Humans have always wanted a long and prosperous life. We have distinct desire to live as much as we can, even if it may mean being bedridden for the rest of one’s life. But in today’s world, we hear a lot of cases of suicides everyday. It has inspired a lot of debates and discussions around the world. We as a society are struggling hard to find a solution to this disease that is gripping our society real hard.
The total number of suicides in 2012 was 800,000 as compared to human violence death which were at 620,000(including wars and everyday violence). The number itself is alarming, but more alarming is the fact that the suicides rate are much higher in a first word country than in a third world. For example, in 1985 when South Korea was a dictatorship and Human rights were more or less a dream, there were nearly 9 suicides in 100,000 as compared to 30 in 100,000 in modern day liberal and developed South Korea. The countries such as Philippines and Guatemala which suffer from poverty and underdeveloped have suicide rate 1 in 100,000 whereas the developed and happy country, such as France and Japan have suicide rates 25 times greater than them.
Let’s focus the studies in India, nearly 17% of all the suicides globally occur in India which corresponds to 17% population of India wrt World. When we disemble this number, we find that 80% of suicides are done by literate people while national literacy rate is 74%. While the number of farmers is 22% of national population, whereas only 11.2% of number of suicides are done by farmers. There is also discrepancy in number of males to female suicide which is nearly 2:1 in the ratio, which a lot as we are in a more or less a patriarchal society. The international data in Gender based distribution of suicides gives nearly a same discrepancy. The number although may seem normal at first, on a deeper insight gives us other things to wonder about,
The number clearly indicate that the general socially accepted parameter for judging happiness are lacking somewhere, otherwise why would the people whom we see as oppressors will be dying more due to suicides, whereas people who are being oppressed and in worse condition are less prone to commit suicide. The traditional values for happiness means that if we have materialistic success, we are bound to be happy and that if we are not happy, there is something wrong with us. But the stats clearly goes against the traditional yardsticks.
The technological advancement is happening is such a fast pace that human mind is not able to grasp all of it so suddenly. What was groundbreaking technology 10 years ago is an obsolete piece of technology today. But this advancement is coming a cost. Humans are losing their will to live as everything in life is becoming smaller and smaller. Our achievements, our assets, everything that we have is generally minute on a global scale. Globalisation has set false targets for us to achieve, have set standards that are not possible to achieve for everyone. Consumerism is on rise and buying products that we don't need is the new trend.
In a country where people struggle to live everyday, where getting bread to eat at the end of the day, people have a hope, a hope to see a better future that helps them to live even in the worst of situations. In a first world country, the struggles are done for something else. For the urges that nearly impossible to satisfy. This creates a vacuum inside a person, taking with it the hope for a better future as the future they image is possible for less than 1% of total population. This results in lack of will to live and often people drift into depression. I have tried to set create a overview of the problem, whereas I agree there may be some unique underlying case for everyone. The question is how do we intend to tackle this problem that globalisation has presented to us?
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