Schools have sent letters to parents to warn them about the danger of watching the Netflix series based on Jay Asher's best-selling YA novel.
- Apr 26, 2017
AceShowbiz - The buzz of Netflix's "13 Reasons Why" has been followed with concerns about the danger that it may carry. Some mental health experts fear the show could glorify teen suicide. Based on Jay Asher's best-selling YA novel, the show chronicles the story of a teenage girl named Hannah Baker (Katherine Langford), who has recently committed suicide.
"Sequences of terrible things happen to Hannah, and we don't get a feel for her internalization until she kills herself," Dr. Victor Schwartz, medical director of the JED Foundation, tells NBC News.
School officials, meanwhile, have sent letters to parents to warn them about the show. "While the show is fictional, the series is extremely graphic, including several rape scenes, and raises significant concerns about the emotional safety of those watching it," reads part of a letter sent to parents of public school students in Montclair, New Jersey.
Andrew Evangelista, Montclair Public Schools District's mental health and harassment, intimidation and bullying (HIB) Coordinator, says he wrote the letter after hearing about the series from students and watching it himself.
"It just didn't seem right," he says of the show, which is co-executive produced by Selena Gomez. "There were a lot of questions I had, about how the girl was portrayed and the lack of mental health resources that were available to her."
A letter sent by administrators at the Ethical Culture Fieldston School, a private school in New York City, warns parents that children of all ages may be aware of the series. While the show is rated TV-MA, which stands for Mature Audience Only, the show is easily accessed on Netflix by kids who have laptops or iPhone with internet connections.
"We have heard from students, particularly in the middle school, who have viewed the series and/or have been discussing it with peers, but we know upper school students have also watched the series, and we are concerned about whether students in our lower schools are aware of it too, especially those students with older siblings," reads the letter.
It adds, "While the show's producers claim their intent is to start an important dialogue about bullying and suicide, mental health experts have expressed deep concerns about how the show may be perceived as glorifying and romanticizing suicide, and they worry about how it may trigger children who are vulnerable."
Dr. Christine Moutier, a psychiatrist and the chief medical officer for the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention (AFSP) in New York City, suggests that some school officials are offering support to parents around the show's content. "I think the proactive approach with the parent community is really appropriate and commendable," she says.
Netflix previously said that it sought the advice of "medical professionals" when developing "13 Reasons Why". "We support the unflinching vision of the show's creators, who engaged the careful advice of medical professionals in the scriptwriting process," the streaming service said in a statement. "The series carries a TV-MA rating as well as graphic content warnings preceding specific episodes, along with an after-show and companion website with additional resources. Our members tell us that '13 Reasons Why' has helped spark important conversations in their families and communities around the world."
As for the gruesome scene of Hannah's suicide on the show, creator Brian Yorkey said it was intentional for a right reason. He explained, "We worked very hard not to be gratuitous, but we did want it to be painful to watch because we wanted it to be very clear that there is nothing, in any way, worthwhile about suicide."
