Top Psychiatrist's Stunning Announcement About Gun Violence

"people diagnosed with mental illness are far more likely to be victims of violence than perpetrators of it and that most of the mentally ill will never commit acts of violence against others." True. And hence my presumption that it went without comment as these facts are not doubted. However, can it be contended that the vast majority of these shooters have serious mental illnesses?

The vast majority of guns are not used to shoot college students or journalists or high school students. Is this then also an absolute defense to taking any steps in improving the gun issue?

In other countries, the ones that America is often compared to in regards to these types of incidents, are much more pro-active not only with guns, but with forcibly, if need be, placing those who are deemed seriously mentally unstable in institutions.

In America, people have been conditioned to mind their own business and to not say anything about anyone, less they be judged. Do we actually believe this US policy which has become stronger and stronger ever since the 1960s of not labeling anyone in any way in order to avoid stigmatizing people has not been negatively impactful? Perhaps the pendulum has swung too far?

In many of these matters, it has been the case that people were aware, the signs were there. But no one did anything. This is not a healthy attitude to continue to promote, obviously at this point I would hope.

It seems that the APA may be more interested in protecting its political agendas than making concessions that must be made in order to get us back to a safer place in this country. The gun people have to make some as well.

And yes, our society is way over psychiatrized. Everything is given an excuse and responsibility has been thrown out with the bath water, lending no doubt even more to this issue. Just my two cents.

This is a fallen world and everybody has to die.
It's just a matter of when and how.

I think everyone here is missing the point.

One does not have to be crazy to kill people; one merely has to be angry. Most gun deaths in this country occur because someone gets ticked off at someone else and happens to have a handgun handy. That's not crazy, and it's not premeditated, and in most cases I doubt the intention is to kill. That is an unfortunate confluence of blind rage and firearms, like punching someone in the nose only to realize you punched them with a bullet.

Rage of the type and kind necessary for killing people en masse may be extreme, but it is not (so far as I know) a diagnosable illness. Our society, in fact, lionizes rage of that sort in both politics and entertainment (to the extent that one can talk about those as being different subject areas). How many action heroes have shot their way across our screens to redress some grave insult to character or country; how many politicians and pundits spend their careers screaming, shouting, and pounding their fists, demanding that we attack this group or bomb that country with blood-filled alacrity? In the US, we *like* the vicarious experience of unbridled rage, we think it's authentic and passionate; we like it just so long as it stays within certain bounds of conduct, and the people whom we identify with 'give' better than they 'get'. It's just our bad fortune that the real world does not play by movie rules, and we occasionally end up being 'got' in ways we dislike.

So long as we as a country thrive on vicarious rage, we will have people who are more rage-filled than we would prefer. So long as those rage-filled people are given free and open access to guns, we will have gun violence. There is no special psychological dysfunction behind this. It is who we choose to be as a culture, and it will continue to be that way until we make different choices.

Is the claim that most diagnosed "mentally ill" people are not
dangerous to others and will never be? And that they are far more likely to be victims than perpetrators?

I am sure this is true. Indeed, most people are not
dangerous and never will be, and most people are more
likely to be victims of violence than perpetrators.

But are people suffering from certain mental illnesses
disproportionately likely to commit crimes? Or to be a
danger to themselves or to others? (Note how many "mass
shooters" are suicidal, too.) I don't see that point addressed
in this article.

On the other hand, that domestic violence is a much stronger
predictor of crime, and that other variables are much stronger
predictors than a "mental illness" diagnosis, makes a lot of
sense.

If we can possibly agree to keep guns out of certain hands,
wouldn't that be a very small step in the right direction?

And don't you find it strange that this young man's mother
had an arsenal at home, after Sandy Hook?

This isn't some sort of "zombie nation" where there is a "mental illness virus" causing violence.

(I care as I was, decades ago, locked in a Ct. state hospital, tied face down on a bed, and forcibly drugged with Thorazine, all for the crime of...well, a shrink looked at me and decided I was "mentally ill". Treatment consisted of trying to convince me I was crazy and should take horrible drugs, and accept that I was defective. Only years later was it recognized that trauma, including growing in a dangerous alcoholic home, the Vietnam War, and...trained me to become dysfunctional. I got out of the mental health system, thanks to being able to spend years at the Eugene Mission, and today am reasonably together. Short version of recovery)

There are tens of thousands of young people out there who are traumatized to the point of despair, lost and hopeless, keeping themselves together with wisps of daydreams that some call crazy. We all would be shocked if there were an accurate way to ask them if they are suicidal or homicidal, at the sheer numbers of Americans for whom America isn't working.

Truth is, the great majority of the "shooters" were already in, or were recently in, the insane care of the mental health system. They were on the drugs that shrink the brain, and if fact cause many to become suicidal or violent. Check out www.madinamerica.com and do the research.

We can't make ourselves feel better clinging to the illusion of "mental illness" being the source of the problem. We live in an insane and bizarre culture that alienates many of our young, lets them know they neither belong nor matter. They are trained to be dysfunctional, they are trained to be violent, they are fed by violent images at every turn. We all watch tens of murders a week on national tv. We all watch our young gladiators sacrifice their brains on the Oregon football fields like Autzen or the new one at Marist. We watch war on tv where the US has murdered hundreds of thousands of people in the Middle East, in shock and awe campaigns.
Want to really change things? Fight for real firearm control, for social programs that bring safety and housing and jobs.
Want to insure that these shootings keep occurring all over the country? Keep calling it the fault of Bat... crazy people. That does nothing.
Mental illness, by and large, is a misnomer. It is in reality the burden placed on our fellow humans by trauma and alienation and our violent culture. Today, there are million of young people lost and despairing. Trauma hurts, but despair kills, as would many "normal" people who lived the lives of the lost and were forced to take those drugs.
Me, I am fine these days. But I look at the millions being released from inhuman prisons or captured by Big Nurse and having to live with the soul robbing indignity of being labeled as defective with this non-existent "mental illness" and I hurt.

Austism Spectrum Disorders is considered a "developmental disability" not mental health issue and therefore wouldn't fall under these mental health restrictions. Sandy Hook and UCC were both ASD diagnosed.

Pilots have longed avoided getting treatment for mental illnesses because they can lose their FAA licenses and their jobs.

With up to 30% of the population having various forms of mental illness including anxiety and depression, you gotta assume that 30% of gun owners do as well. There's going to be a large subsection of them that just absolutely wont go see a clinician for their depression for fear that 5 or 10 years down the road they get their gun rights taken away as a result. A few years ago one could have consulled somebody saying that's paranoid and asking them to go get treatment anyway, but with recent revelations that the VA has turned over the names of anybody who has their VA benefits paid to somebody else on their behalf to the NICS system so they can't buy gun... and then Obama recommending that social security do the same... it's no longer a paranoid reaction.

Thanks for speaking the truth; even if people don't want to hear it. Also; even though it is a cultural issue that might not really concern people working in the field (who may not be personally interested in gun ownership)....

It does matter to many patients and thankfully someone said something on their behalf. Taking their guns for seeking help just adds to the stigma of asking for it...

Thanks for giving such a platform through which we can share our thoughts. You gave very useful information.
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