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Comment by stagas | Hacker News Reader

Can we change the title to 'attempts suicide' because this is disturbing until you read the article?

I don't think the title is sensationalist or inaccurate. Attempting suicide could be any number of things. Here, he actually shot himself in the chest. That's pretty wild.

I understand, but it seems clickbait to not convey the information that the judge survived the shot.

It doesn’t to me. Had he killed himself it would have been described as lethal. It’s standard practice to describe only what’s known, even when doing so is at odds with how the average person would characterize the event — it may well have been his intention to cause a spectacle without taking his life, so it’s premature to describe it as an “attempted suicide”.

I agree with the parent insofar as the title is misleading. I immediately assumed he had died from the title. It's heavily implicit.

I also think it's pretty clear that it was a suicide attempt, and, though I could be wrong, the article itself describes it as a suicide attempt, so they've already made that judgement when choosing the title. Of course, regardless of whether or not it was a suicide attempt, the information that he didn't kill himself could be conveyed in the title.

Reading the article wasn't disturbing?

FWIW I assumed from the title that he hadn't killed himself; if he had, the title certainly would have stated it.

The implication is that he tried to kill himself, and the absence of the phrase "attempted suicide" implies he succeeded.

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