank him for writing the book. I’m glad it has been helpful for so many. I’m happy this book exists for them. Maybe my reaction is unusual, but some of these implications worry me. Suicide shouldn’t be portrayed as a cute, quirky hipster trend; as a way to make others sorry; or as a way to gain permanent love.

On the Cannonization of Suffering

One of the most commonly believed ideas that I would most like to see eradicated is the concept that putting up with another person's shitty behavior makes someone a "saint." I've believed this before, I've said it myself, and have heard it said by countless other people--and never once has it yielded a positive result. The principle behind it is damaging because to canonize suffering is to discourage people from standing up for themselves. It tells them that tolerating unacceptable behavior makes them a good person. It also elevates those who mistreat their peers by implying that they're somehow contributing to a greater good, to the character-building of their victims.

Additionally, not everyone who accepts terrible behavior from others is exempt from doing harm themselves. The world isn't solely made up of aggressors and targets; there can be overlap between the two. You can be aggressive in one relationship and passive in another. To ignore that is to overlook the complexities of our social lives and the contradictions that exist in people.

Standing up to homophobia, and what *not* to do

When someone is harassed because they're assumed to be gay, and they have neither confirmed nor denied it, one of the most misguided ways in which others try to defend them is by vehemently insisting that the person in question is straight. The intent may be protective, but it reinforces the idea that being gay is a terrible thing which has to be denied. When calling out harassment, it's important to direct the focus to the perpetrator's behavior rather than to their target's orientation.

Another mistake is to flip it around and tell the homophobe, "Well, you must be gay. Why else do you care so much?" When that's said in an accusatory way that's meant to make somebody defensive, it also expresses the idea that being gay is wrong—whether or not that's the intention. That, and it obscures the fact that there really are straight people who are committed to making anyone miserable who is either gay or perceived to be. The majority of it is not some self-sabotaging effort orchestrated by closeted folks. In implying that it is, people absolve heterosexual homophobes of responsibility.

Never Trust Anyone Who Hasn't Looked in a Mirror

          The other day I came across an article that must be seen to be believed. It’s called “Never Trust Anyone Who Hasn't Been Punched in the Face,” written by a man named Scott Locklin. It's been receiving a great deal of attention and praise. I clicked on the article because the title intrigued me. What followed was a tangent so riddled with misogyny, gender stereotypes, racism, homophobia, and outrageous misinformation that my husband theorized that it may actually be from another world, transported to ours via the Tardis.

          I briefly wondered if it was satire, but as I continued to read, I realized the truth. Locklin wholeheartedly believes his own bunk. He’s expressed the same views in other articles he’s written, most of which are featured on Takimag.com. (Taki’s Magazine is a publication which pretentiously describes itself as “mental caviar.” The “About Us” page claims that they’re politically and ideologically neutral, but they mainly publish material that is sexist, racist, or homophobic in nature. Only two of their columnists are women, both of whom are virulently anti-feminist. Another regular columnist is Pat Buchanan, who wrote a piece bemoaning the “anti-Christian” assault on Christmas. Despite the fact that 77 percent of American adults identify as Christian, America is clearly an anti-Christian country and Christmas is in grave danger of going the way of the dinosaurs and Paris Hilton’s career.)

         I couldn’t resist adding my own input. Locklin’s article follows below, and my own commentary is the bold print after each of his paragraphs.

****

“Conservatives like to talk about the causes of Western Civilization’s downfall: feminism, loose morality, drug abuse, Christianity’s decline, reality TV. Blaming civilization’s downfall on lardy hagfish such as Andrea Dworkin is like a doctor diagnosing senility by an old person’s wrinkles. The fact that anyone listened to such a numskull is a symptom, not the cause, of a culture in decline.”

        At first I was perplexed as to why he’d mention Andrea Dworkin at all, let alone mark her as the first target of his diatribe. She’s hardly relevant to this topic or to modern public discourse. Later on in his screed, I realized why. You’ll see.

“The cause of civilizational decline is dirt-simple: lack of contact with objective reality. The great banker-journalist (and founder of the original National Review) Walter Bagehot said it well almost 150 years ago: ‘History is strewn with the wrecks of nations which have gained a little progressiveness at the cost of a great deal of hard manliness, and have thus prepared themselves for destruction as soon as the movements of the world gave a chance for it.’”

      "Hard manliness." I see what he did there.

“Every great civilization reaches a point of prosperity where it is possible to live your entire life as a pacifist without any serious consequences. Many civilizations have come to the state of devolution represented by modern Berkeley folkways, from wife-swapping to vegetarianism. These ideas don’t come from a hardscrabble existence in contact with nature’s elemental forces; they are the inevitable consequence of being an effete urban twit removed from meaningful contact with reality.”

           …And this article was penned by a Berkley-dwelling number cruncher who self-admittedly has “limited experience with violence.” Also, referring to wife-swapping as an act of “devolution” contradicts his own argument, since that practice would almost certainly lend itself to a population increase. He makes it sound like a mainstream lifestyle within our society, rather than something marginal. Now who’s the one “removed from meaningful contact with reality”?

         A side note: Why the bitterness about vegetarians? This resentment is pervasive in his other articles as well. Did this guy have a traumatic experience with a soy burger or something? And how presumptuous—and inaccurate—to assume that vegetarians don’t get into fights. There are wrestlers, MMA fighters, and other athletes who eat vegetarian and vegan diets. You don’t need to eat meat to kick ass.

        I may be overanalyzing a bit, but it seems that Locklin equates "meat eater" with "tough guy" because to him, meat isn't just a part of one's diet. He appears to think that eating an animal is an act of conquer. It's one of many examples of his overcompensation. (Not that every non-vegetarian eats meat because they want to "conquer" an animal, but those who regard vegetarians as weak and wimpy seem to hold that attitude. It's a form of posturing that's near-painful to listen to.)

“The over-civilized will try to portray their decadence as something “highly evolved” and worthy of emulation because it can only exist in the hothouse of highly civilized urban centers, much like influenza epidemics.”

         Actually, non-urban people can certainly be vegetarians or wife-swappers. And influenza epidemics are hardly limited to “highly civilized urban centers.”

        Yes, it is flawed reasoning to deduce that a behavior which can only exist in a highly advanced society must, in itself, be an evolved and highly productive behavior. But as we've established, vegetarianism and non-traditional marriages don't fall into this catagory. Another fact to consider is that a society resting on fistfights, gang violence, and abuse is not highly evolved, and certainly not one to strive toward. Technology doesn't separate us from that way of life, either. On the contrary, technology often enables us to develop more far-reaching forms of warfare.

“Somehow these twittering blockheads missed out on what the word “evolution” means. Evolution involves brutal and often violent natural selection, and these people have not been exposed to brutal evolutionary forces any more than a typical urban poodle.”

        In other words, people never face violence in cities?

“Through human history, vigorous civilizations had various ways of dealing with the unfortunate human tendency toward being a weak ninny. The South Koreans (for my money, the hardest men in Asia today) have brutally tough military training as a rite of passage. I’ve been told that the Soviet system had students picking potatoes during national holidays. The ancient Greeks used competitive sports and constant warfare. The Anglo-American working classes, the last large virtuous group of people left in these countries, use bullying, violent sports, fisticuffs, and hard living.”

           There is so much wrong with this paragraph that I barely know where to begin. You’re either a violent bully or a “weak ninny”? Wow, someone’s dichotomous thinking is showing. He uses the ancient Greeks as an example of a group that thrived because they were stoic and aggressive. They were tough, but also every bit as “decadent” as the contemporary urban masses he sneers at. Not only that; he’s trying to condone brutality by using ancient Greece and the Soviet Union as examples to emulate, though both of those governments fell. (Whether their downfalls were due to warfare or in spite of it is beside the point.) In regard to the Soviet Union, he criticizes their form of government later on in his essay. This article has the consistency of a bowl of Jell-O.

           He lauds bullying as some sort of strength of character, when by its very definition, it is anything but. Bullying is the act of targeting someone vulnerable; someone who won’t pose a challenge to oneself. In that sense, a bully is a coward.

          Also, the Anglo-Americans are “the last virtuous group of people left in these countries”? Mad props on the xenophobia and white supremacist overtones, bro.

“I think there is a certain worldview that comes from violent experience. It’s something like…manhood. You don’t have to be the world’s greatest badass to be a man, but you have to be willing to throw down when the time is right.”

         Or, in the author’s case, you have to imagine you would hypothetically be willing to beat up those nefarious wife-swapping vegetarians if one of them kidnaps you in his Prius, force-feeds you his homegrown soy products, and tries to rope you into his polyamorous marriage. In reality, any one of those folks could probably kick him to the curb with their faux-leather Birkenstocks.

“A man who has been in a fight or played violent sports has experienced more of life and manhood than a man who hasn’t. Fisticuffs, wrestling matches, knife fights, violent sport, duels with baseball bats, facing down guns, or getting crushed in the football field—men who have had these experiences are different from men who have not. Men who have trained for or experienced such encounters know about bravery and mental fortitude from firsthand experience. Men who have been tested physically know that inequality is a physical fact. Men who know how to deal out violence know that radical feminism’s tenets—that women and men are equal—are a lie. We know that women are not the same as men: not physically, mentally, or in terms of moral character.”

           Welcome in, sexism! I was wondering when you’d arrive. For those of us less fluent in Misogynese, his dig at women roughly translates to: “I’ve been blocked too many times on OKCupid.” BTW, way to knock feminism without the slightest inkling about what it is. By asserting that men and women are equal, feminists do not claim that both genders are “the same.” As far as that’s concerned, men are vastly different from other men and women vary greatly from other women.

          From the get-go of this essay, he’d set the bar pretty high in terms of gender clichés, and this paragraph does not disappoint. The statement that “a man who has been in a fight or played violent sports has experienced more of life and manhood than a man who hasn’t” is meaningless. You could say that a man who’s attended college or traveled to foreign countries is different than a man who has not. That generalization could apply to anything.

“Men who have fought know how difficult it is to stand against the crowd and that civilization is fragile and important. A man who has experienced violence knows that, at its core, civilization is an agreement between men to behave well. That agreement can be broken at any moment; it’s part of manhood to be ready when it is. Men who have been in fights know about something that is rarely spoken of without snickering these days: honor. Men who have been in fights know that, on some level, words are just words: At some point, words must be backed up by deeds.”

           “Civilization is an agreement between men to behave well.” He completely excludes women from his definition of civilization, even though we make up over half the population and we certainly fight, too. As far as words being backed up by deeds, who’s to say that those deeds always have to be violent in nature? There are numerous ways to change society, stand up for oneself, and gain power without employing violence. Civil disobedience, boycotts, changing laws, suing one’s oppressors, and gaining media attention are just a few of those methods. History has shown time and again that there are myriad factors which contribute to people gaining power. You don’t need to be a bloodthirsty brute. People climb to positions of influence by way of intelligence, talent, useful information, money, manipulation, social connections, and more. Not all of those are positive or honest means of ascent, but they’re not necessarily violent.

“Above all, men who have been in fights know that there is nothing good or noble about being a victim. This is a concept the modern “conservative movement,” mostly run by wimps, has lost, probably irrevocably. They’re forever tugging at my heartstrings, from No Child Left Behind to Israel’s plight to MLK's wonders to whining that the media doesn’t play fair to the overwrought emotional appeals they use to justify dropping bombs on Muslims. The Republicans even took seriously a pure victim-candidate: Michelle Bachman. As far as can be told, she’s a middle-American Barack Obama with boobs and a slightly loopier world view.”

            Ah, yes. You can’t write a racist, sexist, xenophobic piece without a good old fashioned dose of victim-blaming. No, a victim is not always a brave or noble person (it would depend on the individual), and it’s true that victimhood is not a badge of honor in itself. At the same time, it is neither a sign of weakness nor a fair cause for derision. Many people who have been victimized have chosen to turn their experiences into triumphs by learning from them and using their unique insight to help others avoid their own plights.

           Besides, what kind of alternate universe does he live in? Is there really a parallel world in which the modern GOP is overly sympathetic to marginalized victims? Or another planet in which Republican media frequently invokes the rhetoric of MLK? No Child Left Behind was in no way a sentimental initiative. Sure, it used a double-speak name in a shallow attempt to sound more humane, but it focused on punishing schools for their underperforming students. It assessed a student’s entire aptitude by their grade on a standardized test.

          As far as the comparison of Obama to Michelle Bachman, I have no words. Just an incredulous blink.

“Modern “civilized” males don’t get in fistfights. They don’t play violent sports. They play video games and, at best, watch TV sports. Modern males are physical and emotional weaklings. The ideal male isn’t John Wayne or James Bond or Jimmy Stewart anymore. It’s some crying tit that goes to a therapist, a sort of agreeable lesbian with a dick who calls the police (whom he hates in theory) when there is trouble. The ideal modern male is the British shrimp who handed his pants over to the looter in south London.”

1.) A great many civilized males and females play violent sports. What makes them civilized is the fact that they don’t allow that violence to leak into other areas of their lives.

2.) I understand using examples of John Wayne or James Bond, but when was Jimmy Stewart ever regarded as a masculine ideal? He was admired, but never seen as especially macho. Additionally, James Bond is highly educated and cultured—two qualities that Locklin often thumbs his nose at.

3.) This can be paraphrased as “real men don’t cry or go to therapists.” I just rolled by eyes so far that I’m surprised they didn’t lock into place.

4.) Aside from the glaring sexism and homophobia inherent in using “lesbian” as an insult for men, it’s not even consistent with his other thoughts. He hates men who he sees as “effete” and “wimpy” (his definition of feminine). In the beginning of this article he took a swipe at Andrea Dworkin for her feminist outlook, but her perspective was far from pacifistic. She was frequently criticized for being forceful and endorsing violence toward male supremacists. She doesn’t represent the face of feminism at all; there’s great variation within the movement. However, the author seems to use her as an example of the quintessential feminist. He only criticizes aggression when women use it. This tells me that it's not really passivity he objects to; it's people who don't conform to gender stereotypes.

5.) He is in no position to express contempt for those who would call the police instead of taking vigilante action. Unless he’s prepared to take down a burglar with his own brass knuckles (or tin knuckles, more likely), it’s just plain ridiculous for him to judge. Anyway, police are trained to maintain order and use violence if necessary, so you’d think he would appreciate their societal role.

“How did we get here? Estrogens in the food supply? Cultural Marxism’s corrosive influence? Small families? Some of the greatest badasses I’ve known had many brothers to fight with growing up. When good men who will fight are all extinct, there is no more civilization. No lantern-jawed viragos are going to save you from the barbarian hordes. No mincing Nancy boys with Harvard diplomas will stand up for the common decencies: They’re a social construct, dontcha know. The conservative movement won’t save you: They’re chicken-hearted careerists petrified of offending a victim group.”

           Sounds like someone’s a subscriber to WorldNetDaily.

           Plenty of scrappy adults grew up without brothers to fight with, and plenty of pacifists have siblings.

          Why does he have a problem with barbarian hordes? They’re far from the “mincing Nancy boys” he disdains. It sounds more like he wishes he were a member of a barbarian horde instead of a metropolitan office worker.

          His anti-intellectualism makes little sense, since he seems to be desperately grasping for the tone of a Harvard graduate. He believes that “common decencies” are not a social construct, but blindly insists that bullying, sexism, rigid gender roles, homophobia, and overcompensating machismo are healthy and innate aspects of our nature. Doesn't common decency require us to not hold those attitudes?

         And once again, he asserts that American conservatism somehow panders to victim groups. I don’t know which bodily orifice he pulled that concept from, but it certainly was not from his head.

“Teddy Roosevelt, my ideal President, kept a lion and a bear as pets in the White House and took his daily exercise doing jiu-jitsu and boxing. He even lost vision in an eye in a friendly boxing match while he was president. Our last three glorious leaders are men who kept fluffy dogs and went jogging. I don’t trust squirrelly girly-men in any context. When confronted with difficult decisions, they don’t do what’s right or tell the truth—they’ll do what’s easy or politically expedient. Unlike the last three, Teddy Roosevelt never sent men to die in pointless wars, though he was more than happy to go himself or risk his neck wrestling with bears.”

         So he believes that an ideal president treats himself as expendable by choosing to go out and wrestle with bears while the country is in his hands?

        And “real” men don’t own fluffy pets? I wonder if he’s aware that his favorite president had guinea pigs.

“I’m no great shakes: I’m a shrimpy egghead in a suit who thinks about math all day. I don’t train for fighting anymore, and my experiences with violence are fairly limited. Nonetheless, I judge people on these sorts of things. When I first meet a man, I don’t care what kind of sheepskins or awards he has on his walls. I don’t care if he is liberal or conservative. I want to know if they have my back in a fight. That’s really the only thing that matters.”

        He recognizes this about himself, yet believes he’s still in a position to judge. Not only that, but he claims not to judge people by their political views while assuming that a liberal would be unwilling or unable to defend another person in a fight.

       Then again, what do I know about logic or consistency? I’m just an “effete urban twit,” and worst of all, female. I should just spend my days picking flowers and baking cupcakes for a bored internet-surfing financier who wishes he were a Skyrim character. He’s the real expert on what life is all about.

You can read the original article here: http://thoughtcatalog.com/2013/never-trust-anyone-who-hasnt-been-punched-in-the-face/