Hot on the heels of discussions about banning possession of BSDM material as discussed by Stephen Tall comes news that a charity is called for a ban on pro-suicide websites:

Suicide is a major cause of death in young men

The government should make it illegal for internet sites to incite or advise people on how to commit suicide, a charity says.

Papyrus, set up to tackle young suicide, said the risk posed by pro-suicide websites was not being taken seriously enough.

The charity said the 1961 Suicide Act should be amended to make it illegal to publish such material on the web.

The government said it was looking at how rules could be tightened.

At the moment, the law says it is illegal to aid, abet, counsel, procure or incite someone to commit suicide, but to be successfully prosecuted the individual has to have knowledge and participated in the suicide.

The charity said it was aware of nearly 20 internet-related suicides cases in the UK in the last five years.

Oh dear. At least the Home Office spokesperson quoted said it would not be possible as many sites were hosted abroad. But this apparent trend towards demanding censorship of this that and the other is naive and dangerous.

Suicide is tragic. My then best friend killed himself while away at university twelve years ago. Because, it transpired, he feared that he would not make a good lawyer and let his family down. And guess what, we hadn't heard of the web back then. "20 internet related suicide cases" - all very sad, but actually, how on earth do you work that out. There are lots of legitimate medical sites as well that someone might use in the process of working out how to kill oneself. Are these to be banned "just in case" as well?

I'll bet those same sites that have allegedly aided and abetted suicides have also prevented a fair number as people talk about their problems, hook up with others in the similar situations and so on. Suicide, I am assured, is rarely a rational act. Some would say that philosophically it is the most irrational act as we are preprogrammed to be survivors.

People will always find information from other sources. A quick glance at the top few of the "I want to kill myself" search they claim yields about 5 million pages (I get nearly 29 million incidentally) seems to suggest that most are cries for help. And I've seen such cries in action on the web where the person has been "talked down" and gone on to sort themselves out. I rather think you can't have one without the other. If the information wasn't there you'd likely not have people asking for help and being talked out of it. The very top returned site on Google is, as you might expect, the Samaritans.

Censorship is not the answer, and in particular on the web will lead to dangerous consequences for civil liberties as every pressure group gets in on the act about their particular issue.