ANSWER TO THE AOKIGAHARA FOREST POST

   Kim has mentioned the stricking number of suicides in the Aokigahara Forest in Japan.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Aokigahara_forest_01.jpg 

   I left a commentary on her post [http://dirtondeathblog.blogspot.ca/2012/02/aokigahara-forest.html#comment-form], but it seems to refuse my list of references. So here it is with another copy/paste of my reaction.


   Thanks for your post. Not that many people would have opened the subject on the taboo of suicide.

   I am sorry if I am of no help concerning Japanese funerary practices regarding suicide. Data concerning their rituals felt like looking for a needle in a haystack. 

   However, David Reid seems to suggest that funerary rites are different when it concerns suicide and 'muenbotoke (people who die with no kin to remember them, or whose line dies out)'.(Reid, 1981, p.12)

   Besides, I could find that the unidentified found dead were under the jurisdiction of the 3 villages of Narusawa, Ashiwada and Kamikuishiki for they are adjacent to the Aokigahara forest. So we know that the John and Jane Does will have "decent" funerals as the villages will pay for their cremation, the hearse, the urn and storage.(Hadfield, 2000)

   But I think that we have to take into account different parameters on why suicide is more 'acceptable' in Japan. We may think of their historical background which is tightly linked to their code of honor. Remember the expression 'harakiri' (aka seppuku) or your History classes when we talked about the kamikaze aviators in World War II? Both of those suicidal methods (one by disembowelment and the other by crashing oneself with a plane) are violent deaths which are seen as respectful for they are proof of one's devotion to a figure (a lord or a master) or to one's country - which might result in self-punishment in case of failure in one's duty -, a form of protest against one's enemies, or the last resort when there are no other solution.(Thompson, 2007, pp. 20,22 and 37)

   Ok, I admit that I was also shocked by the use of the adjective "magnificent" by policemen and the fact that they were "impressed" when they describe a hara-kiri scene which took place in front of the US embassy on May 31, 1924 as a result of the American Immigration Act of 1924. But we have to keep in mind that their notions of beauty, morals and codes are different from ours, due to the culture they were immersed in. (Hirobe, 2001, p.33)

   Plus, the act of suicide has been embellished and/or romanticized with literary works and more modern media, to such point that it help to instill the belief that it is being "normal". As you said before, there are books like "Kuroi Jukai" or "The Complete Suicide Manual". But we may also mention the mangas and animes the Japanese are so fond of, like "Saint Seiya", "Dragon Ball" or "Ken". Or we may also refer to the dramatic movie Yûkoku (1966) with its harakiri scene, and the real death by seppuku of lead actor Yukio Mishima a few years later. (Yukio, 2008)

   In addition to that, the news media cover more and more suicide stories as Japan is the country with the highest lethal rate. The phenomenon (or common practice?) hits the students and employees undergoing lots of pressure, economic hardships, newly-widows or divorced people. These figures are also explainable by the fact that their religions - contrary to Christianity, Judaism and so on - do not forbid such practice.(Aoki, 2012)

   This is interesting to see how such people burdened by the restrictiveness of their traditions, morals and codes can be so open-minded when it comes to death, and especially voluntary death.
REFERENCES
*Aoki, M. 2012. Suicides top 30,000 for 14th straight year. The Japan Times [online]

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20120112a2.html

*Hadfield, P. 2000. Japan struggles with soaring death toll in Suicide Forest. The Telegraph [online]. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/japan/1373287/Japan-struggles-with-soaring-death-toll-in-Suicide-Forest.html

*Hirobe, I. 2001. Japanese pride, American prejudice : modifying the exclusion clause of the 1924 Immigration Act. Stanford, Calif, Stanford University Press.

http://books.google.ca/books?id=aodXI-385HoC&pg=PA33&dq=suicide+japan+funeral+police+magnificent&hl=en&sa=X&ei=rtFvT7-sI8mYiQKbnqGnBQ&ved=0CDIQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=suicide%20japan%20funeral%20police%20magnificent&f=false

*Reid, D. 1981. Remembering the Dead : Change in Protestant Christian Tradition through Contact with Japanese Cultural Tradition. Japanese Journal of Religious Studies, 8(1/2), pp.9-33.

*Thompson, S. 2007. Tokyo. London, New Holland.

http://books.google.ca/books?ei=tblvT8y3A8PSiALVrpi3BQ&id=143W5XbACSsC&dq=shinto+mortuary+rites+suicide&q=suicide#v=snippet&q=suicide&f=false

*Yukio, D. 2008. La mort volontaire au Japon. Canalblog [online]

http://japon.canalblog.com/archives/2008/08/02/10115718.html