This is the part where every one piles in posting suicide hotline numbers. I would argue most of those people do not have any experience with, or understanding of those hotlines and it's just a trite thing to throw out to show support like "fuck cancer". You should seriously understand what you are signing yourself up for if you call one of those numbers on yourself or someone else. For one you are volunteering that…
If you don't mind me asking, is there anywhere I can read more about this aspect of the system? This comment seems really extreme and it's a perspective I haven't really seen anywhere else.
I had a colleague, now retired, who was the president of state mental health associations, etc. who made the argument that most suicide treatment programs are really designed to protect practitioners and healthcare providers, not the patients. At the time I understood what he was saying, but didn't really understand it until later.
The way it came up with him was more about prediction and risk. He was talking about it because there's basically no way to know if someone is actually imminently suicidal. Most people who talk about it never even make an attempt, and there are lots of people who commit suicide suddenly without saying a word to anyone else ahead of time.
My colleague's point was this: if saying X is totally unpredictive of Y in reality, why react so strongly to saying X? The reason is because it's not really about preventing Y -- you can't -- it's because it legally and morally absolves you of responsibility.
I feel weird writing this because it sounds so cynical, but its a sad truth about the poor state of care of our fellow human beings in contemporary society.