You're 21?
I agree with you there. Times have changed. The whole emo thing has developed, where contemplating suicide is considered 'cool'.
I still don't believe the majority of kids think about suicide though and I say that because most of the kids at the schools my daughter attended (she attended four different schools while growing up before being home-schooled) seem pretty average, healthy and well-adjusted. Most of those kids didn't looked like the type to be contemplating suicide.
I mean it's not like they walk around telling everyone, it's usually kept a secret. Despite being common enough, it's still seen as displaying traits of weakness, save for maybe... yeah, emo-like crowds. Pressure and doubt during a time of such silly melodramatics can lead to wondering if suicide would be "easier". I think the believed count is 1/25 (4%) of US teens who have attempted suicide. The count of those who contemplate it is probably higher. It usually takes knowing someone pretty well to get them to open up about those sorts of things.
I've seen it from people with combinations of shitty home lives, prior histories with drugs (medication or street drugs), know someone else who does if not did it (a social contagion of sorts?), people with identity issues that find turmoil in not being who they feel they should (living the mask, like some extreme cases of furries and the like, gender identity problems, etc), overly dramatic responses to loss, general depression or emotional instability... and so many other reasons. It began to feel like the more I learned of how someone thinks, the more I realized how many people might have done something more fatal if they weren't so afraid.
I think it's mostly that it's so known and assumed to be more common that has made it more common, alongside typical scenarios like antidepressant withdrawal and the like.