Tag Archives: suicide

Lock it up — Seattle mayor puts forward ‘safe storage’ gun control legislation

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Preventing the next school shooting might be at the heart of it but data show helping to prevent suicides could be an equally important outcome of new gun control legislation sent to the Seattle City Council this week by Mayor Jenny Durkan.

“The roots of gun violence are complex, but we know that unsecured, unsafely stored guns help fuel this crisis of violence because they are more likely to cause tragic accidents, fall into the wrong hands, or be used in suicides,” Durkan said in announcing the new legislation. “Requiring that gun owners safely store their guns can help make our communities safer places to live.”

The  legislation proposed by the former U.S. District Attorney would require “safe storage of firearms” and will increase “civil penalties and legal responsibility” for owners who don’t report stolen firearms within 24 hours as is already required by law. Continue reading →

Pride Lives will walk Capitol Hill to distribute suicide prevention information

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In 2002, Judd Shapiro attempted suicide. Now he looks at what he’s achieved since then including starting a nonprofit called Pride Lives to get resources to help those considering suicide.

“Life has changed for me so drastically in ways that I never thought were even possible,” Shapiro said. “If I had succeeded and ended my life then, I wouldn’t have experienced so many things.”

Shapiro moved to Seattle in 2014. When he got here, he heard about people in the LGBTQ community as well as in other cities who had recently committed suicide.

He noticed when that happened, the community would remember the person with a memorial or moment of silence at a bar, but then would go back to their lives. Continue reading →

Pride Lives to put suicide prevention information ‘where we live and play’ on Capitol Hill

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The front of the information card the group plans to distribute this weekend…

The 30-month sentence in a federal hate crime case and a weekend malicious harassment incident in Pike/Pine are reminders that fights for equality and tolerance will never really end. They are also reminders of the difficulties that still remain for LGBTQ communities. This weekend, a coalition of neighborhood queer groups are banding together to spread the word about where people can turn to for help:

Pride Lives will take place Saturday, November 14th starting at 2 PM:

Volunteers will walk Capitol Hill with suicide prevention materials we’ve designed. We’ll start at the Cuff Complex and walk across the hill visiting businesses and giving them signs and hand outs to display. This gets needed resource info out to the public right in the spaces where we live and play.

Support for the information cards and posters — as well as the volunteers who will be on the move to distribute them — come from many organizations including several active in the city’s leather scene. The after-party, of course, is at the Cuff. Continue reading →