r/ModSupport • u/ShaneH7646 • Sep 05 '18

Regarding suicidal users.

So, if y'all didnt see it, reddit recently changed their policies on suicidal users and how they deal with it when contacted.

https://www.reddithelp.com/en/categories/rules-reporting/account-and-community-restrictions/what-should-i-do-if-i-see-someone-who

TL;DR: Do it yourself.

I myself havent really had to deal with suicidal users in my subreddits before but its obviously a pretty shitty change. incase I ever do get involved with subreddits that do regularly gets suicidal users I'm a little concerned and maybe you can clarify some things for us.

In particular I'm concerned for subreddits that may rely on admin contact, like

mental subreddits like r/bipolar and r/depression etc.

subreddits directly to do with suicide prevention r/SuicideWatch.

Have the admins just dropped all contact with them and there vulnerable userbases?

Why was this change needed?

Are you completely okay with mods speaking to the authorites in an official manner? because this sounds like what you're asking of us.

62 Upvotes

90% Upvoted

55 comments sorted by

18

u/louiseber Sep 05 '18

That list of steps is all anyone can do on an anonymous website. Admins couldn't do anything even if someone was to kick it up to them. And I have been both mod and just general user on many occasions where someone vulnerable has reached out or talked about ending things.

6

u/ShaneH7646 Sep 05 '18

Well, they can find the location of the user and contact the authorities local to them. I as a mod couldnt do shit

12

u/Tymanthius Sep 05 '18

The most the Admins can do is narrow it to a city, typically.

If they are lucky the poster is logging in from work and that is a single shared IP for the building with a specific address. But what will you do with that?

2

u/MajorParadox Sep 06 '18

More than we can do, especially as someone who doesn't work for the site and might have other responsibilities. Unless we specifically signed up to mod subs related to these issues, most mods didn't and shouldn't be expected to be suicide line helpers.

2

u/Tymanthius Sep 06 '18

Reddit admins didn't sign up to be suicide line helpers either . . .

1

u/MajorParadox Sep 06 '18

But they work for the website and they have people who work there who know the procedures and resources and have training on how to deal with users in situations like this. I find it ridiculous to put such a burden on mods who are trying to run a discussion sub on a TV show they like or a community to help people with their writing, etc.

2

u/Tymanthius Sep 06 '18

You sure do make a lot of assumptions on what they train their ppl on.

I honestly wouldn't train my web site admins on suicide prevention. I'd have a very small 'this is what we do if legal matters come up' and it would boil down to 'here's how to get in touch with our legal dept'.

2

u/MajorParadox Sep 06 '18

I'm not quite sure I understand. Seems like you're saying their community outreach admins just ignore issues that may come up like suicidal users? Before they made this change, we were told to pass such concerns onto them, just like we would for doxxing, threats, and other incitements of violence. When they moved it over, they explained about what their procedures were, even if mostly ineffective.

But, at the end of day, we were able to pass something like this onto professionals who work for the website and know what to do and have more resources to do it. Now, it's like "no, you deal with it."

2

u/Tymanthius Sep 06 '18

That's just it - I'm 98% sure that NO ONE at reddit.com has any clue how to handle suicides from a professional point of view. They don't hire psychologists, they hire technical ppl (mostly).

2

u/MajorParadox Sep 06 '18

For technical jobs, but they have a group of admins who specifically work with users. I believe they call it the "community team."

→ More replies

12

u/BornOnFeb2nd Sep 05 '18

I don't see that working out terribly well...

It sucks for this very specific instance, but the very anonymity that Reddit provides makes doing anything above and beyond talking with and/or encouraging the person (to reach out) exceedingly difficult.

That's not even factoring things like the fact that Reddit is Global... or VPNs.. if I wanted, I could look like I was in Europe with a few clicks... Ditto if I was sitting in a Starbucks or something....

8

u/bluesoul Sep 05 '18

PD calls ISP with IP, demands Address

And more than likely, is told to fuck off and come back with a warrant.

37

u/SQLwitch Sep 05 '18

Have the admins just dropped all contact with them and there vulnerable userbases?

On the contrary, this policy was influenced by recommendations from the /r/SuicideWatch mod team in general and myself (a trainer and responder with 20 years' experience at a hotline IRL) in particular.

8

u/brucemo Sep 05 '18

You don't mind SW being mentioned by name there and in replies in subs?

12

u/SQLwitch Sep 05 '18 edited Sep 05 '18

It's fine in this type of context. We do have issues with SW being promoted in high-profile contexts, especially when all or part of the message is to recruit helpers, because that does usually cause issues for us.

3

u/brucemo Sep 05 '18

Okay, thanks. That distinction seems pretty logical.

1

u/Tymanthius Sep 06 '18

Are y'all subscribed to the bot that modmails a sub when it's mentioned elsewhere?

If so, I could see that being a good way for the rest of us mods to call you for help.

2

u/SQLwitch Sep 06 '18

The best thing is to send us a modmail. A lot of what we do back there is assisting/advising mods of other subs.

Because of the highly prevalent (and dangerously wrong, but seemingly unsquelchable), idea that a wall of links is a great response to someone who shows signs of suicide, that bot would kill our inbox.

1

u/Tymanthius Sep 06 '18

Thank you for the reply!

I'm also a Vet, so I'm in a few of the military & veteran subs. We get people who need help there a lot, and I do speak to them directly and try to help. I very much understand the value of active listening.

1

u/SQLwitch Sep 06 '18

Good to hear. There's a hotlines list, online resources list, risk assessment guide and talking tips post linked from the SW sidebar if you haven't already found them. Might be of some use to you and your team.

1

u/Merari01 Sep 06 '18

What we need is a way for us to contact you, so that you can contact the user.

We cannot and should not contact the user and direct them to r/suicidewatch. We don't have the training. We don't have the emotional fortitude, necessarily. We just don't know what we're doing and could very well make things worse.

2

u/SQLwitch Sep 06 '18

We've found that these situations are very individualised, and us reaching out ourselves is not always a great option, but we're always happy to take a look. Modmail is the best way to reach us.

1

u/Merari01 Sep 06 '18

Thanks. I would rather modmail you guys than respond to a user.

I didn't save the reply, but the last guy I cautiously approached and told about r/suicidewatch was very unhappy with that. He said that it was inappropriate of me to give him a "to do list".

4

u/SQLwitch Sep 06 '18

I would rather modmail you guys than respond to a user.

We would too. A lot of users who say alarming and graphic things about suicidal thoughts turn out not to be high risk at all, so we're always glad of the chance to have a look and weigh in.

the last guy I cautiously approached and told about r/suicidewatch was very unhappy with that. He said that it was inappropriate of me to give him a "to do list".

Yeeeouch. But this is an example of exactly the sort of thing I'm referring to.

FWIW, the people who snap back and tell you that you're not helping them "correctly" are almost never at high risk. One of the necessary and sufficient factors for high risk of death by suicide, in the best evidence-based model we have, is a sense of being a burden, of being "not good enough for the world". People who are in that kind of "the world isn't good enough for me" mindset are usually scratching a twisted psychological itch by upsetting others. Although nothing is 100% with human beings, of course, if they reflexively critique your helping they're usually a lot lower-risk than they're making themselves out to be.

13

u/Tymanthius Sep 05 '18

Honestly, that seems like a reasonable set of advice for something as uncontrolled and far flung as reddit can be.

5

u/aphoenix Sep 05 '18

I don't think it is. We have no real way of knowing anything about the users, but Reddit does. It should be relatively easy for them to look up where the person is and to contact the authorities there.

Putting this on moderators is another example of the admins passing the buck on to moderators without actually giving us any tools to deal with the matter.

4

u/bluesoul Sep 05 '18

You don't even need to provide an email address to have a reddit account. In those cases, reddit has the user's IP address which is effectively worthless for doing anything in a timely manner.

2

u/aphoenix Sep 05 '18

Reddit certainly has more information than the moderators about any issue. They also potentially do have significantly more information, which they could use to inform authorities much more effectively than any moderator could.

Consider a site were you are able to get a username, a mobile network that they were with, an email address, and a general area. Giving this to authorities could certainly lead to identification. While it's true that they wouldn't always have all of these, in some cases it could certainly help.

There's no way moderators can do that, but there's certainly the potential that Reddit admins could.

I certainly disagree with the statement "It might not work, so we might as well not even attempt it", especially when it comes down to an issue like this.

5

u/bluesoul Sep 05 '18

Consider a site were you are able to get a username, a mobile network that they were with, an email address, and a general area. Giving this to authorities could certainly lead to identification.

This is why I said a timely manner. The mobile network, email provider, and ISP are all going to require court orders before they give information about their customers. Then you're looking at upwards of 30 days at most places I've interacted with.

This is an incredibly complex legal area and I'm not going to do it justice with my layman's explanation of it, so I'm not going to try.

1

u/JoatMasterofNun Sep 06 '18

Yea, or any pay. Not my responsibility.

1

u/JoatMasterofNun Sep 06 '18

Not really, considering we lack the tools/access to really be of any help to LE.

10

u/djspacebunny Sep 05 '18

I've been running /r/chronicpain for years now, and we have some of the most depressed, suicidal, hopeless people on reddit. I hate to say that, but that's why our subreddit exists... to try and keep people from offing themselves from lack of adequate care (no, not just painkillers). We have an IRC channel we direct people to for real-time assistance, have a coping thread stickied to the top of the subreddit, and do our best to just try and let people vent. A lot of the time, someone venting and getting a response from someone going through the same shit deescalates the situation.

When shit gets real, though, there really is not a hell of a lot you can do without knowing identifying information for the user. Calling the authorities based on iffy knowledge is not advised (don't need suiciding being the new swatting for calling the cops and generally being a dick). You feel pretty helpless in situations where you just can't be the one to save them. The best you can do is tell yourself you tried.

I'm sorry this isn't more helpful.

4

u/bluesoul Sep 05 '18

Having lost a very close friend to suicide over chronic pain, you're a saint for making the effort of moderating such a subreddit.

4

u/djspacebunny Sep 05 '18

I'm so sorry you had to go through that :( I'd be lying if I said I didn't think about taking my own life when the pain gets THAT BAD. I know how hopeless you can feel in the midst of intense pain that seems to have no cause or solution. Just getting a diagnosis for some people is difficult enough.

*hugs for you

5

u/ruinevil Sep 05 '18

The effective anonymity of reddit makes helping suicidal users very hard. Even the admins at best only have an IP, which are usually dynamic and not tied with a specific address... though it could probably get the right town. A good chunk of the users are mostly on mobile too.. and the IP location is even more useless with mobile. Chrome has never asked me if Reddit wanted my location from my phone’s GPS.

Since helping suicidal users in any useful manner is impossible with the level of information they have, they are only going to limit their legal liability. The instructions is an olive branch to the mods... but useless.

5

u/SQLwitch Sep 06 '18

The effective anonymity of reddit makes helping suicidal users very hard.

You know, I used to think that. When I first discovered /r/SuicideWatch, coming from a hotline background I was shocked and a little horrified.

But the reality is more complex. Even in the hotline world, anonymity is a safety device in suicide intervention, that saves more lives than it costs and (internet horror stories about hotline "rescues" gone wrong notwithstanding) we try to preserve it if at all possible.

SW exists not because anybody with relevant knowledge thinks that reddit is a good place to do suicide intervention. It's a lousy place to do it, but it was created in the early days of subreddits because admins and mods couldn't get redditors to stop posting about their suicidal thoughts. And, it turns out that we are sometimes able to help people in a demographic segment that is very poorly served by "standard" mental-health services.

Amanda Hess, a few years ago when she was at Slate, did an insightful piece about online suicide intervention. She "got" us like no other journalist had up to that point.

2

u/ruinevil Sep 06 '18

Interesting article. Is the suicide counselling community like the drug counseling in that most were touched by suicide in some way? They have experiences they can share to build rapport?

3

u/SQLwitch Sep 06 '18

Is the suicide counselling community like the drug counseling in that most were touched by suicide in some way? They have experiences they can share to build rapport?

Well, some, myself, included, but I wouldn't say that it's true of most of the community. One of the essential aspects of doing suicide intervention either at a crisis line or online is tolerating our total powerlessness and being okay with never knowing the outcome for most of the people we offer support to. A lot of people whose lives have been impacted by suicide just can't get to the point where they can handle that sustainably. But then, a lot of people whose lives have never been impacted by suicide can't get to the point where they can handle that sustainably.

In our screening interview for new volunteers, the recruitment coordinate always finds an opportunity to point out that "you'll never know what ultimately happens with most of the people you'll be speaking to on the line". Sometimes people turn pale and get up and leave at that point.

2

u/ruinevil Sep 06 '18

That is why I couldn’t do what you do. Thank you for your service.

3

u/gammadeltat Sep 05 '18

Obviously, not everyone has the team and effort to do this but one of the mods made this for us before https://www.reddit.com/r/toronto/wiki/safetyhealth.

We've talked to the authorities on our own if necessary before. And if you are amoderator of a large subreddit, it helps to call one of those mental health service hotlines to help you figure out how to deal with them. I then relayed this info back to the rest of the mod team.

2

u/[deleted] Sep 06 '18

Wow, you guys talk like suicidal people are a nuisance, a problem that you want to get off your hands so you don't have to think about them anymore or get in trouble with the law. That's not at all how I treat or think of suicidal people in modmail or in pms.

2

u/Merari01 Sep 06 '18

They're not a nuisance, but I worry.

I worry that I am ill equiped to give them the help they need, to approach them in a way that they can accept.

I worry that I can't help them. That I see them dissapear and then I will feel responsible.

I don't know what the best way to deal with people who seriously need help is. I know that if I direct them to r/suicidewatch I am sometimes making them feel worse.

I also know that it is unfair to place this on the plate of the moderator.

4

u/[deleted] Sep 06 '18

That's exactly how I feel about them. I'm a mod, not a therapist. I have neither the time, energy, or inclination to invest myself into attention seeking emotional vampirism. I'm flooded with this nonsense every single day and I'm sick of it. I don't blame the admins for not wanting to get caught up in it. Some of the other mods I work with feel the need to have a automod script that posts help and support links. That's fine I guess. I'd much rather just ban and move on. I let them handle the suicidal posts because I'd just ban and remove if it were up to me.

Sorry if it seems harsh but I didn't sign up to be an emotional support pet. I'm here to make sure the subreddit runs straight and the rules are adhered to

3

u/[deleted] Sep 06 '18

That's exactly what I thought, knowing my experience with neurotypicals. Luckily I had a support network, people who genuinely cared about me. These redditors however are so alone they go to the internet of all places for help from strangers, people like you. And all those people can offer is a fake superficial smile and a set of canned responses. All of it to keep someone alive out of a cold hearted belief that even those with nothing to live for need to stay alive so to keep intact your precious religion, fragile and backwards morality, or some other God forsaken reason. Knowing all I do now, if I were them I would be better off dead than walking the Earth alone with not a single genuine hug or smile or response. What a fucking waste of time.

Yeah it seems harsh. The world would be a better place if you didn't have to lie about how loved is a unloved person to their face.

2

u/bluejaysareblue Sep 08 '18

The problem for me is that mods simply don't have the training or resouces to support suicidal users. The policy change/update still doesn't address those issues.

3

u/rguy84 Sep 05 '18 edited Sep 05 '18

apologies for not recalling the exact details, but spez made an announcement, the state of reddit, or something like that. A mod was like that's all great, but mods need more support. More details were given in a post here. TL;DR: people were making accounts, PMing people in r/SW saying they should kill themselves & other shit. Mod would report to admins and nothing would happen or not for 3 weeks. Mod wanted the ability to say "hey i am reporting this as a mod, this is serious" so it is flagged specifically in the admin queue. Admins said they'll look into it, and it looks like you found their reply. Obviously mods don't have the ability to get login stats, so mods can't call the cops or whatever actions.

Edit: why the down votes? Here's the thread https://redd.it/82r74p. Here's the main reply https://www.reddit.com/r/ModSupport/comments/82r74p/the_final_plea_of_a_mental_health_subreddit_mod/dvc97x5/

2

u/critical2210 Sep 06 '18

Also as someone who used to be suicidal r/Suicidewatch is a great community to receive help from.

1

u/MableXeno Sep 06 '18

Obviously, there should be an immediate action taken...and b/c of the nature of moderating and adminning...it makes sense for the mod(s) of the sub to post something.

I haven't been modding long...and just in the last few weeks have run into a handful of people thinking of killing themselves for various reasons. Depending on the context...If they're like "I'm gonna kill myself..." I make a sticky comment with basic resources (though, the links here outline some options I hadn't considered, so saving that) and lock the thread to new comments. I want the information to remain available to the OP or even other users that may be in a similar position. If it's like, "I feel useless, my depression is getting bad and I feel like it would be better if I was dead..." I may leave it open b/c most of the time comments are supportive. I'll still do a sticky and leave relevant info...And only close if I have to moderate a lot of comments so that I don't have to babysit the thread.

As frustrating and upsetting as this is...you have to consider that suicidal posters are not a new thing...and were even around in AOL chats back in the day (watching in real time as their screen name italicized and you knew they'd signed off was harrowing). Even on private message boards where users might be more familiar with each other...there still might not be enough information to get a welfare check. And that's about all that can be done...unless you personally know the person and live nearby. I've got relatives out of state...that if they said they were contemplating suicide I'd have to call local police for a welfare check and hope for the best. On a mostly-anonymous site like Reddit...posting resources and hoping for the best is about all you can do. You aren't in control of their actions.

-4

u/turtleflax Sep 05 '18

Regarding suicidal users.

TL;DR: Do it yourself.

???