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from the reports-of-my-death-are-not-exaggerated dept.
The U.S. Centers For Disease Control And Prevention (CDC) released a new Vital Signs report on Thursday, 7 June, 2018.
In the press release about the new report, the CDC states that:
Suicide rates have been rising in nearly every state, according to the latest Vital Signs report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). In 2016, nearly 45,000 Americans age 10 or older died by suicide. Suicide is the 10th leading cause of death and is one of just three leading causes that are on the rise.
[...]
Researchers found that more than half of people who died by suicide did not have a known diagnosed mental health condition at the time of death. Relationship problems or loss, substance misuse; physical health problems; and job, money, legal or housing stress often contributed to risk for suicide. Firearms were the most common method of suicide used by those with and without a known diagnosed mental health condition.
Are any Soylentils contemplating suicide? Do you know anyone who has attempted or succeeded in taking their own life? Why do you think suicide rates are on the rise?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 09 2018, @01:37AM (7 children)
Keep dreaming Skippy. You cannot be Alpha while putting pussy on a pedastal.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday June 09 2018, @04:14AM (5 children)
Has it occurred to you that maybe he's not interested in "being Alpha?" Personally, if I were straight he sounds like the kind of man I'd be looking for.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 5, Insightful) by bobthecimmerian on Saturday June 09 2018, @01:28PM (4 children)
I'm taken, but thanks for the kind words. If you private message me, I can send you the address where you can mail a sympathy card to my wife. ;)
"Alpha male" crap annoys the hell out of me. Real power means you have nothing to prove. I'm not going to have more muscles or a bigger dick if I trade my minivan for a $55,000 pickup truck, or buy a motorcycle, or get tattoos. I can treat everyone as equals because first and foremost they are equals and second I don't feel threatened by anyone. I have my own insecurities and anxieties, but I don't make a laughable attempt to wallpaper over them by being a colossal asshole.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 09 2018, @03:43PM
Around here you don't need trucks or tattoos, just a crusty beak and some moldy wings!
(Score: 4, Interesting) by acid andy on Saturday June 09 2018, @04:17PM (2 children)
Exactly this. Aside from the fact that's it an old-fashioned and fuzzy biological concept that applies in questionable amounts to the rest of the animal kingdom, let alone to modern humans, those who resort to repeatedly applying the term to themselves and others certainly seem to have a certain amount of insecurity. I always think understated power is the more attractive aesthetic
With regard to feminism and even putting women on pedestals, there are plenty of people that do that more through choice (be it ideological or sexual preference) rather than necessity. There's even the cliche of the powerful executive submitting to a dominatrix! Giving up power and showing respect for another requires a certain confidence and strength of character in itself as well. Being a brash, abusive asshole is easy.
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 2) by bobthecimmerian on Saturday June 09 2018, @06:44PM (1 child)
I think putting someone on a pedestal has subtly different connotations compared to allowing yourself to be dominated or - if it's your fetish - abused by a woman. I think a pedestal tends to indicate unrealistic ideas about what women are and how their mind works, like they're special angelic beings or something. Which might seem harmless at worst, but I think any classifying of women as fundamentally different than men is risky. When your relationship goes sour, or you can't get a date, or the person you love desperately is callous or willfully cruel to you, I think it's too easy to develop a mass hatred or distrust or something for all women. But if you view each woman as human as each man, then you realize any particular female asshole or idiot means exactly as much for the whole sex as any particular male asshole or idiot means for the whole male sex.
(Score: 2) by acid andy on Saturday June 09 2018, @07:10PM
When you put it like that, I see the distinction but I'm not sure the AC that introduced the term does.
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by bobthecimmerian on Saturday June 09 2018, @01:22PM
No pedestal. Equal footing. That's all.
A lot of guys have a problem thinking women as some kind of "mysterious other". They think differently, their minds work in bizarre and alien ways, they have an indecipherable logic, whatever. It's an incorrect and more importantly counterproductive way to view the situation. Women eat, sleep, drink, shit, have hopes and dreams, have back pains and itches, get bored, get happy, get sad, just like men. Through upbringing or maybe innate tendencies they're more likely to be focused on social connections than most guys. And for some bizarre reason I'll never understand but am very thankful for most of them are attracted to the male body instead of the female body. They're not that different from us, and they're not impossible to understand.
And even a lot of women's supposed craziness is easy to understand if you look at it that way. "Lots of women are attracted to asshole alpha males." Yeah? Tell me how many hetero guys are turned off by the half-dressed tough girl biker chicks - not many. Confidence is sexy, for every guy that wants a girl who likes to be bossed around there's another guy who wants a woman who goes after what she wants, likes her looks and doesn't care what anyone else thinks, and won't take shit from anyone. "Women are hyper-sensitive about their looks." Ever have a wife or girlfriend tell you you're getting fat flabby? I guarantee you will want to cry, scream, or hit her (that doesn't mean it's okay to hit, just that it's the first thing to come to mind). "Women don't understand blue balls." Sure they do, they can be horny and frustrated too. But nobody ever owes anyone else sex, not even a spouse. If your significant other wants sex with you a lot less than you want sex with them, discuss it. If things don't change, end the relationship.
Don't put them on a pedestal, don't treat them like dogs. Just treat 'em like people.