Suicide Risk Factors and Signs

Take our Depression Test

Find a therapist near me

At least seven Black people have been found hanging under disputed circumstances in the U.S. in 2026 alone.

Suicide deaths among Black Americans rose 53% from 2014 to 2024, far outpacing every other group.

Racism operates as chronic stress, driving suicide risk along with hypertension, stroke, and early death.

I was mid-lecture in my undergraduate community psychology class the week the Raleigh case broke. I was standing at the front of the room talking about ambiguous loss and retaliation killings, of all things, when a student's phone lit up with a headline about a young Black man found hanging near a downtown parking lot, just blocks from a Caribbean festival. By the time class ended, three more students had pulled it up and we were in a full-on discussion. Within the hour, my own timeline was full of stories about and responses to the discovery of the Charlotte teenager with a ratchet strap around her neck, 10 days after she went missing. Then, the familiar sting when we realized that no autopsy was ordered. We talked about the Delta State student whose family fought for a second look. We talked about the six, maybe seven, more that we had seen either on the news or on social media in 2026.

And right alongside the grief, the same response started appearing everywhere: "Black people don't hang themselves." Ms. Rachel said it out loud on video. I heard it on one of my favorite podcasts, and it was even said in a group chat that is typically reserved for humor but was not exempt from this tough conversation.

I get why we say it. "Black people don't hang themselves” is said not out of paranoia, but due to a harsh reality of racism in our distant and recent history. Lynching is inside the bodies of our country, and it’s alive in people who are still here, passed down through generations of stories and repeated experiences. When Black bodies show up hanging in public spaces and cases are closed in 72 hours with no autopsy, no phone recovered, no interview with the person who........

© Psychology Today