The family wrote a letter which was signed by their pastor...the pastor is a guy I went to college with...a good friend of mine there at school! Makes it a lot more personal for me from that perspective...sounds like the guy had a history of mental illness. I just recently lost a friend at church...an incredible woman...to depression through suicide. She was unmarried and left behind her adopted daughter. I've run the gamut of emotions from initially being overwhelmed with sadness...to anger for her actions, particularly leaving behind a junior high age daughter with no family at all. She was very involved in our church...and other churches...and in the community...gave a ton of her time to volunteering in schools...ministry to the poor...etc. So tragic.
Just found out that I knew him. I played football in HS with his older brother and remember Ryan as a kid, I guess he would have been about 10 at the time. My heart goes out to all of his friends and family. +++
Mrs. JB, I respect that you can't find the humor in it. But to judge everyone else? What's righteous about that? You want to call me a coward? You think you know how suicide has affected my individual life? If this guy's parents or siblings are reading this board, you have my most sincere condolences for your loved one's incredibly selfish act. Apparently, police were asking him to come in through a window, but he decided to harm you all in the most public and horrifying way possible. No family member should have to endure that compounded type of grief. Ah, now isn't this better than a little absurdist humor? I guess it is. I know I feel better. **** off.
Excuse me, but you assumed a F,C,K where I only see a ***. Don't jump to conclusions and make this a bad situation. Possible variations of **** include- kiss off step off piss off jump off....oops, maybe jump off wouldn't fit here......
Four of my close friends have committed suicide. Two of them when I was thirteen and two in the last year. I'm very sensitive to friends and family being mad at the suicide, but I couldn't disagree more with the characterization of suicide as a cowardly act. It's not. It's an act of desperation. I understand people being mad or taking it personally, but that is the selfish act. And making jokes about it is really small. Sorry for your loss, Gaul.
Damn, I can't edit. Actually, to correct my above statement, I wouldn't go as far as labling the guy's acts selfish, since one cannot know what mental state he was in (the Chronicle article says he had some mental problems).
No, not really. To my knowledge, Jeff has never kicked anyone off the board for arguing with me -- he has too much integrity for that. My post was not directed at any one poster in particular. I like B-bob and he seems to be a genuinely nice person. In fact, I think almost everyone who posts here (and certainly all the posters I've met in person) are genuinely good people. Which is why I'm so shocked by some of the harsh "humor" in this thread.
I think that there are different ways to deal with unusual incidents, even with sad and tragic ones. Humor was even used to deal with the Holocaust - Roberto Benigni got an Oscar for that. Some people just use humor to cope with things. It does not necessarily mean that they are unable to be compassionate. As I said, sorry if I offended anyone. Obviously, the more anonymous and far away things happen, the more will people be inclined to joke about it. I do not think that anybody here would make these jokes if they had to assume that any close relatives or friends of the guy are reading the board.
ok... if you are sensitive about death, please don't click my Jackass thread better yet, can we just ban all suicide and death threads?
Hopefully he hasn't been banned ? Don't mess around with the Jeff on this board. Just take your licks, even if attacked, and keep trucking.
Oh, come *on*. Look, Mrs. JB, I like you lots, you're hilarious, but I must disagree with you for a change. B-Bob is right on here. You either laugh or you cry, and I'd much prefer to laugh. Here's how it goes for most of us: of course it's sad, of course we'd be nice to his friends and family if we met them, of *course*. But I'll happily remove my cloak of anonymity for you if you like: my name is Danielle Moreau, and I often laugh at others' misfortune when amongst friends, particularly if the people I'm laughing at hurt or kill themselves doing something objectively r****ded. In a bar, watching TV with mates... I mean, seriously, are you saying you're never mean-spirited? You never make jokes about this stuff? Remember that Bill Hicks bit where he talks about the guy who dies thinking he can fly after he takes acid? And how it's not a tragedy? 'Good! One less moron in the world!' Now, Bill Hicks was, I believe, a nice guy. But funny is funny is funny, and sometimes cruel-funny is even funnier than nice-funny.
