It's one thing to take medication if you are seriously depressed or another hardcore issue. But Big Pharma is pushing drugs as a quick fix solution these days. An adult female friend of mine committed suicide this summer. She was on anti-depressants at the time, because she had been feeling blue. Not clinically depressed, but down. I knew her for over two decades. I honestly blame the drugs for her suicide. They changed her personality.

I strongly, strongly suggest that people think long and hard about putting children or teens on drugs. They're meant for serious cases. Right now, they're being overly prescribed.

I'm not a Scientologist, but I am concerned about all this medicating of young people with drugs used for adults with serious duty mental illness.

Supposedly, a symptom of a bipolar child is inappropriate rage. How do they determine what kind of anger is appropriate? Perhaps the kid is reacting in a very understandable manner to the abuse and dysfunction in his family. Or perhaps it's the result of being bullied at school. But instead of trying to fix the major family problems, they medicate the kid. Child calms down a bit, starts getting better grades, presto, problem solved.

Going the route of telling an adult that you, as a teen, feel suicidal doesn't always work as well as it's supposed to. I told my mom that I'd attempted suicide. Her reply was: "No, you didn't. You're not depressed." That was that. I did get help for my depression years later, but it took awhile because I was convinced that I didn't really have a problem. Guess where I got that idea from?

Without digging into the data, I would bet they cannot rule out chance variation - the phrasing would be something like "the rate change did not reach statistical significance".

...with 6.5 years of Shrubby's MalAdministration?

Seriously, though - the constant drumbeat of fear and vitriol from the neocons and echoed endlessly by the M$M/Versailles must have an effect. I know it affects me, and as an adult I'm not the raw nerve ending most adolescents are (I remember being like that - it sucked).

Not to mention, with the slow but steady erosion of the average American's buying power (propped up by a deficit economy), that I suspect money problems are increasing among most families. Money is one of the usual suspects in emotional stress.

While it may seem a contradiction, I really think that in certain groups these drugs are over-prescribed and in others they are under. As someone who struggled for a long time before deciding to take SSRI's (and feeling I was pathetic and weak for a long time after for doing it), and as someone who hates the side effects and big pharma, do say that advertising plays a big role. However, while I know a lot of people on it that shoulnt be on it, I can also see the backlash in the truly depressed kids, the ones most vulnerable, not taking the meds. Anti-depressants suck, but the fact is is that all the studies have shown that teen suicide has risen in correlation to the black box warning. medications are overused in this country and while it is a definite worry and should be taken seriously, because it is over-prescribed for some does not mean that some still are in desperate need.

This trend is very worrying, but the media and the constant stress on teenagers today plays a big part o it. A lot o girls I talk to never feel good enough, there is constant stress on girls (I cant speak of the other gender, as I am not a member), and I cant help but imagine that the hopelessness that comes from a feeling of constant failure plays a part of it and needs to be focused on as much as SSRIs and MAOI's

...but this is an article specifically about the rise in **girls'** suicide rates within the overall rise in teen suicide rates. So shouldn't we look beyond the drug companies? (I'd like to avoid an argument about whether the patriarchy overprescibes girls for assorted mainias, if we can.)

I say this because suicide is reported to be in large part a cultural phenomenon (didn't "The Tipping Point" cover these studies?). Haven't we sort of created a culture of suicide around teen girls (i.e., the unambiguously named "Suicide Girls" who glamorize generally self-destructive behaviors for profit), and couldn't this be a significant factor? I think in some other cultures (Japan) suicide is very much a "guy thing".

I caught a song the other day--pretty sure it was Amy Winehouse--and started thinking, "Jesus Christ, this girl really is getting off on how much of a self-destructive psycho she is!" Then I realized that a lot of girls I know, including my sisters, TOTALLY love Amy Winehouse. Then I thought about my suicidal ex, and how she was all about all sorts of reckless, anti-social and frequently suicidal female archetypes in film and music. Is chicken or egg? Doesn't matter. More chickens, make more eggs, make even more chickens.

I think suicide is going viral for certain unhappy girls in America, just like suicide clubs have formed around other demographics at other times. Not necessarily the successful act, but maybe the attempts and certainly the iconography. What do you think Broadsheet? I'm sure this issue's been raised before.

Well,

We need to medicate the kids because schools do in fact, suck.

We need to medicate the kids because education is meant to create zombies to feed into industry jobs.

We need to medicate the kids because we aren't allowed to discipline the kids.

We need to medicate the kids because Broadstreet fems demand a culture that say girls can dress like skanks but need not take any responsibility for that, so then the girls get into all sorts of competitions over sex but we are not allowed to say that.

We need to medicate the kids because otherwise they won't get good grades, get the internship, get the college of their choice, get the residency they want

We need to medicate the kids because if they hold up a banner saying bong hits for jesus our zero tolerance policies will kick them out of school

We need to medicate the kids, because feminists demand zero tolerance policies, and if we don't medicate the kids, god only knows what they are capable of.