High-Profile Violence and How We Can Be Effective for Change

After every mass shooting and high-profile incidence of violence, the chorus rises, accusing individuals with serious mental illness of being the danger that needs containment (easier commitment laws, longer hospital holds).

Millidgeville, GA, State Psychiatric Hospital Closed

Source: Aaron P. Brinen, PsyD

The allure to place blame for all of society’s problems of violence on this group of people isn’t hard to understand. Schizophrenia and related disorders are the stuff of nightmares. Most people will never meet a person affected by psychosis (or so they think). So, those people are easy to cast in the role of boogie man.

Our politicians use this to great effect to persuade us, “[South American countries are] emptying out their prisons and their mental institutions into the United States of America,” frightening us into supporting whatever measure they want, immigration restriction, prevention of gun restrictions, or whatever.

Society, with regularity, paints these individuals as dangerous, violent, unpredictable, and scary. Diagnostic terms are flung as insults on the playground and in arguments: “You're acting psycho,” or “You're delusional.”

What’s the big deal?

The first problem is a factual one. It’s just not true. In my upcoming book, Living Well With Psychosis, I look at this myth that individuals with psychosis are dangerous. The data show that they are more likely to be the victims of violence and be harmed by a firearm.

When individuals with psychosis are involved in violence, they have the same risk factors as those without psychosis: extreme negative emotions, drug misuse, and social factors (like poverty, living in a high-crime area, early abuse, and unemployment). In fact, when you statistically remove those misusing drugs from the data, the relationship between psychosis and violence is eliminated.

"Just Trying to Get By." Box Turtle, Evansburg State Park

Source: Aaron P. Brinen

In reality, many of the experiences that make up psychosis (hearing voices, fearing being under threat) are extremely frightening. The normal, initial human reaction to a frightening experience is to retreat or avoid, not go toward or attack. Many of these individuals are trying to live their lives and get by.

Who’s harmed?

So maybe it’s not 100 percent correct about these people being dangerous, Dr. Statistics, but who is really harmed?

Good question. There is a great line in the musical, Into the Woods, “Careful the things you say [people] will listen.”

Many people are harmed because they hear what is said:

• The diagnosed individuals: It sucks to hear this stuff about you. These individuals hear the politicians blaming them, the news reporters questioning if the perpetrator was mentally ill, and their coworker talking about these schizophrenics. They feel under siege or like there is something wrong with them. They think, “Maybe everybody else is right, and I am dangerous,” or “Why won’t people just leave us alone?”
• Parents and loved ones: This societal and ever-present anti-serious mental illness speech or stigma makes parents and loved ones terrified when serious mental illness strikes their loved one and defensive when bad things happen in the news. Mental illness cares little for where you live or the size of your 401k and will visit professors' and store clerks' children alike. When that specter arrives (and you sit in that first ER), all the scary images you’ve stored over the years will be the basis of understanding this new, terrifying world of the mental health system you are entering.
• You: I believe you genuinely care about the problems. When you pass on and endorse stigma, you miss the mark in two important ways. First, you are not solving for violence because you are blaming it on the wrong thing. Like taking an aspirin when you have a stomachache. Second, you are missing out on knowing and connecting with a group of individuals with perspectives, abilities, and wisdom that are informed by a unique recovery journey.

No one knows who these individuals are and where they are, but whenever violence occurs, the news often looks for any mental health treatment in the history of the perpetrator and then conflates that with serious mental illness.

Many individuals with psychosis recover and disappear back into society. You might work next to such an individual and never know it.

What do we do?

Let’s not ignore our real concern: violence.

How can we make a meaningful impact on violence and be of help to those with serious mental illness and mental illness overall?

• Treatment: Support and demand effective treatment for mental illness. For serious mental illness, psychological treatments are available that are effective and acceptable, particularly cognitive behavioral therapy for psychosis (CBTp). For other disorders, we have highly effective treatments as well. The Talking Therapies program in the United Kingdom is a great example on a systemic level. If our intention is to help those with mental illness, we need to focus on treatments that work and not on containing humans.
• Fund Research: While we have effective treatments, we have so much more to learn about how to help those with serious mental illness and how to get those treatments to providers serving these individuals in the communities. These studies are funded by the federal government and run through educational and research institutions. When we take money away from these institutions, we are halting research into solving these problems.
• Fund Early Childhood Education: If violence is the real concern, continuing (and increasing) funding in early childhood education is one of two sound investments, especially such well-established programs as Head Start. Violence, as mentioned above, is linked to poverty, early abuse, negative emotions, unemployment, and drug misuse. Federally funded Head Start has been shown to impact these factors for children and their families, and the outcomes are durable.

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"Building Blocks"

Source: Aaron P. Brinen, PsyD

• Fund Public Health: Funding public health, like Medicaid, allows people to get medical, mental health, and substance abuse treatment before it becomes a crisis. Continuing this funding is the second sound investment if we are interested in preventing violence.

You care deeply about the violence epidemic in our society. Don’t be distracted anymore by those trying to misdirect you and blame serious mental illness. Demand changes to the real problems related to violence and stop them from spreading stigma.

If you see something…say something.