NZ’s horrific suicide rate is our mass shooter thoughts and prayers

ByMartyn Bradbury

We describe NZ Suicide as ‘stubbornly high’ but never talk about our cultural denial…

Rate of suspected suicides largely unchanged, Māori still worst-affected

The rate of suspected suicides has fallen slightly according to the latest report from the Coroner’s Court and Health New Zealand.

Latest figures show there were 11.0 suspected self-inflicted deaths per 100,000 people in the last year – that’s down 3.1 percent from the average rate of the last 16-years.

However, in actual numbers there were 630 suspected suicides in the last financial year, from 617 the year before.

The Coroners Court and Health New Zealand | Te Whatu Ora said the annual provisional suicide statistics showed no statistically significant changes in the rate of suspected self-inflicted deaths between 2024 and 2025.

Males made up 474 of the deaths and females 156.

Males who are Māori are dying in suspected suicides at a rate of more than twice that of non-Māori.

Māori males had 28.1 suspected self-inflicted deaths per 100,000 people compared to non-Māori males, who had a rate of 14.2 per 100,000 non-Māori male population.

The rate of suspected self-inflicted deaths for Māori females was 8.6 per 100,000 Māori female population equivalent to about 1.7 times that of non-Māori females, who had a rate of 5.1 per 100,000 non-Māori female population.

Over the last year, the difference in rates of suicide between Māori and non-Māori was most notable in the 25-44 years age group.

…we always describe NZ Suicide as ‘stubbornly high’ but never talk about our cultural denial do we?

We don’t have a youth problem in NZ, we have an adult problem.

NZ hates young people.

This week it was revealed that over 500 kids taken into state care were abused by those supposed to be caring for them.

We screamed ‘something just be done’ during ram raids, that ‘something’ was criminalising  children, holding them in dangerous facilities and graduating them to jail as quickly as possible.

NZ hates young people.

The horror of our suicide rate gives us a glimpse behind the ‘she’ll be right’ facade of our culture and the dark torment of an alpha male macho mental landscape that is terribly fragile.

Our under funded social infrastructure, our ‘me first’ consumerism, our 30 years of neoliberal mythology, our disconnection from one another, our untreated pain, our lack of hope from grinding poverty in a first world country, our damaged masculinity, the intergenerational consequences of colonialism, our unspoken rage culture, our inability to express emotion beyond anger – all of this demands questions we don’t want to hear as a society and the shame of suicide continues to hide and smother any healing.

NZ hates young people.

In a society that has no religious faith and all the cultural maturity of a can of coke, the bonds which keep us attached are frail and disconnected. In our fetishisation of individualism we have lost the central part of the human condition –  connection.

We have traded in our interwoven threads of whanau, friendship and kin for a race where no one wins.

The reason we can’t talk about suicide is because we can’t stand to talk about the dark treacle of self hate and loneliness at the core of consumer culture. We don’t dare confront the hollowness of our existence on these far flung crags of rock for fear of what we will reveal about ourselves.

Damaged individuals competing for a self identity too fragile for the storms and tempests of life.

Thanks to neoliberalism, we are further from each other than ever before.

Look at the manner in which our suicide rates jumped after the neoliberal reforms of the 1980s, where we moved away from the communal towards the individual…

…we huddle frightened on these lonely rocks at the end of the world and slowly one by one slip off into the swallowing dark. Until we are prepared to confront many of the individualism-over-all myths and rebuild our tattered communities, our suicide rate will remain reminding us of our whispered deceptions.

We refuse to ask the why of suicide because we are too frightened to know the answer is a reflection of the shallow and lonely community we have become. Instead we reel off a list of phone numbers whenever we dare mention suicide as if that means a fucking thing.

We are broken and no one wants to admit that.

NZ hates hate young people.

That’s why we have the highest youth suicide rates in the OECD.

That’s why this Government will achieve nothing.

NZ’s horrific suicide rate is our mass shooter thoughts and prayers

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16 Comments

  1. Two things I see here .First over time families have disintegrated with members now spread around the world .In my family siblings are spread from the far north to the south island and very little if any physical contact .The result being there is no one to share concerns with or to just have a chat about the daily grind .The other cause is the failing of relationships and the resulting drama that comes with that .Those situations become a war of lies and inuendo as to the character of the two former partners .The family court fails to be decisive and make binding decisions in a consistant way .
    The first mistake in most cases is that because the relationship has broken down men are suddenly labled as being bad people and therefore an unfit parent .This after spending years working all god given hours to support the kids and take them to sport etc.Suddenly they find them selves out on the street with no support for them selves yet still supporting the family as before .There is no MENS REFUGE that I am aware of .In my family I have seen both sides of the coin and have spent the last 6 years raising 3 grand kids while mum works and gets back on her feet so to speak .
    One son has been baned by the family court from having any contact with his two boys even when the police had to take the mother and the kids into protective custody because her drug supplier had assulted her because she could not pay for her fix of meth .Those boys had to watch as she performed sex with men to pay for those drugs on many occasions as well as witness her beatings by the same men .They are now well down the path of being involved in crime starting out raiding Avocado orchards at night ,while mum was stoned,and then selling them by day instead of attending school .Womens refuge pleaded with their dad to come and collect them because mum was a danger to them .So he collected one but soon was dobbed in by their maternal grand mother and police made him return the child asap or be arrested .
    With all that shit happening to families it is no wonder suicide levels are so high .
    Another sad case ,a young man Killed himself after years of manipulation just as he was getting a relationship built with his dad .Had dinner with mum then went home and took his own life .

    1. Gordon W – U think most of us here know some reality that others aren’t willing to countenance. It becomes a class thing – thinking those people are inadequate or some other putdown. And in truth most of us are inadequate to deal with all the life that our society has created for us.

      It’s too difficult, and it’s a matter of pride that one doesn’t fall to the levels of others read about. People are reluctant to have anything to do with people fallen by the wayside. And when that happens they are almost impossible to help and one’s own life can get ruined in trying to do so. And yet the government gets harder and meaner; problems, well fine them until they do right, if they don’t pay put them in jail. Do a Tom Phillips action, regard it as a practice, a manoeuvre to be used afterwards as a model for how to hunt people.

      It bloody makes me sick. The complacency and self-satisfaction of the middle class prevent them from looking to the real problems in society and how to cope with a worse climate-destroying and vulture-wealth future. I am helping at an agency that has been going for decades, and know the woman managing it from early years. I understand their needs and they get a kick out of some help. So people can try doing that, it will make a dent in their anxiety level that would look good on a graph, a big slide down the scale from a previous level!

      I don’t know about society as a whole. Spiritual values, just general concern and friendly help are less available, and I remember the sneer on a businessman’s face as he said he didn’t support Labour or churches. If people wanted better, let them earn it, and religion was for people praying to get things others worked for. Sport was put in place of church, church became too middle-class, and rule bound, and caring about parents and helping them and families an individual thing. It was to the fore after World War 2, but now the thrust is not for families, its is making money and getting fine houses (or houses by the score), and concern about families? – they shouldn’t have children if they can’t manage them. If we want people we can import them.

      A cold-hearted, selfish society, constructing money as a totem, not even as strong as glass, which you can see through, and yet it is a solid though still can be fractured. Money is formless and invisible, morphing and changing, fulfilling dreams and desires as well as being a trading mechanism for which it is most useful, if only we kept to that. And paid into a sort of companionship fund to further the ‘hamlet’ we live in and amongst and we would all thrive.

      1. You trying to beat Bob1st Jacqueline at vacuous, and in the end, stupid uncaring time-wasting input? Stick your tiny head if you do have one in your coffee cup, or go to AI hunting ground (at NZ Initiative?) to mix with your other free-dreaming thinking modules. You have nothing to lose; because you are nothing.

  2. NZ did not always hate young people. Back when the boomers were growing up, newsreels such as this one, https://youtu.be/Gj7tTDHH8oE, were full of such statements as “Only an intensive building programme now can provide for the future! Children, the citizens of tomorrow, must also have their chance!”

    And then after 1984, of course, we did a complete 180, raising the drawbridge and lowering the portcullis on the citizens of tomorrow, who were by that stage increasingly Māori and Pasifika as well.

  3. NZ’s ugly suicide rate, especially among the young and our Maori is a stain on all of us. Yes, social media, bullying, friendlessness, loneliness, life pressures are all contributors. But they all amalgamate into HOPELESSNESS. I truly feel for this ‘Lost Generation’. We recently sat in a cafe and a bunch of young men came in for lunch. As soon as they sat down, out came the phones and there was NO interaction, no laughing, no banter. They ordered/ate and left, no doubt saying what a great time they had! We compared this with the table on the other side, mid to older males – no phones – lots of laughter, banter, who had a wonderful rewarding outing. My daughters’ families are now playing cards, board games [from their childhood] doing jigsaws, having fun. It started with a power black-out and has continued. However our youth need to make the important decision to change the way they are controlled by social media/phones etc. If they don’t it will only get worse – already it is TRAGIC. Most of us would know someone who has taken their own life or seriously threated to. Again it’s tragic and so unnecessary! Gordon I so feel for your experiences – you are clearly a kind and decent man. All the best to you and yours.

  4. One need only glance at NZ’s political leadership to understand why people are killing themselves in droves – greedy, stupid, backward individuals that would disgrace Game of Thrones.

    No enlightened futurism, no economic ability, no charisma, no fucking idea. How do we consistently end up with MPs that would struggle with the intellectual challenge of being a coffee table ornament? The only way they could serve NZ is as compost.

    1. Yes, HOW? A box of chocolate fish for the best answer, and no jokes are allowed, or sardonic comments. This is a serious question.

      1. It’s not complicated to measure government performance against a basket of social goods. One could use Maslow’s hierarchy of human needs, or Savages “Somewhere to live, someone to love, something to do, and something to hope for.” No government in recent memory has made any progress whatsoever on these priorities.

        They should be hanging their heads in shame – failing which, the public, with a bit of rope, should be hanging the lot of them. Instead they lie about growth, cut taxes on the least deserving, and hand out great chunks of money to their mates. Stupid backward clowns, and traitors to their duty.

  5. All societies go through great stressors. NZ is still wealthy by world standards.

    The problem is kids are taught to prioritize feelings over stoicism and self discipline

    Andrew Tate’s audios should be forced listening on loop for our young, particular young men.

    1. You may wipe your tears of frustration away with what Mark? Dollar bills are no longer currency. The fictional world of money has been taken over by the kids of the wealthy and pretentious so money in material form is less available. Cotton might be replaced with something made from seaweed,; just remember Mark how things move on. First they did away with money, then they did away with useful plants, and soon after they will decide that you are not useful, and unplug you.

  8. The world should get free of capitalism (and keep democracy). We don’t actually need it anymore, but the greedy elites want it

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