Blacks often experience injustices and discrimination that can lead to poor mental health, but culture may play a role in deemphasizing behaviors that signal potential for suicide. Black youth are often taught to hide emotions by families, schools, and peers – told to “toughen up” or “pray about it.” Moreover, many Black Americans do not know about or have positive relationships with mental health resources, or may be reluctant to call upon such resources. Secrecy and distrust may cut people off from medical and mental health care and perpetuate the notion that “time heals all wounds.” The result may be suicides – and also behavior that leads to deaths or harms not recognized as suicidal.
Possibly, too, Black suicide rates seem relatively low because suicide is not straightforward to define. Some deaths that are not called suicides may amount to the same thing. One possibility is “suicide by cop,” in which individuals deliberately behave in threatening ways toward police, in attempts to provoke a lethal response. “Suicide by interpersonal violence” also happens, when individuals provoke family members, friends, or strangers to make lethal responses to them. Rather than simply categorizing violence among Black youth as “street violence,” or even bullying, analysts should consider ways in which certain Black youth seem to intentionally invoke violent encounters in the expectation of being harmed or even killed. Some of these situations may amount to suicide, which would imply that low statistical rates of suicide for African Americans are not what they seem. Possibly, the kinds of factors that make people unusually vulnerable to suicide are leading to Black deaths that amount to suicides, even if they are not officially classified as such.
Outreach and Prevention
The assumption that Blacks are less prone to suicide than other groups must be questioned – especially as this view pertains to Black youth. Lower official rates of suicide do not mean individuals and groups are immune from suicidal ideation and behaviors. Among African American youngsters, lower rates may only mean that some deaths are being misclassified. And even if rates are relatively low, the rise in Black youth suicides shows that interventions are needed.
Fortunately, data on recent trends in suicide and self-harm have sparked new efforts at outreach and prevention, including efforts particularly aimed at minority youth. Support groups encourage individuals, families, peers, and the general public to become more aware of potentially suicidal feelings and behaviors. And new forms of treatment combine counseling with heightened social support from family members and peers. To further strengthen preventative efforts, we must do additional research on the factors that contribute to suicide attempts and deaths – with careful attention to previously understudied populations and new sensitivity to social and cultural stressors that vary for different racial, economic, and age groups.
Kimya N. Dennis, PhD is a sociologist and criminologist with interdisciplinary research and community outreach dealing with suicide and suicidal self-harm, mental health, and reproductive freedom.
This article was originally published at Scholars Strategy Network.