Statistical analysis is hard.
(Veterans) were more than twice as likely to commit suicide in 2005 than non-vets. (Veterans committed suicide at the rate of between 18.7 to 20.8 per 100,000, compared to other Americans, who did so at the rate of 8.9 per 100,000.)
One age group stood out. Veterans aged 20 through 24, those who have served during the war on terror. They had the highest suicide rate among all veterans, estimated between two and four times higher than civilians the same age. (The suicide rate for non-veterans is 8.3 per 100,000, while the rate for veterans was found to be between 22.9 and 31.9 per 100,000.)
Bill Sweetman is smart.
In the US, male veterans outnumber female veterans 13:1. Since four times as many males as women commit suicide in the general population, you’d expect the rate among veterans to be close to the rate among males – 17.6/100,000 per year in 2002 – and indeed it is, if the CBS raw numbers are correct.
CBS also makes an issue of the fact that suicide rates among younger veterans exceed that of the general population by an even bigger margin – but again, that’s what you’d expect, because in that age group, the male-to-female imbalance in suicide rates is greatest, almost six to one.
I wish CBS Evening News (with Katie Couric) was smart.
Every suicide is a tragedy. Sensationalizing those tragedies in order to sell adspace – I will not say for political purposes – is a grotesquerie.
You’re much kinder than I… For whatever purpose, sensationalizing it stinks!
Ghouls.
Lies, damned lies, and statistics!
Lex,
It would be nice if perchance they would list the source of thier numbers. Always handy to be able to see the data from which such numbers are drawn.
Perhaps I’ll be called out on these commets as I was on others. No matter. Still and all, what is the big hue and cry regarding suicide? Haven’t generation after generation been told it’s better to burn out than to rust?
Do not ad agency after ad agency cater to the 20-35 year old demographic? Are we not told that we need to measure up to the hip, cool lifestyle? It’s always better to be youthful, with 6-pack abs and a BMW and all that that entails?
Only partially in jest to I note that perhaps it seems better to check out than to deal with the examples of our elected officials in Congress assembled? Would it not be better to honorably serve the nation and than leave it then to live under the spiteful glare of our mass media and annointed aristocracy, those who inhabit the ivory towers of learning, who always know what is best for thee and me, but never for themselves?
Trust me, shipmates, I fully understand the drive to say FU to those in the media, on campus, and in government, and check out early. Why should I spend the rest of my life being seen by my elected officials as a meat-based ATM for their social-justice wet dreams?
There are truly times when I despair of this great nation ever amounting to anything more than a pile of hubris-infused vomit.
But then, I see the face of my youngest daughter, and realise that I need to provide for her. That I need to instill in her the desire to be better than what her teachers have planned for her, to be above what those craven sycophantic raving hordes of narcissitic zombie leftists subscribe to. In short, to be the citizen the founding fathers wanted her to be, and I am brought back to earth. To reality.
I owe it to her to be the best father that I can be, to be the best teacher she will ever have. To be the standard by which other men will be judged.
Yet, I understand why my shipmates might check out early. I cannot blame them. I will not pity them. It is their life, their choice to make. How can a society that supports the right of abortion decry suicide?
Ah well. I need a drink.
May God Bless all my shipmates, and hold them close. They have earned that right, every man jack of them.
Respects,
And I am sure there’s no mention of the constant, grinding pressure provided by our media to believe that they are evil, wicked, baby-raping demons……
that couldn’t have anything to do with it.
d
thanks for the link and putting us on your blogroll, Lex.
Hi Everybody, I remember earlier this year, Lex wrote a posting on this subject. On 2 Jan 2007, Lex wrote a post about a tragic event, “I hate these kinds of Stories”. This was the story of the death of Cpl. James Dean in Maryland. Almost 40 years ago, When I was at Lackland AFB, I had a major brain infection. I would go to the clinic and they would tell me it was a head cold. I knew this was wrong, I was in severe pain in my head, ears and neck. I was in pain 24/7. Then, one night the pain increased exponentially and finally my eardrums ruptured, it also blew out the 2 small bones of the inner ear, according to records. While I was “healing”, I was sent to a med hold, while there, I had friends there and they wound up hanging themselves. These men were not recruits. The line in their logic was this, “Our leaders are absolutely clueless, they have never been there! We are just tired, tired, oh so tired.” After two of us found them the next morning dead, we agreed to fight suicide in any way we could. Go back and read that posting, you’ll do yourself a favor on 2 Jan 2007, “I hate these kinds of Stories”. What are we going to do with these, “canary in the mine” type events?
Lex, I just want to thank you for the many ways you serve this Great Nation.
Grumpy