lunes, 31 de diciembre de 2012

Obscene and lazy to blame DJs for nurse's suicide - Houston Chronicle (blog)

Jacintha Saldanha, the British nurse who, thinking she was on the line with Buckingham Palace, allowed two Australian DJs to talk to Kate Middleton's private nurse, killed herself last week. The UK's Daily Mail described Saldanha as a "victim of today's causal cruelty".

Everybody seems to agree with Saldanha's neighbors:

What these Australian guys did is not acceptable. Their prank has killed our beloved Jacintha. Her death should be blamed on them.

Well, no, actually. The DJs didn't kill Saldanha. They probably embarrassed her, but according to the hospital, she faced no criticism internally for allowing the call to go through. Her job wasn't threatened. She wasn't disciplined and wasn't going to be. To the contrary, the hospital was apparently "supporting her during this difficult time." Even the Royal Family lent their support:

"At no point did the palace complain to the hospital about the incident," a spokesman for St. James's Palace said. "On the contrary, we offered our full and heartfelt support to the nurses involved and the hospital staff at all times."

Something else was going on in her life and in her mind. This just wasn't nearly enough to cause anyone who wasn't already contemplating an early exit to do themselves in.

But assume before the prank Saldanha was not depressed and not contemplating suicide. Is it really reasonable to think that a radio prank was enough to make someone go from zero to ending it all in less than a week?

What about her children? If you'd been slightly embarrassed because you made a mistake at work — even one that brought you some public notoriety – would your family be satisfied that that was the reason you decided to desert your children forever?

But if the news accounts are accurate — and nobody seems to be asking what else was going on in her life — a radio prank, of which she was not the primary target or victim, was enough to persuade Saldanha that nothing in her life remained important enough to stick around for. That includes her children. Was a radio prank enough to convince Saldanha that her present unhappiness was so great that it was better to relieve herself of further humiliation than to devastate her own children in ways they'll never get over? What's that tell you about her emotional state before the prank and the kind of parent she was?

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