Japanese woman found hanged aboard KAL plane

Thursday 29th May, 08:50 AM JST

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Africanist at 03:27 PM JST - 29th May

jinjapan: How is Japanese police practice relevant, when the flight originated in Hawaii and ended in South Korea? I don't see how it's necessarily in Japanese jurisdiction at all. It may be a legally Japanese affair since a Japanese national was involved, but it is more especially Hawaiian and South Korean. I don't believe the death took place in Japanese territory, though it might be established that it happened in Japanese air space.

kronjp: Why do you assume everyone posting messages here is living in Japan?
Zer00 at 03:33 PM JST - 29th May

Every country has problem with people committing suicide, but the Japanese seem to find the most abnormal and unusual ways to do it!!
romulus3 at 04:04 PM JST - 29th May

kronjp,

the news is depressing. should we have a song and dance instead? should we say what a wonderful person she is by ruining the day of hundreds of people? Its kind of difficult to respect her for what she did although it is sad that she was driven to finish it in airplane toilet. anyway, there are plenty of lovely things about Japan. don't let this ruin it for you. most Japanese people are quite nice and friendly and do not have suicidal tendencies.
Alphaape at 04:04 PM JST - 29th May

himasan, I can't speak for all "Bible thumpers" but for myslef, but based on my training, and belief system, I think that their lack of religion may have something to do with it. Not saying that one religion is better than the other, or saying that if you don't believe then you are not as good as me or destined to burn in Hell for eternity, but that in most cases, I have a belief system that tells me that there is something more than just this life. Not that I am in any rush to get to the afterlife, but that this pain and suffering is not all that there will be, and that there is hope for tomorrow.

Maybe, people who are brought up with only living for the moment may not have this belief. Yes, christians and other religious people do kill themselves and just because you believe that does not mean you will not have pain and suffering; but I just don't see the whole scale glorification in suicide in "Bible thumper" societies as I do here in Nippon. Yes, some religious groups will kill themselves along with all around in the name of their god, and that is just as wrong too, but in these cases, I think that a lack of an belief system has something to do with it.
romulus3 at 04:39 PM JST - 29th May

cut and paste statistics.....

Suicide. You might argue this has something to do with a developed nation and that it creates people who are more likely to kill themselves, yet Israel, which was founded on the concept of religious right, has a suicide rate of about 10 per 100,000 which is one third of other similarly developed countries which can go as high as thirty five percent.

Another thing to note is countries like Lithuania are second world but have a suicide rate of 75.6 per 100,000, its population is comprised of 10% athiests. Surely if we were to argue 'the better developed a nation the more likely it would create suicidal citizens for reason x rather than lack of religion' then Lithuana would have a considerably less suicide rate. First world countries seem to average 25 per 100,000 while third worlds which have a higher devout religious population can go as low as 0.1 yet a second world with a 10% population of Athiests (which is relatively quite high for any country) has a suicide rate double that of first world countries. Technically it should have a rate lower than first worlds and higher than third worlds. If you do compare it with another second world country such as Georgia which has a higher religious population (10% Muslim, 82% Roman Catholic) we find it has a suicide rate of just 4.8 per 100,000.
taiko666 at 05:30 PM JST - 29th May

There is such a stigma to this here that people are not identified as mentally ill, and do not get the help they need.

I think thousands of people are diagnosed with some sort of mental illness here, but they just get prescribed drugs (at a profit to the doctors and the drug companies) rather than receiving therapy.
blvtzpk at 06:48 PM JST - 29th May

Isn't a religious rant based on a death that the poster assumes is a suicide off-topic enough for moderation?

Really.
Triple888 at 08:43 PM JST - 29th May

Why does everyone leap to the conclusion that this was a suicide? Shouldn't you wait for the investigation? Africanist

Because suicide is a Japanese tradition.
WMD at 10:21 PM JST - 29th May

I've never heard of someone killing themselves in the aircraft toilet before. Though I guess this can't be the first time??
Blue_Tiger at 10:28 AM JST - 30th May

In the past, there have been media outlets that have blamed Japanese deaths -- even suicides -- on the foreign country or company where the Japanese person was killed. I wonder if such wil be the case this time.

TPOJ and himasan - Care to exoplain, then, why suicde rates in Japan are os high? If 'tisn't a lack of Hope and Peace (Christianity in and of itself can never offer peace, and no religion can either), then what is it?
UnagiDon at 10:39 AM JST - 30th May

The reasons for high suicide in Japan are most likely more complex than the simple one dimensional musings given here, and I agree that "lack of religion" causing it is way offensive, but have come to expect no less from the fairy tale believers.
netrek at 01:47 PM JST - 31st May

I wonder what the suicide rate is in North Korea?
Lolli at 06:25 AM JST - 2nd June

I've only come across one person who was a friend of my ex who admittedly thought of suicide and happens to be Japanese. She thought she had done poorly at a job interview in London and wanted to die BEFORE she even found out whether she got the job or not. (She really wanted to work for that co.) She didn't go through with it but I think it was seriously on her mind at one point. I wasn't sympathetic TBH and just couldn't fathom how someone can be so weak and want to give up on life over something like that. Ironically she did get the job!
TheguyNextdoor at 03:54 PM JST - 3rd June

I will wait for more, there is no way she could have hung herself in that space. from the sink? where? As soon as you even try to tamper with the smoke detector it will go off, where??? Something no right about this story. R.I.P....
the_sicilian at 08:00 PM JST - 3rd June

UnagiDon: I agree that "lack of religion" causing it is way offensive, but have come to expect no less from the fairy tale believers.

Very true. But that criticism is for another topic.

Not to placate the simplistic, but as stated before, Japanese history has believed suicide is honorable (in not so many words). If the act is honorable, then it is the ultimate choice for those that feel it is their only answer...... I don't believe it. And feel the mental support system here is terrible. Lives could be saved if there was a better way to deal with people's mental health problems.

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