Aboriginal teenager, 18, takes her own life as indigenous suicide crisis claims 30 lives in just four months

A community has been left devastated after an 18-year-old's girl was found dead in an apparent suicide on Thursday.

The death in remote region of Balgo in WA brings the total number of indigenous suicides to 30 this year, according to the National Indigenous Critical Response Service.

The suicide is the 10th in the Kimberly region since the beginning of 2018.

Eight of those deaths were children under the age of 18, suicide prevention researcher Gerry Georgatos a suicide prevention researcher told ABC News.

It comes after an inquest into the suicides of 13 young people across the region.

WA Coroner Ros Fogliani who concluded that 'inter-generational trauma' was responsible to the terrible loss of life.

Three 12-year-old indigenous children have committed suicide since January, according to the National indigenous Critical Response Service (NICRS).

Rochelle Pryor, 14, took her life in January after posting a heartbreaking message to Facebook.

'Once I'm gone, the bullying and racism will stop,'she wrote.

She was one of five young indigenous girls who took their own lives across Australia in January.

Gerry Georgatos has previously said poverty and living conditions in remote indigenous communities are part of the problem.

'Suicide is multi-factorial and multilayered with an arc of issues, some which intertwine, but it is not complex. There is an underwriting narrative — poverty,' Mr Georgatos wrote for Independent Australia.

'In my research – borne robustly from the experiential – responding to suicide-affected families, nearly 100 per cent of First Nations suicides are of people living below the poverty line.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6917927/Aboriginal-teenager-18-takes-life-indigenous-suicide-rises-25-just-four-months.html

the problem is this is even more complex than just poverty
in a lot of remote aboriginal communities 'first contact' is within living memory,
adjusting to modern society from their traditional society is a huge leap and not all of it is positive there is definitely less 'community' for lack of a better term in a modern western society than their tribal one.

This is why we can't just pretend everyone has the same opportunities in life, some people are born 'behind the eight ball'

Another thing to take into consideration :

Among 'developed'/'first world' countries, Australia often ranks among the top ten countries for suicide rates --  not only for indigenous youths, but for teenage suicides in general, and for overall suicides --  along with other "wealthy" countries like Japan and Finland...

Increasing inequalities and poverty levels, lack of oppportunity, unrealistic expectations and undue pressures to "excel" and reach often unobtainable goals --  exacerbated even more over the last 20-odd years by conservative-leaning/right-wing guvm'nts and media paying more attention to high earners and wealth generation, while largely ignoring social problems and environmental concerns.

And then those greed-fuelled c**ts make things even worse by labelling the poorer half of society as bludgers, "leaners", shirkers, unworthy --  and resorting to their usual 'politics of envy' mantras to defend their own selfishness and inaction.