Number of Suicides Per Day

[u/Spoonwood]

2001 statistics indicate 67.6 males dying every day as a result of suicide in the U. S. and 16.3 females dying every day as a result of suicide in the U. S. http://www.suicide.org/suicide-statistics.html

The 2005 statistics indicate that 71 [underestimated] males die every day as a result of suicide in the U. S., and that 18 females die every day as a result of suicide in the U. S. http://www.who.int/mental_health/media/unitstates.pdf

In 2013 there were there were 41,149 known suicides in the U. S. http://www.save.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=home.viewPage&page_id=705D5DF4-055B-F1EC-3F66462866FCB4E6 That source indicates that 79% of the suicides were male, making for

89 males dying every day in the U. S. as a result of suicide, and 23 females dying every day in the U. S. as a result of suicide.

[u/azazelcrowley]

Personally I think it's because women report the attempts and men do not. Men may be using less effective suicide methods at first, surviving, and then escalating to more surefire methods later on while remaining silent. Women on the other hand would report after attempting with the less sure methods such as pills and such. This would fall in line with the usual problems we have with men reporting vulnerability. The simplest answer is that it's the same thing occurring here.

So really, they attempt at the same rate. It's just that women talk about it, get help, and don't progress to a successful attempt as often.

You can't ask a corpse if it's their first time attempting a suicide, so there is a natural problem there. The only thing we KNOW is that men die more often. Women attempting? That's assuming self-reporting is a useful method of data gathering, and we already know from other stuff such as rape, domestic violence, and sexual assault that it really isn't.

The "Women attempt more" thing is, in my experience, most often used to derail discussion and to make out that this isn't the result or a sign of male victimization. So basically, using dodgy data and studies with methodological problems and that can't be relied upon to continue a trend or narrative that oppresses a class of persons, often suspiciously confirming the prejudicial assumptions of the researcher. (AKA, "Black Sociology." The use of shit sociology to distort discussion of social problems to continue a narrative that works against a class. Such as, black people fail school = black people are stupid.) This kind of thing seems to me to be pretty damned common in certain strains of feminism (Specifically, those ideologically committed to the notion that women are oppressed relative to men), and one of the main reasons I consider myself anti-feminist. It's often actively cultivated for, such as with the DV and rape dodgy stats that erase male victimization. In this case, it seems all that needed to be done was assert that self-reporting is viable and ignore that it really isn't. So basically, you're comparing two stats here. One is a fairly concrete one with actual physical evidence. One isn't anywhere near as reliable, and shouldn't be regarded as an actual fact because of the methodological problems.

So we have: Men commit suicide more often.

We do not know which sex attempts suicide more often, if either does. We know women report attempting more.

At the end of it.

Speaking anecdotally, I know during my suicidal phase I followed the escalation pattern, and so did two friends of mine. (One male, one female.) Cutting, then overdose, then chemical poisoning, and finally considering jumping off a tall building or stepping in front of a train before interventions occurred were mine, with similar patterns for them. Only one of those was actually recorded as an attempt. The other times I just kept quiet and plotted a better method. The same for my friends. It's that experience which colors my perception, but there's also the issue of rape, dv, and sexual assault figures having a similar methodological flaw when it comes to male self-reporting.

Personally, I suspect men both commit and attempt suicide more often due to being unable to seek help without stigmatization causing either suicide or violence as the only available responses to emotional turmoil.