Proposal for Samaritans of Singapore (SOS)

Proposition

This proposal aims to get youths to help fellow youths going through suicidal
thoughts, by producing a social experiment video, advertisements or a blog.

Preface

There has been an increase in the number of Youth experiencing suicidal

thoughts. The inability to be open about the thoughts and seek help due to social
stigmas. People with such thoughts are considered weak and mentally unstable which
is why people do not talk about it. Youth is also unaware of the severity of having
suicidal thoughts and make comedic comments about it. The danger is not noticed
until its too late and life is taken.

There is a lack of awareness for youths of how to handle suicidal thoughts.

Youths do not know how to react to their friends having such thoughts. This leaves
youths to be left alone with their thoughts to deal with. The lifestyle of youth is very
hectic, and they prioritise everything else over their mental health. Academics has
become a big part of a youths life. They constantly reminded of what will happen if
they were to do badly which creates a stress factor and lesser time spent on their well-
being.

The three campaigns consist of a social experiment video, advertisements and

lastly a blog run by youth volunteers. The social experiment video is about how the
youth react to a stranger showing symptoms of suicide while advertisements visually
attract the youth to click on it. Lastly, the blog run by volunteers will be about
anonymous youth sharing their experiences and how to cope with suicidal thoughts.
The campaign about the blog would be the best as it fulfils the main idea of our
proposal which is to get the youth to help each other. The advertisement costs too
much money, and the video has too many restrictions which are why it was not picked
as the best. This proposal aims to get youths to help fellow youths going through
suicidal thoughts, by producing a social experiment video, advertisements as well as a
blog.

Position
 Youths with suicidal thoughts are unable to express their feelings due to the
rising stress from social pressure from social media and the misconception of the
danger of suicidal tendencies. Firstly, there is a social stigma that people who say they
have these thoughts, are immediately judged and criticised as someone who is
unstable. Due to such thoughts. People affected will think they are crazy or weak, or
somehow a lesser person if they were to talk to others about their condition (Sin).
Secondly, youths get influenced by the wrong messages in social media, encouraging
suicides. Cyberbullying plays a major role in spreading negative messages.
Psychologist Daniel Koh, from Insights Mind Centre, said that the messages have the
power to reinforce whatever negative thoughts a person might have, making it more
difficult to cope (Sin). Another reason why youths are unable to reiterate their
thoughts, is because they do not understand the intensity of the issue. Whenever
something hard come across their lives, youths joke about how they want to commit
suicide, turning it into a norm. It no longer becomes something serious. Youths would
use the word suicide to tease fellow youths without thinking it through. In New
York, it was reported that in 2015, Daniel Briggs shot himself with his shotgun due to
a text from a bully asking him to kill himself with his own shotgun. Such comments
may seem trivial to the bully but they were definitely not for the victim (Pospychala).

Samaritans of Singapore (SOS) came up with two campaigns that helped raise
awareness about youth suicidal thoughts. The #howru campaign was created for world
suicide prevention day and was very successful regarding gaining support in two
ways. Plasters were given to all Singaporeans by volunteers, who distributed them to
support the cause attracting the attention of 4.5 million Individuals (How can a
plaster fix wounds?). The campaign became the hot trending topic on Twitter in with
local celebrities and even SR. Nathan was posting their supports of it. The news also
covered the campaign without any media cost. Another campaign was also released
called Hidden Pain. Posters were made upside with the same words but different
meanings. Over 100 secondary schools, junior colleges and other educational
institutions have eagerly participated in this project and made the campaign a success.
SOS distributed a total of 250,000 postcards to youth island-wide (Im fine/Save
me). The postcard was given to raise awareness to youth telling them that there is

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help. Though the postcard, youth were able to relate to the message that they should
come out about their hidden pains and seek help.

Problem / Potential

The two main problems faced by youth in the current generation that stop
them from helping each other are the inability to notice the signs of suicidal
tendencies as well as the negative effects from the exposure of the internet. Firstly,
youths do not know how to identify that their friend has these thoughts. Their friends
are then left to deal with their suicidal thoughts as no one else is able to notice their
suicidal behaviors until it is too late. When left alone, their thoughts may go from
harmless to harmful in a matter of seconds. Secondly, youth spend most of the time on
the internet. Growing up in the digital age could make them particularly susceptible
to negative online influences, steering them into harming themselves or developing
suicidal tendencies, said Ms Petrine Lim, principal social worker at Fei Yue
Community Services. At greater risk are those who have mental health issues and are
stressed by home and study environments (Sin). Bring it to the next problem that
youths get too caught up in the lifestyle in Singapore, they do not pay attention to the
importance of their mental health. With the workforce being so competitive, youths
are paper chasing. Mental health is not on their list of priorities. Expectations from
their loved ones cause more stress for them so when they do not do well, they feel like
they have disappointed everyone, causing a mental breakdown. In an interview with
The New Paper, Madam Ng, 71, shared about her granddaughter, Ng Siang Mui
jumped to her death just three hours after getting her results slip because she got 2
Bs in her O level exam (Koh).

By equipping youth with knowledge of symptoms of suicidal tendencies, they

will benefit in two ways. Youths will be more aware of how they act around their
friends. They will be cautious about the words they use to tease their friends as they
know how much it can affect a person. Small comments such as You are so fat and
Why are you so stupid and useless? can be seen as jokes but what they do not
realize is how it can negatively impact someone. They will be more internet-friendly.
If they were to see someone posting something negative, they would go and make
sure that the victim is alright. 16-year-old Myanmar girl, Khine Thinzar killed herself

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after her jilted boyfriend allegedly insulted her on Facebook calling her a loose
woman (Chen). Youths will know what to do if they were to see their friends having
suicidal thoughts. They will be able to spot the signs earlier and encourage their
friends to call the hotline. They would know that the first thing to do would be
making sure the person is accompanied full time to ensure her safety and that her
parents are contacted immediately. They can also be a pillar of support for their friend
in the time of need instead of leaving them alone to deal it on their own. The more
they do not talk about, the bigger the problem becomes until one day, they see only
one path to get away from the problem; suicide.

Possibilities

The first campaign is a social experimental video where an individual will run
into a passer-by, crying. The aim of the video is to see whether Singaporean youths
will come forward to help the individual. As the experiment will take place in
polytechnics, youth will get the cold hard facts of the generations actions. The
scenario would show how the youth are reacting towards the symptoms of suicide.
The outcome will then be edited into a video. As it is a video shot in a polytechnic
(poly), they can help promote the video in their social media accounts. Along with the
social experiment, as the different scenarios are playing, there would be words written
explaining the different symptoms. As youth are more interested in visuals, using
them that will help get the awareness across more clearly and they would not be
bored. Through the video, a lot of content can be given, which is beneficial as youth
would prefer to have all the information they need in one location alone.

The second campaign is providing awareness through visually shocking web

banners such as a picture of a girl trying to eat pills while her friends are right beside
her, will be produced to grasp the youths attention. As the youth use the internet all
the time, the chances of them seeing the banners are higher. While surfing the internet,
they would come across the web banners that will lead them to the website. As the
visuals will be something related to them, they would be attracted to the banner
advertisement. Using a certain type of design, the youth will easily be able to identify
that there are different types of scenarios. With a modern design, youth will be
attracted to the visuals. After seeing the visuals, they will see the purpose of the

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advertisement. Youth that are going through such thoughts are able to click on the link
if they are too shy to talk to their friends and family about it.

The third campaign is about a launch of a blog where people talk about how
they survived the suicidal tendencies. This will be talked about in schools and
polytechnics. Youth in Singapore will be cooperative if they are assured that their
identity is confidential. As Singaporean youth are very conservative, having
anonymous posts would allow more of them to take part in the blog postings. As all
the accounts are anonymous, youth who want to know how they can prevent suicide
can now read about it from the blog. The blog would be updated weekly by Youth
volunteers. Youth would have new insights to read regularly. Youth running the blog
would be able to know what their age group wants and what kind of writing would
interest the youths.

Proposal

Out of all the campaigns, the blog is the best choice due to two reasons. It
promotes youth helping each other rather than the organization alone. As the youth is
writing about their real life experiences and not what the professionals think will
happen. There is an interaction between a youth who needs help and a youth who
wants help. Youths are better able to notice the signs of their friends having such
suicidal thoughts better rather reading the vague descriptions from the internet. With
real life experiences, youth are able to relate to it. They can also ask questions
anonymously and get opinions from different people. Any negative comments will be
taken care of by the organization and be dealt with severely based on the severity of
the comment.

The campaign involving the social experiment has its disadvantages. A lot of
permission is required to film in the various polytechnics. Some polytechnics may not
allow such filming as they want to ensure the privacy of their students. It requires a
lot of time. Some youth may not want to be featured in the video as do not want to get
hate by the viewers for not helping the girl. There might be a negative reaction
towards the video. Youth may call it biased against and that the video is representing
youth in a bad light. People might say that it is hard to get youth to help a stranger in
general as Singaporeans are people who do not want to intrude the lives of others.

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Even though the video is highly likely to receive a lot of attention, due to the above
reasons, it is not as good of a campaign compared to the blog campaign.

The advertisement has its disadvantages. There are ways that the
advertisement can be avoided by the youths. There are advertisement blockers that
most youths use to block ads from websites and videos. This will stop the youth from
seeing the advertisement and thus, the visuals will not be able to attract the viewers
attention in the first place. People might be desensitized by the banners after seeing it
for numerous of times. Seeing the recent generation are always looking for new
content and may be difficult to gain the attention of youth who are always on their
phones. The cost of the campaign will be very expensive. The cost for the
advertisement on the internet alone will be a hefty sum of money. In Singapore, to add
advertisements in a website, it costs $15 per measurement (Media Sales Kit). As the
organization is nonprofit driven, there would not be enough money to have the
advertisement in the top searches, and thus it will not receive full awareness. It would
also be unwise to spend that much money on advertising as they need the money to
continue helping people.

Works Cited

Chen, Elysa. Ex- boyfriend called her a loose woman. 9 April 2011. Web. 1 August
2016.http://news.asiaone.com/print/News/AsiaOne%2BNews/Singapore/Story
/A1Story20110408-272533.html

Im fine/Save me Youth Outreach Project. SOS.n.d.web. 1 August 2016.

<https://sos.org.sg/i-m-fine-save-me-a-youth-outreach-project>

How can a simple plaster fix Singapores wounds?. SOS.n.d.web. 1 August 2016.
<http://www.our-idea.net/sos/direct/>

Koh, Maureen. Women loses grandchild and daughter to suicide. The New Paper.

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 SG , 28 Jul. 2015. Web. 8 Aug. 2016.< http://mypaper.sg/top-stories/woman-

loses-grandchild-and-daughter-suicide-20150728>

Media Sales Kit.n.d.pdf. <file:///Users/NPStudent/Downloads/Todayonlinerate

Dec2015_20151222113913.pdf>

Pospychala, Megan. Teen kills himself after being bullied, heartbroken mother

pleads
dont let anyone be treated like my son. FOX 16 Now. 28 May 2016. Web.
1 August 2016.

Sin, Yuen. If youngsters harm himself, his computer may hold key. The Straits

Times. 11 Mar. 2016. Print.

Tan, Judith. Ask. Fm & you could receive abuse / young dont realise danger. The

New Paper. 10 Aug. 2014. Print.

Wang, Tianjie. Teen suicides highest in 15 years but overall rate falls: SOS The

Straits Times. 26 Jul. 2016. Print.