It’s not so much suicide that’s causing alarm in Japan – death by one’s own hand is woven into the nation’s fabric – it’s who’s committing it and how. Just this week, nine people in two separate events were found dead in their cars after forming Internet suicide pacts, and the trend is on the rise.
With 32,000 deaths in 2004, Japan has one of the highest suicide rates in the world. Nearly a hundred percent of those were not the result of Internet suicide pacts, but those that were cyber-suicides hit record highs every year.
The number of Internet pact deaths has tripled since authorities started paying attention to it in 2003. In 2005, a record 91 people (most of them in their 20’s) killed themselves as a result of Web correspondence, up from 55 people in 2004. The most popular method seems to be for the group to lock themselves in a car and light charcoal grills to die by carbon monoxide poisoning.
The Associated Press reports that the bulk of those committing suicide in Japan are older people faced with financial difficulty. The rash of cyber-suicide has caused alarm because it is spreading among those not traditionally interested in dying-those in their 20’s and 30’s.
“Depressed, young people and the Internet – it’s a very dangerous mix,” said Mafumi Usui, a psychology professor at Niigata Seiryo University. Mafumi added later the expectation that as Internet use increased, so would the suicide rate among young people.
“The Internet has brought a lot of convenience to Japan, but it has brought with it a lot of ills,” he said.
Suicide has a long history in Japan, dating back to (at least) the feudal Samurai ritual of Seppuku (self-disembowelment) to save one’s honor. It is not uncommon to hear a tale of the Japanese businessman throwing himself in front of an oncoming Shinkansen (bullet train), mortified with shame after failing his company.
There are even famous (and popular) places to commit suicide in the island nation. On the Izu Peninsula, at a site called Jogasaki in the city of Ito, forlorn souls are known to throw themselves from the jagged cliffs or the famous suspension bridge.
Perhaps even more haunting is Aokigahara (trans. “Sea of Trees”) at the foot of Mt. Fuji. Local legend has it that due to electromagnetic fields around the volcano Fuji, compasses cease to function. “Lost souls” are rumored to haunt it and each year, there is a sweep to collect the bodies out of the forest.
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