TECHNOLOGY giants including Google and Facebook should be forced to remove content about suicide and self-harm, the government’s minister for suicide prevention has demanded.
Jackie Doyle-Price, 49, said internet giants need to take action against self-harm methods in the same way they tackle online extremist content.
The MP for Thurrock was appointed as Britain’s first suicide prevention minister in October.
In an interview with the Daily Telegraph, the minister said that sites Wikipedia, Google, Facebook and Twitter were behaving like ‘unruly teenagers’ who had to be ‘dragged, kicking and screaming’ into taking action.
She told the paper: ‘Publicising methods of how to take your own life are just as irresponsible as publishing hate videos and terrorism videos. It’s the same thing; it leads to death and it leads to death that is preventable’.
Mrs Doyle-Price cited Wikipedia were ‘totally irresponsible’ for hosting pages with descriptions of common suicide techniques.
‘If someone who is vulnerable and considering taking their life reaches that state of utter low self esteem and self worth and they decide to go on the internet and start looking at ways to kill yourself they are going to find access to those techniques – that’s just totally irresponsible,’ she said.
The hypocrisy of Jackie Doyle-Price going after internet companies that host pages with suicide methods (which requires effort on the part of a suicidal person to look for) whilst being part of a ‘government’ that has caused thousands of suicides with their policies (without the victims having any say in whether they wish to take their life or not).