Suicide becomes a morally acceptable act when a person acts under the influence of their society; since ethical viewpoints vary from culture to culture, it only makes sense that society is what determines whether certain behaviors are acceptable. Furthermore, a person's individual beliefs should be taken into consideration and therefore help determine whether suicide can be condoned.
This belief follows the idea of cultural relativism which states that “a sophisticated understanding of the world must include an appreciation of such differences between cultures” (James Rachels). In other words, various cultures have varying ethical codes, and these differences should not be overlooked when attempting to determine what is right and what is …show more content…
Depending on how the media frames the act determines exactly how the public will respond. For example, online bullying is a major issue for teens in the US. Often, it can be argued that the news “over-simplifies” the reason for suicide, thus incidentally sends out the message: suicide is an acceptable way to handle online bullying (Kendal, 2015). Author, Dianna Kendall argues that the way in which the media frames the article can greatly affect the outcome. This has been proven time and time again. If the media does not push that suicide is unacceptable then it can potentially lead to more …show more content…
The problem is that such an event could have been prevented if the media had instead sent out the message that suicide was unacceptable. The best example of media doing this can be seen in the instance of Kurt Cobain's death where the media covered the act on the show MTV. Throughout the entire documentary MTV focused on sending out a messages saying, “Don’t do it.” The program was a success since MTV took extra measures to discourage viewers from following suit. Specifically, they listed contact information for a people to seek help through a suicide help line. Because their message did not glorify suicide, there were not nearly as many occurrences following the event (Comer, 2015,
This belief follows the idea of cultural relativism which states that “a sophisticated understanding of the world must include an appreciation of such differences between cultures” (James Rachels). In other words, various cultures have varying ethical codes, and these differences should not be overlooked when attempting to determine what is right and what is …show more content…
Depending on how the media frames the act determines exactly how the public will respond. For example, online bullying is a major issue for teens in the US. Often, it can be argued that the news “over-simplifies” the reason for suicide, thus incidentally sends out the message: suicide is an acceptable way to handle online bullying (Kendal, 2015). Author, Dianna Kendall argues that the way in which the media frames the article can greatly affect the outcome. This has been proven time and time again. If the media does not push that suicide is unacceptable then it can potentially lead to more …show more content…
The problem is that such an event could have been prevented if the media had instead sent out the message that suicide was unacceptable. The best example of media doing this can be seen in the instance of Kurt Cobain's death where the media covered the act on the show MTV. Throughout the entire documentary MTV focused on sending out a messages saying, “Don’t do it.” The program was a success since MTV took extra measures to discourage viewers from following suit. Specifically, they listed contact information for a people to seek help through a suicide help line. Because their message did not glorify suicide, there were not nearly as many occurrences following the event (Comer, 2015,