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Religious Influence in LGBTQ Suicide may be Overblown


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15 minutes ago, bluebell said:

"Staley, an openly gay man, adds that in a nutshell, LGBT suicide with the LDS church as a factor “is not this overwhelming tidal wave.”

Yeah, there may be specific cases where religion plays a bigger role, but have a hard time believing that it would be considered a major factor in most situations. 

 

 

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If Staley, a gay man, continues to demonstrate that the data does not support the gay activist agenda then I project he will lose his gay card and be pushed out of the group and labeled a straight man or at least a wanna be. This type of thing is just not acceptable to the gay agenda. 

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7 hours ago, Storm Rider said:

If Staley, a gay man, continues to demonstrate that the data does not support the gay activist agenda then I project he will lose his gay card and be pushed out of the group and labeled a straight man or at least a wanna be. This type of thing is just not acceptable to the gay agenda. 

Gay agenda?  

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14 minutes ago, sunstoned said:

I'm sure it is not intended, but your post could be taken as being judgement and offensive. I don't think any of us has the right to judge a whole group of people as unstable.  

Homosexuality is widely accepted now but these teens are still 4x as likely to attempt suicide.   What would you call it then?

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Despite a general perception that many of Utah’s youth suicides arise from intolerance toward LGBT people promulgated (though not necessarily intentionally) by teachings of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the state’s suicide prevention research coordinator says that may not be the case.

can anyone describe what is meant by this?  What is meant by "many of Utah's youth suicides"?  If one takes 10 suicides and of that 1 is a suicide by an LGBTQ youth, then the rate of suicide by LGBTQ youth is so much higher than others--purely by the fact that there are so many fewer LGBTQ people than not.  You see even if LGBTQ youth equal 5% of the population than if 1 in 10 are LGBTQ then the rate is showing twice than average.  So let's add, if we know that 1 in 10 youth suicides is by an LGBTQ youth, perhaps we have 1 or two other LGBTQ youth among the other nine but we don't know. 

I am aware of a number of adult LGBTQ people who were raised LDS and had, as described to me, a strong pull to suicide.  And some of these attribute the Church, it's teachings and influence as a primary cause. Some of these didn't come out to family and friends until they were adults.  I don't know how much this type of thing factors into this study.  It doesnt' sound like it does at all.  

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We’re building the most comprehensive database of information about suicide decedents around. That’s huge,” Staley says in an interview with QSaltLake Magazine. In fact, it’s the first undertaking of its kind in the country and, because of the organization of the state’s medical examiner’s office, it’s possible in Utah and only a handful of other states. Staley calls the effort “progressive” and “pioneering.”

Staley’s research involves gathering two kinds of information. The first is the findings in official documents: OME investigation records, medical and mental health records, criminal or court records, and the like.

The second kind makes up a “psychological autopsy,” and involves, among other things, talking to the people suicide victims leave behind: family and friends. “We’re getting real-time data about suicide that we’ve never gotten before,” Staley says.

This is great and I'd say there is probably an overwrought conclusion that the Church is causing LGBTQ suicides (but there is plenty of room to see the Church, its influence as a factor for many youth suicides).  But what is described here may not really be getting to the heart of the matter.  That's why we're stuck with the tentative conclusions offered with a bunch of maybes and may not bes.  

There are a couple of problems here.  If an LGBTQ youth commits suicide at a young age, whose to know he/she was LGBTQ?  The family may not even know.  And if suicide, finding the cause of it seems near impossible with so many who commit suicide not around to tell us why.  And if any LGBTQ youth commits suicide due to pressures from Church it may be that the family is going to protect the Church--perhaps even unwittingly.  A youth in such a situation may not have support of the family, or may feel largely rejected by the family due to their allegiance to the Church.  From what is described here, I fear the conclusions are going to be a bit hasty.    

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21 hours ago, bluebell said:

I read this article a few days ago and thought that some on here would find it interesting.  

Utah researcher: theory of religious influences in Utah LGBT suicides may be overblown

Here are the first few opening paragraphs-

"A Utah suicide researcher says the friction between LGBT sexuality and religion in Utah may not be quite the driving factor behind youth suicide as many people believe.

Despite a general perception that many of Utah’s youth suicides arise from intolerance toward LGBT people promulgated (though not necessarily intentionally) by teachings of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the state’s suicide prevention research coordinator says that may not be the case.

“There’s no data to show that, period,” says Michael Staley, who works in the Utah Office of the Medical Examiner and is the first person who would know, since he leads an effort to collect, compile and analyze suicide information from around the state. He conducts that research at the behest of the Utah Legislature. “We are working to get that data,” he says."

Further down in the article-

"Staley’s research involves gathering two kinds of information. The first is the findings in official documents: OME investigation records, medical and mental health records, criminal or court records, and the like.

The second kind makes up a “psychological autopsy,” and involves, among other things, talking to the people suicide victims leave behind: family and friends. “We’re getting real-time data about suicide that we’ve never gotten before,” Staley says.

But that real-time data, as well as other available information, doesn’t validate the narrative of the sexuality-religion-suicide nexus. “I will not ignore that narrative, of course … but I also think it’s a more complex story than just religion and sexuality,” he says.

If there is a misperception about that, it begins with another. During a presentation to the LGBTQ Affirmative Therapists Guild of Utah on Nov. 15, Staley asked guild members what proportion of Utah suicides they thought were made up of youth (LGBT or not) age 10–17. “Most people would say 40–60 percent, and people assume that all these people are LGBT,” he said. But the real numbers may be far lower. Data from the OME shows that suicides of youth age 10–17 make up about 6 percent of suicides per year in Utah."

Another interesting point-

"Staley, an openly gay man, adds that in a nutshell, LGBT suicide with the LDS church as a factor “is not this overwhelming tidal wave.”

The data is still being collected and analyzed and there will be more information coming so this is not a done deal.  And Staley does say this about religion, LGBTQ, and suicde-

"He knows he’s going to get pushback.

“I hope I didn’t paint a huge target on my chest with this group,” he said to the Guild. Nevertheless, “I want to prepare groups like this group to hear that.”

But that hardly means that the “intersection between sexuality and religion,” as Staley calls it, is not a factor in suicides, or that religion-based or -justified messages and actions don’t contribute to it."

Prediction: Those who have previously accused the Church of causing a suicide epidemic will dismiss this information or find some way to explain it away so that they can continue to blame the Church.  This doesn't support their narrative, so it must be some conspiracy by the Church to hide the truth. 

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4 hours ago, stemelbow said:

then the rate of suicide by LGBTQ youth is so much higher than others--purely by the fact that there are so many fewer LGBTQ people than not.  

If absolute numbers are small, one may not be able to extrapolate to an accurate rate.  

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4 minutes ago, Calm said:

If absolute numbers are small, one may not be able to extrapolate to an accurate rate.  

It does make you wonder where the rates come from.  The article linked said the rate is twice the rate of youth LGBTQ than others.  it's really scary because if youth who are LGBTQ commit suicide it may be that they do so without telling them they are LGBTQ.  

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According to this site, about 560 Utahns on average suicide each year (of course variation might be affected by rapidly increasing or decreasing rates, immigration changing ethnic proportions, etc...but for this discussion I am going to use this number)

https://health.utah.gov/vipp/pdf/Suicide/youth-suicide-factsheet-12-14.pdf

The article states about 6% are youth, so 34 total youth suicide deaths.  If one assumes 10% for LGBT youth present in a population, one would expect 3 suicides a year in the whole state.  Suicide contagion could easily double or triple that number, given it is so small.  Normalizing suicide for LGBT youth could account for some of the deaths (so much conversation around LGBT suicides leads some to believe it is typical behaviour, expected behaviour and therefore they are more likely to consider it a viable solution to their difficulties) and thus cause huge increases in the rate.

Small numbers make for unreliable conclusions, imo.  It sounds like the researcher was trying to be careful and pointing out conclusions couldn't be drawn yet.  Small numbers aren't great extrapolators.  There may be Utah counties that have no youth suicides in a year because of low population numbers and that could affect an improper reading of variable impact (say if altitude or pollution is being studied, they may appear to have less effect than they do given higher altitudes and less polluted are generally less dense population).

However, there might be some general pointers that are relatively easy to find out that is leading him to speak out as much as he is even while cautioning conclusions are not yet drawn.  For example, location and timing...which could imply likely contagion or not.  If the kids were or were not primarily from active or devout LDS families or religious families.  Iirc, Utah youth suicides were highly correlated with drug and alcohol abuse and incarceration.  The last would also be something relatively easy to determine, not sure about the former.

Edited by Calm
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4 hours ago, rodheadlee said:

Gerry Rafferty. 

Oh, you can impugn him if you want. Never been a fan.

I do think it is unhealthy that you view gays as a monolithic united force and ascribe to them all the beliefs of the most wacko amongst them (aiming to destroy marriage, fixated on destruction of LDS church, etc.) The LGBT suicide narrative is mostly coming from the "Anti-People Formerly Known as Mormons". Most gay people outside of the Mormon do not know much or care much about the LDS church beyond some having a dislike of us over our political stance in California but even that is becoming a memory.

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22 hours ago, tulip said:

Homosexuality is widely accepted now but these teens are still 4x as likely to attempt suicide.   What would you call it then?

Suicide is tragic and complicated.  With that said, I would not call the LBTGQ lifestyle very unstable.

Edited by sunstoned
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23 hours ago, LoudmouthMormon said:

Paging @california boy... Need to hear your opinion!

It is hard to evaluate objectively anything that is in the article.  Virtually no data is included.  So it ends up mostly being an opinion piece.  

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My biggest frustration with this topic is that so many seem to willingly ignore or mistrust the personal accounts that so many LGBT Mormons ourselves share about our own personal struggles with reconciling our religious/cultural/familial/LGBT identities and overcoming suicide, and instead try only/mostly to discern the answers from purely data-driven numbers by those who actually succumb to suicide without leaving clear or traceable answers/motives behind.  It seems logical to me that to understand suicide, it’s multifaceted causes, and best-possible steps for prevention, we should not only be investigating those who succumb to it, but also studying and seeking to understand those who survive it. 

Edited by Daniel2
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