Death Note cover picture alertfrom Rahul Sridhar's Facebook profile
Death Note fans, were you aware that we have a code of conduct - enshrined into being by Kira himself - which commands us to destroy all evidence of our own lives, if such could potentially be sought by police?
Nope, neither was I.
Yet that is precisely the conclusion set to be reached by Indian investigators, as they pen their final report into the tragic death of teenager Rahul Sridhar. (For more context, see Rahul Sridhar: Lucknow Teen Suicide Linked to Death Note (April 2015))
Police have devoted three pages to the fifteen year old's obsession with Death Note, including noting that Rahul had updated his Facebook cover picture to depict Light Yagami. Thus proving that Kira was his hero, or at least someone whom he saw as representative of himself.
The official report says that this explains anomalies in the boy's behaviour shortly before his alleged suicide, particularly the burning of certain papers and wiping clean portions of his digital history too.
The boy was patently emulating Kira, prior to the latter being arrested by L. This is the infamous Death Note Code to which we surely all adhere.
In both cases - fact and fiction - the result was a lack of evidence by which the full story may be pieced together by police.
Sorry, investigators, as someone fully entrenched within the Death Note fandom for quite some time, I have never heard of such a code being prevalent amongst us. In fact, Rahul's death is the first time I've ever encountered even a suggestion that it might be a thing.
It's not, nor should it ever be.
And I do hope that such scaremongering doesn't lead to Indian parents all panic snatching their children's manga from bookshelves, nor petitioning politicians, libraries and stores to ban Death Note as a dangerous influence.
Particularly when it's a conclusion reached through lack of evidence.
In the meantime, RIP Rahul Sridhar, I do wish your own life could have been otherwise. You were one of us.
Nope, neither was I.
Yet that is precisely the conclusion set to be reached by Indian investigators, as they pen their final report into the tragic death of teenager Rahul Sridhar. (For more context, see Rahul Sridhar: Lucknow Teen Suicide Linked to Death Note (April 2015))
Police have devoted three pages to the fifteen year old's obsession with Death Note, including noting that Rahul had updated his Facebook cover picture to depict Light Yagami. Thus proving that Kira was his hero, or at least someone whom he saw as representative of himself.
The official report says that this explains anomalies in the boy's behaviour shortly before his alleged suicide, particularly the burning of certain papers and wiping clean portions of his digital history too.
The boy was patently emulating Kira, prior to the latter being arrested by L. This is the infamous Death Note Code to which we surely all adhere.
In both cases - fact and fiction - the result was a lack of evidence by which the full story may be pieced together by police.
Sorry, investigators, as someone fully entrenched within the Death Note fandom for quite some time, I have never heard of such a code being prevalent amongst us. In fact, Rahul's death is the first time I've ever encountered even a suggestion that it might be a thing.
It's not, nor should it ever be.
And I do hope that such scaremongering doesn't lead to Indian parents all panic snatching their children's manga from bookshelves, nor petitioning politicians, libraries and stores to ban Death Note as a dangerous influence.
Particularly when it's a conclusion reached through lack of evidence.
In the meantime, RIP Rahul Sridhar, I do wish your own life could have been otherwise. You were one of us.
