The Budd Dwyer Suicide Tape
One cold day in January 1987, I was watching television. It was on Nickelodeon, playing the show "You Can't Do That On Television!" as my mother walked in and switched it to a conference with Pennsylvanian governor R. Budd Dwyer.
He gave this big speech that I couldn't remember because I was only 9 years old; hell, I didn't even know his name at that age. He then passed out fliers to everyone, a copy of his transcript, he passed it to everyone.
All of the sudden, he pulls a gun out of an envelope, as my mother's face grows pale, I am staring blankly at the television, too little to understand. Everyone in the conference was scared that Budd Dwyer was going to shoot one of them. Everyone flipped out, he told everyone to calm down, well the pure truth of it....
''He was not on a mission to kill them''
''he was going to kill himself''
I look at my mom for a split second and all I can hear is a giant
BANG!
I looked back at the television, and Budd Dwyer collapsed. A giant hole could be seen in his head, blood spilling out. I just sat there and cried at the disturbing image that I saw. My mother got up and turned off the TV before she brought me to my grandmother's house to calm down and relax. The image of Budd Dwyer's dead corpse still rots in my head... I can't get it out of my skull... I can't believe that shit even aired on TV...
Well, it is now 2012. I looked up on YouTube, "Budd Dwyer Suicide Tape" and got NO
good results, only ones in which it cut after he pulled the trigger.
I then looked up "Budd Dwyer Death
" - same results; only censored ones.
I then had the crazy idea to look up "Budd Dwyer Media Incident". I clicked the first result.
It was the same old tape, same faces, same place. He was passing out the transcripts, as I remembered watching on the television. He then got the gun, and told everyone to calm down, as I remembered.
I sat on my office chair, expecting the video to get cut at the suicide... but when he pulled the trigger, it showed the death, the full length death. Blood spewed down his nose like a water fountain, and I heard the guy say
"Everyone, calm down!"
"Somebody call an ambulance!"
Terrible memories popped into my head, the many nights crying and sleeping in fear, are stirred back into my mind... This tape was one of the worst televised suicides in history that I've ever seen, other than the Christine Chubbuck incident, but after all, they did cut the footage after she shot herself...
So remember... if you want to kill yourself, do it on television...