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| Suicide
in South Korea Case of Too Little, Too Late |
Published
2007-02-03 06:36 (KST)
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| Star's recent
death by own hand raises issue once again |
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Tania
Campbell (tania79)  |
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Suicide is the fourth cause
of death in South Korea. A government report released at the end of
2006 stated that South Korea's suicide rate was the highest among the
members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development
(OECD) in 2005. The report highlighted that the high suicide rate is a
reflection of changing and conflicting gender roles, economic hardship
and domestic violence. In 2005, 26.1 out of every 100,000 South Koreans
committed suicide, a dramatic increase from 11.8 people in 1995.
However, this plays down the role of mental illness and other social
conditions that significantly contribute to the statistic. The World
Health Organization has estimated that 90 percent of all suicide
victims have some kind of mental health condition, most commonly
depression or substance abuse. This means that if these conditions
could be acknowledged and treated, there would be a dramatic decrease
in the suicide rate.
This
was highlighted recently by the suicide of Korean
actress-turned-singer, Lee Hye-ryeon (also known as Yuni). On Jan. 21,
she was found hanging from a door frame by her grandmother. While no
one will ever know the exact reasons for her suicide, according to the Chosun
Ilbo, her family believes it was due to a combination of work
pressure and well-hidden depression (her family believed it to be under
control with anti-depressants). This case is reminiscent of the death
of famed Korean actress Lee Eun-joo who killed herself nearly two years
ago after suffering severe bouts of depression.
Like most Asian nations, South Korea does not have a well developed
concept of mental illness, especially as a treatable disease.
Certainly, the recovery-based, consumer-driven model that exists in the
West has not been implemented here. In addition, there is a lot of
stigma attached to various mental disorders, meaning that people are
living in hell because they feel they cannot seek the treatment they
need in order to cope and eventually recover. Those who are brave
enough may very well find themselves locked away in an asylum.
Dr. Daniel Fisher, an American psychiatrist, recently visited South
Korea at the invitation of the National Human Rights Commission. His
observations gleaned from the trip, which he included on his Web site,
are telling: "South Korea is still operating the type of
institution-based system seen in the U.S. 40 years ago," he wrote.
According to Fisher, people labeled with mental illness in South Korea
are treated as an extreme underclass.
He visited Yongin Hospital on the outskirts of Seoul and was shocked by
what he saw. The model of psychiatry practiced in South Korea reflects
the hierarchy of Confucianism, essentially meaning that the father has
the power to admit members of his family as he sees fit -- one wife was
admitted for two months for changing her religion; one young man was in
for a year for yelling at his father. In addition to fifteen people
sharing a room, the hospital carries out ECT without anesthesia which
leads to broken bones.
While mental illness is linked with 90 percent of suicides, what about
the other 10 percent? This must be contributed solely to social
factors. For example, in South Korea, it is intensely competitive to
get into a prestigious university. Suicide rates unsurprisingly spike
around the time of midterm exams for high school students. There were
at least five such suicides reported in 2005. At a public rally to
mourn one of these victims and to protest the pressure-cooker
conditions forced upon them in high school, 400 students and supporters
cheered one student's speech: "We are not studying machines. We are
just teenagers."
Suicide is also high among gay men, who are ostracized by society and
generally shamed and expelled from their families after coming out.
Although they are slowly becoming more accepted in Korean culture (in
2004 the first public same-sex marriage took place), it's no Amsterdam.
While no reliable statistics exist on this topic, there is a lot of
anecdotal evidence on the Internet that would suggest that suicide
among gay men is a significant factor in South Korea's suicide rate.
One man wrote on a gay rights Web site:
I consider myself lucky, though. Between 1997 and 1999, three of my gay
friends in South Korea committed suicide. In May 1998, Oh disclosed his
homosexuality to his family. They immediately rejected him and expelled
him from their home. After living and suffering on the streets for
months, and at one point sleeping in an office, Oh killed himself. The
other two went to Seoul National University, which is South Korea's
Harvard or Yale. One was in law school; the other was a graduate
student in biology. Their success in society was "guaranteed." However,
when they came to the age of marriage, they both faced a brutal
dilemma. Neither wanted to marry. But they also didn't want to disown
their families and disappoint their parents. So they chose to kill
themselves. One in 1997, the other in 1999. No funerals were held for
these three young men: their families considered them "bad" sons..."
In order for there to be a positive difference made in the suicide rate
in South Korea, two things need to happen. First, mental illness needs
to be acknowledged, the stigma surrounding it decreased and more
measures put in place to treat it, making it accessible to the public.
Second, the various socio-cultural factors behind the ten percent of
suicides which are generally not related to mental illness but more to
societal pressure and conflict, need to be considered and change take
place. People need to become more accepting of sexual difference. Those
officials who set the standards for entrance into university need to
learn that teenagers are human beings, not machines. Of course, the
causes of mental illness need to be considered as well. Although a
complex issue, the tragic suicides of Lee Hye-ryeon and Lee Eun-joo,
most likely due to severe depression, beg the question: what causes
depression in the first place? Society needs to recover its humanity so
that these potential victims of suicide can find theirs, before it's
too late. |
| ©2007
OhmyNews |
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