Suicide and the Young Outcast

04/04/2018 Raymond Viger 4

People from different schools of thought within the suicide prevention community have various methods of operating, but we all agree on one thing: young people contemplating suicide don’t use suicide hotlines. They usually don’t reach out beyond their peer group at all. Amongst the young, […] See more

Suicide and the Closed Environment

03/04/2018 Raymond Viger 4

I have had the great privilege of working as a suicide prevention counselor among the Inuit of Quebec. Their 14 villages are strung along a thousand kilometers of some of the most desolate-looking land on planet Earth, in Quebec’s far north. In conjunction with McGill […] See more

Suicide and Society

02/04/2018 Raymond Viger 5

In the face of this distress, we couldn’t continue our intervention efforts without trying to discuss the matter with the proper authorities. Band-aid solutions wouldn’t do. My colleague met with the Casino’s management. We offered to work on the premises to help compulsive gamblers directly, […] See more

Suicide and Politics

01/04/2018 Raymond Viger 6

This line of questioning could well have led me to get involved in politics. But I am a hands-on type. I neither like nor understand the political world. I got involved with a community newspaper aimed at troubled youth in Canada’s poorest federal riding, Hochelaga-Maisonneuve […] See more

What is Suicide?

08/24/2017 Raymond Viger 2

The reality is that suicide is an assault. In the Italian writer Dante’s classic work The Inferno, written in 1321, he gives readers a tour of hell. He puts suicides in his seventh circle of hell. He calls them “the violent against themselves.” They are […] See more