From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A jumper, in police and media parlance, is a person who commits suicide by jumping from a height. People have jumped, then survived with terrible injuries and permanent disabilities. ^[1] A frequent scenario is that the jumper will sit on an elevated highway as police attempt to "talk him down." Potential jumpers are sometimes encouraged to commit suicide by observers, an effect known as "suicide baiting." (see Suicide Baiting correlational study (Mann, 1981))

Cases

• In August 2004 in Japan, a man jumped from the top of a high rise, crushing a 20-year-old student to death [1].
• The Golden Gate Bridge is a popular spot for jumpers due to the length of the fall and temperature of the water below. The 2006 documentary The Bridge captured 23 people ending their lives there. On average, two people per month are either seen jumping from the bridge or found in the water. About 50 people a year are talked or pulled down before they jump by police patrols.^[2]
• On August 28, 2001, a woman in Seattle was taunted into jumping from the Ship Canal Bridge by commuters who had been stopped while police tried to talk her down.^[3][4]
• In 2001, police were trying to persuade a man not to jump from an overpass into traffic, when someone began transmitting on the police frequency the Van Halen song Jump, whose lyrics repeat "Might as well jump! ... Go ahead, jump!" The man was talked down safely.^[5]

• Urban legend has it that during the Great Depression, many bankers and people who had lost all their money would often plummet to their doom rather than face the result of the stock market crash. This stereotype might have been popularized by radio personality Will Rogers, who once said, "When Wall Street took that tailspin, you had to stand in line to get a window to jump out of, and speculators were selling space for bodies in the East River."^[6]
• In October 2009, the Erskine Bridge, a notorious suicide spot, in Renfrewshire, Scotland hit the headlines following the suicide pact of two teenage girls. The girls who were members of a residential school in Bishopton, Renfrewshire, walked 3 miles to the bridge where they leapt hand-in-hand to their deaths from the 125ft Bridge into the River Clyde near Glasgow. ^[7]

In popular culture

Third Eye Blind's song, "Jumper" addresses the act of jumping to commit suicide in their 1997 self-titled album.

Collective Soul's song, "The World I Know" on their 1995 eponymous album addresses the emotional victory of someone who chooses not to jump.

Genesis' song, "Harold the Barrel" on their 1971 album Nursery Cryme is a seemingly amusing look at the topic.

In the movie Lethal Weapon, Martin Riggs tricks a potential jumper into being handcuffed to him and then leaps onto a safety airbag, taking the would-be suicidal down with him to safety.

The song Spring, from Rammstein's album Rosenrot, is about a man who is forced to jump from a bridge by a crowd, despite the fact that he was on the bridge for the view.

The Channel 4 soap opera, Hollyoaks, broadcast an episode, which featured a suicide pact, similar to the Erskine Bridge girls, which was shown shortly after the tragedy. The episode featured schizophrenic teen Barry "Newt" Newton jumping into water from a platform at a disused factory with his imaginary friend Rae.^[8]

References