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Fake Suicide Attempt Tests Facebook Prevention Tool, Lands Man In Asylum
First time accepted submitter abhishekmdb writes Shane Tusch faked his suicide in an attempt to test the authenticity of Facebook suicide prevention tool and got detained for 72 hours. Facebook has rolled out a set of tools to keep a check on its users who are having suicidal tendencies and prevent these users from suicidal attempts. In case some user is having suicidal thoughts and mentions that in the Facebook posts and if a friend of that user reports it to Facebook then a third party will immediately review the post and Facebook would lock the suicidal user's account and the user will be made to read Facebook's suicide prevention materials.
I guess you've never been there. Major depression is an illness, not "the blues". It pushes people to suicide.
"Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
Five days ago, when SFGate reported this story, it was made quite clear that Tusch's friends were not in on the hoax and took it quite seriously ---
and that someone reported it to the police independently of Facebook.
A mans fake suicide post gets him detained
Posting as Anonymous Coward for obvious reasons. I got really, really drunk one night, got really upset about stupid things and started texting people about all the soul crushing burden that was my life at the time. I wasn't going to kill myself. I never even mentioned killing myself. Regardless of any of that, I was picked up and eventually ended up in the psych ward. There is no 24 hour release. They are allowed to hold you as long as the Doctor on duty sees fit, usually a minimum of 48 hours. They bill you for each meal you eat and each and every service you may need while trying to explain that you were just on a bender and don't usually act that way. On the 3rd day (it was over a weekend) the Doc decided I wasn't really a danger to myself and authorized my release. It took an additional 14 hours to be let go. Received the bill a few weeks later to the tune of over $3,000. Then...then I wanted to kill myself. It's good that there is a system in place to "help" potentially suicidal folks by getting them under observation but if that place wasn't trying to maximize their profit while doing so I'll eat a pair of my dirty socks after a run in the mud on a hot summer day.
Deinstitutionalization for most categories of psychiatric patients started around 1950. Psychiatric units are just another specialization in today's hospital.
There are 6 major state hospitals in California which would technically qualify as asylums these days:
Atascadero State Hospital - a hospital primarily for housing the criminally insane (AKA a forensic mental hospital)
Patton State Hospital - a forensic mental hospital
Napa State Hospital - a civil and forensic mental hospital
Coalinga State Hospital - a forensic facility for housing sexually violent predators
Harbor View House - a private civil facility operated by a non-profit
Metropolitan State Hospital - a civil and forensic mental hospital
They are not some place you get sent for a 5150 72 hour hold, and they didn't hold him the full 72 hours in any case, they held him 40 and verified that he wasn't suffering from an altered mental state due to drugs or a disorder. He was either taken to the PES (Psychiatric Emergency Services) unit at San Mateo Medical center, or he was taken to Mills Peninsula Medical Center, which are the San Mateo County designated 5150 receiving hospitals.
In addition, there are two other semi-major facilities, which count a bit more strongly than PES intake facilities for 5150's which are normally handled by regional medical centers, since they deal with longer term holds:
John George Psychiatric Pavilion - which is primarily used for PES 5150's and longer term holds
Langley Porter Psychiatric Institute at UCSF - a psychiatric teaching hospital
Frankly? I'm surprised they took him on it; if he hadn't shown up on their doorstep (he visited the police station for another matter, and admitted to having made the Facebook posting), then they probably wouldn't have. I've had a hard enough time getting services for people who were obviously decompensating or off their meds, in the street in Santa Clara, and the county mental health wouldn't send out a social worker to help them out, unless I basically called the cops on them to have them arrested. There was really no call for that, as they weren't actually hurting anyone, just talking to their voices outside a Subway Sandwich shop or whatever.
But that kind of B.S. attitude would not have flow where I grew up and volunteered: there, they would have sent a social worker. California's mental health services have been going down hill a lot faster than they have in other states.