Suicide by the Book
'Let's Die Together' -- name of a startling article in the May 2007 Atlantic, describing the contemporary cult of anonymous group suicide in Japan. Disparate groups of people are killing themselves, after making arrangements over the Internet. And many of them are taking instruction from The Perfect Suicide Manual, an infamous 1993 book by Wataru Tsurumi that details how to off oneself by various means: hanging, electrocution, drug overdose, asphyxiation (this last method seems most popular.) "There's nothing bad about suicide" the author intones. Japan has a long history of families committing suicide together, as well as dishonored samurai perfoming seppuku (ritual disembowelment), but anonymous groups meeting to kill themselves is something new. Read more in Jackson Library
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Posted, in International, by Paul Reist on April 9, 2007 | Permalink
