Coming back from laughing and joking about the dead body of a suicide victim and using them for clickbait and views shouldn’t be as easy as a “I’m sorry” video. It’s easy to say you’re sorry, Logan Paul. It hard to show that you mean it.
Its not as easy as simply filming a video curated by PR teams and a entourage to showcase you as being contrite. It’s not as easy as pledging a donation of $1 million dollars , and hoping it will all blow over, so you can go back to your old ways. The only way that you will even show that you are truly sorry and have changed is by continuing the efforts to fix what you did wrong.
Logan Paul was disgustingly wrong in the video that he shot in Aokigahara, the so-called suicide forest in Japan. He shows a dead body, a suicide victim who was hanging by his neck, on a video.
Let that sink in.
He went in search of a suicide victims dead body so that he could use it in a video.
Even worse, afterwards, he walked away and began laughing and joking. Even as he tried to claim that it was a coping mechinism, he continued to laugh and joke.
Suicide is not something to laugh about.
I can promise you that I was not laughing when I walked in on my daughter trying to end her life. There was nothing funny about sitting in a sterile waiting room as she was assessed by metal health professionals. I wasn’t giggling as years later I sat in an Emergency Room convinced she was dying when she was totally paralyzed by an episode of Conversion Disorder. I will never forget my daughter being overcome by mental illness and self hatred enough to think that her only option was to die. I will always hear her voice, begging me to just let her go. I will always remember sitting by her side, for months, helping her crawled and claw her way out of the darkness, back to the light. The costs, both emotionally, and financially to help keep someone who has metal illness healthy is no laughing matter. It’s crippling.
I assure you, there was nothing funny about it.
In his video, he included a screen shot of my daughter, Ally as a victim of mental illness and suicide attempt. Let me be clear, I need to say that she was not contacted by him to see if she wanted to be included. I have to say that because she is getting hate mail about being in it video, even as a screenshot. She does not nor has she ever supported or endorsed him. If I could say anything to Logan Paul, it would be this:
Ally is a survivor and she has mental illness. Do you know her story? Do you know anything about her? Do you know about her anti-bullying work to help people learn to #BeBrave and stand up to the bullies, up for the bullied and up for themselves? Or her incredible work to help #EndTheStigma of Mental illness? Would you ever be as brave as her to be open and forthright about her own mental illness?
That is what it means to fight back, Logan.
It’s putting yourself out there and even when it’s hard and dark and bloody and impossible you still are there standing with your hand out, to grasp the hands of those who are begging for help, and pulling them up.
Your demographic is mostly younger people, and the message you sent to them with your first video is that suicide isn’t that big of a deal. IT IS A BIG DEAL. It’s one of the top causes of death in the US. How long are you going to remain true to this “new you” standing up and trying to help end the stigma of mental illness? One month? Two? Six? How long will your viewers let you be a changed man?
You are at a true crossroad in your life, Logan, You have the chance to really make your mark on the world. You can show all those young people who watch your channel that you made a mistake and that you want to change. The question is, how much do you really want to change? We will all be watching to see.
Originally published at waitsover.com