Maisha Mashtura 

Professor Pastore

English Composition 11000
Netflix’s 13 Reasons Why and Its Negative Impact on Suicidal Teens

On March 31, 2017, the show 13 Reasons Why released its very first season on Netflix. The show was adapted from a book with the same title by Jay Asher, and it followed the story of a teen named Hannah Baker. The show explored many issues in Hannah’s life that lead to her suicide, such as bullying, sexual assault, depression, and negligence from adults. While the reasons for Hannah’s suicide stayed more or less the same, the potrayal of the suicide varied vastly between the show and the book. In the book, Hannah dies from an overdose. In the show, Hannah commits suicide by slitting her wrists on screen. Despite being released to raise awareness about mental health issues, the show received enormous backlash due to the graphic scene that horrified many of its teen and even adult audience. The month following the release of the show, there was a significant spike in the teen suicide rate. Critics also blamed the show for causing a suicide contagion among vulnerable teens who have watched the show. The show’s portrayal of negligent authoritative figures discouraged struggling teens from reaching out for help. In spite of having good intentions behind its release, the show 13 Reasons Why was detrimental to the mental health of teens.
The show 13 Reasons Why gained a lot of popularity after its release, the ratings were “highest in April 2017 and was negligible after June 2017” (Niedekrothenthaler). The teen suicide rate in the U.S increased in April 2017. To understand whether there was a correlation between the spike in the suicide rate and the release of the show, many research studies were done. In Table 1, the data from a study on the Journal Of American Academy Of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry shows that “the release of 13 Reasons Why was associated with a 28.9% step increase in the April 2017 suicide rate among 10- to 17-year-old youths” (Bridge). The data consists of monthly suicide rate of teens pre and post 13 Reasons Why, showing a spike in the rate post release (Bridge). Similar research show a increase in the suicide among teens (12.4% in males and 21.7% in females) which supports Bridge’s results (Niedekrothenthaler). Critics have pointed out that other contributing factors may have caused the increase in the suicide rate, and a correlation between the two factors does not prove causation. However, a research study done on adolescents in Brazil showed worsening mood and accessed increased suicidality among struggling teens directly after watching the show after isolating 13 Reasons Why as the only contributing factor (Rosa). And while it’s true the show isn’t the only factor contributing to the suicide rate, the impact of media portrayal of suicide has an undeniable impact on teens. Studies have shown “news coverage of suicide plays a role in roughly ten per cent of suicides by people younger than twenty-five” (Marche). An example of the relationship between media portrayal fo suicide and its real world consequences was shown by the increase in suicides followed the publication of Goethe’s novel “The Sorrows of Young Werther” (Marche). Media portrayal can often be useful in raising awareness about an issue, when done right. However, in the case 13 Reasons Why, it led to an increase in the suicide rate, and caused significant harm to the mental of health of teens. 

Suicide contagion is a phenomanon observed that show exposure to suicide or suicidal behaviors within one’s family, one’s peer group, or through media reports of suicide and can result in an increase in suicide and suicidal behaviors. 13 Reasons Why was successful in creating a suicide contagion that impacted many vulnerable teens and their families. In the show, the suicide takes place in a very explicit and graphic manner, where Hannah slits her wrists in the bathtub, unlike the overdose in the book. This scene caused an uproar among critics, and the scene was eventually edited out months after its release. However, by giving vulnerable teens contemplating suicide the idea to commit suicide and providing them with a specific method, the “bathtub scene” and the tape recorders put the copycat suicide effect in place. There were many reported cases of suicide that was linked to the show following its release. 19 year old Emily Deithorn, who was struggling with mental health issues, committed suicide the same way as Hannah Baker did after watching the show (Macpherson). Another article reports another case where a young teens named “Anna Bright (14) crawled into a bathtub full of water, just like Hannah Baker did in 13 Reasons Why, and took her own life. She did so on April 18, 2017, just 18 days after the release of Season One” (Waliszewaski). Some critics may point out that other shows, such as Euphoria which shows a teen struggling with drug addiction, aren’t blamed for teens who start abusing drugs the same way. Thus, 13 Reasons Why should not be blamed for the suicides that happen similar to the one in the show. However, that point is invalid as the two shows are about 2 different topics and there is little to no research done on the impact of watching Euphoria on drug abuse among teens. Thus, it’s justified to place blame on 13 Reasons Why for the suicide contagion that followed its imfamous “bathtub scene”.
One of the major focus of the show was whether the negligence from the school was to blame for Hannah Baker’s suicide. In a scene from the show, Hannah goes to her guidance counselor, Mr.Porter, to seek help following her sexual assault. Not only Mr.Porter fails to help Hannah, he also dismissed her clear display of suicidal thoughts. While watching this doesn’t directly harm the mental health of teens, it can be discouraging those teens from reaching out to their counselors and school officials for help. An article states, “Teens dealing with depression and contemplating suicide deserve to see what that solution might look like” (Williams). On the other hand, an article supporting the release of the show states that the show is not to blame for portraying the reality of imcompetetent adults, and “the failure to confront their own and their children’s existential difficulties is the reason Hannah’s character threw the adults in the show into a panic” (Scalvini). Perhaps, the only way to help the teens who were deterred from seeking help after watching this show, is to better the system that failed Hannah Baker. Schools can better train guidance counselor and hire more mental health counselors to deal with suicidal teens. A proactive measure would be for guidance counselors to have mental health check ins with students every few months, as a way to create an outlet for struggling teens.
The idea behind the release of the show 13 Reasons Why is an important one, which is creating a conversation about mental health issues among teens. Mental health issues are stigmatized, many people often lacking an awareness about the issues. However, the execution of the idea was poor. The depiction of suicide in the show was glamorised, causing teens to view suicide as a glorified outcome of mental health issues. The graphic scenes shown in the show was inappropriate for its teen audience, traumatizing many vulnerable teens while giving others a detailed method of committing suicide. Why did Netflix release such a scene, when it was eventually cut from the show later? Why did Netflix ignore the studies who predicted that the show would cause a spike in suicides among teens? Perhaps, the revenue made from the show was a motivating factor.  It’s too late to ask those questions, as it is also too late to save the teens who cut their life short after watching this show. But how can Netflix take accountability for those deaths? They can issue preventative measures to make sure that this doesn’t happen again. By having a code of ethics for shows dealing with sensitive topics, such as suicide, Netflix can prevent releasing shows that negatively impact suicidal teens. Netflix can also have the shows reviewed by mental health experts, to make sure it is appropriate for vulnerable teens struggling with mental health issues to watch. Suicide became the second leading cause of death among teens in 2018 in the U.S (Suicide, NIMH). We need to continue to make sure we protect youths, who are directly impacted by the media, from ever making the decision to end their life.

Work Cited
Niederkrotenthaler, T. (2019, September 1). Association of Increased Youth Suicides with 13 reasons why. JAMA Psychiatry. Retrieved April 9, 2022, from https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapsychiatry/article-abstract/2734859
Bridge, Jefferey. “Association Between the Release of Netflix’s 13 Reasons Why and Suicide Rates in the United States: An Interrupted Time Series Analysis.” Define_me, Journal of American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry , 28 Apr. 2019, https://www.jaacap.org/article/S0890-8567(19)30288-6/fulltext#relatedArticles

Rosa, G. S. da, Andrades, G. S., Caye, A., Hidalgo, M. P., Oliveira, M. A. B. de, & Pilz L. K. (2018, October 30). Thirteen reasons why: The impact of suicide portrayal on adolescents’ mental health. Journal of Psychiatric Research. Retrieved March 26, 2022, from https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022395618306344

Marche, Stephen, and Jia Tolentino. “Netflix and Suicide: The Disturbing Example of ‘13 Reasons Why.’” The New Yorker, 6 May 2019, https://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/netflix-and-suicide-the-disturbing-example-of-13-reasons-why
MacPherson, Erin. “’13 Reasons Why’ Pulls Suicide Scene, Teen’s Mother Says It’s Too Late.” WMAR, WMAR, 26 July 2019,
https://www.wmar2news.com/news/region/carroll-county/13-reasons-why-pulls-suicide-scene-teens-mother-says-its-too-late

Waliszewski, Bob. “Can 13 Reasons Why Be Tragically Influential? A Grieving Mom Says Yes, and Why.” Plugged In, 20 Nov. 2018, https://www.pluggedin.com/blog/can-13-reasons-why-be-tragically-influential-a-grieving-mom-says-yes-and-why/

Williams, Austin. “Where Mr. Porter Went Wrong in ’13 Reasons Why’.” VICE, 27 Apr. 2017, https://www.vice.com/en/article/yp7e5x/where-mr-porter-went-wrong-in-13-reasons-why

Scalvini, Marco, and Flandina Rigamonti. “Why We Must Defend Suicide in Fiction.” BMJ: British Medical Journal, vol. 359, 2017, https://www.jstor.org/stable/26951589. Accessed 10 Apr. 2022.
“Suicide.” National Institute of Mental Health, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/statistics/suicide.