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Does publishing a photo increase the risk of suicide?
Tue Nov 03 02:40PMMore than 70 complaints have been filed to the Press Complaints Commission after a newspaper in Northern Ireland this weekend published a picture of a man who took his own life by hanging.
Under the headline 'Halloween Horror' the newspaper Sunday World published a photo of the body of the man suspended by a rope from a bridge in Bangor, County Down.
The newspaper's Northern Ireland editor, Jim McDowell, has apologised for possible offence caused to the dead man's friends and family, but said that in his view, publishing the photo, and an accompanying article criticising the police for leaving the body hanging in public view for three hours, was in the public interest.
It was an illustration of the fact that the body was left in full public view for several hours, he said.
Most newspapers working in the UK subscribe to the PCC's code which has a section covering the reporting of suicide.
Given that, to date, none of the complainants are related to the deceased man, it seems unlikely that the Press Complaints Commission will find against the newspaper on the grounds of causing distress to the family.
The greater concern, expressed by a number of organizations that seek to combat suicide, is research that shows that such media portrayals of suicide may, in themselves, risk provoking a number of copycat deaths, particularly among the young and those who are emotionally vulnerable.
As it stands, the editorial guidelines attached to the PCC code call on newspapers to avoid providing "graphic images" of suicide, or "excessive detail" on the method used, or portraying the death in a way that could seem to "glamorise" the deaths.
The fear is that the publication of this photo crossed at least one of those lines.
In this blog, journalists of global news wire AFP blog about the news they report and the challenges they face covering events from Baghdad to Beijing, the White House to Darfur. Peter Cunliffe-Jones is AFP online news editor.
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Ok so the paper is criticizing the Police for leaving the hanging body in public view, but see's fit to then print a photograph of the body! What a Topsy tervy world we live in...
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hopefully ll the mp`s will do the decent thing now -
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It's fair enough to criticise the police for the length of time the poor man was left hanging but to accompany it with a photograph surely goes against what they were complaining about!!
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As someone who has seen a friend and their family recently devastated by suicide, I believe it is horrendous to depict anything like this as it is extremely upsetting enough to read about such horrors, never mind to see pictures. Newspapers should strive to avoid such utterly scandalous dealings in the name of "public interest", as it is surely deeply unsettling and emotionally disturbing for anyone who has ever been touched by such a tragedy.
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As someone who has seen a friend and their family recently devastated by suicide, I believe it is horrendous for newspapers to print such emotionally disturbing details in the name of "public interest".
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okay we all get the picture when they say a man found haging. why not leave it like that without the pictures as people have suffered from famliy menbers that have taken their own lives and not to point out do they think about childern any more is that what you would like your kids looking at?
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It's possible that the police didn't move the body straight-away until they were certain it was suicide and not a murder. Investigators would want as little disturbance to the crime scene as possible.
Did the newspaper consider this, or did it just rush to publish a "sensational" photo?
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Nothing surprises me anymore. The paper should be charged and ordered to pay a large sum to the family. This MIGHT stop them printing such sad photos. Being honest, I doubt it.
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The last thing anyone who has ever lost someone through hanging needs to see when they open a newspaper. Tbh, it is bad enough thinking about it without seeing it. The paper should have more respect not only for the dead man and his family but also for the people who read it.
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are we all forgetting that the man who commited suicide must have known he was in public view?!...and decided that was the place for it!
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