Yes, that’s exactly what we’re saying. Nazism isn’t a mental illness. Sexism and extreme misogyny aren’t a mental illness. People can just be assholes. America is just unique in its determination to provide those assholes with as much ginned-up outrage and access to rapid-fire assault weapons as possible.
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If I click my heels 3 times and repeat “there’s no place like home,” will I be magically transported back to my own reality, where life still mostly makes sense?!?
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As you have probably guessed, I’m not trained in the study of the mind. I’m basing what I know on my personal experiences.
I’m also not a stranger to mental illness myself; I spent a few months in the late 80s thinking I was a dragon. I’m not joking. So no, I’m not a person that anyone should turn to for a mental evaluation either.
If I came across as an authority on mental illness and mass shootings, I apologize. I am neither.
Of the nonsense she listed, I feel like the odds that someone who has gunned down a bunch of strangers has a mental illness is more likely than they consumed too much porn or watched too many violent films. That fits into my world view a bit better. Does it make it right? You say it does not. I agree to disagree.
Ultimately, I feel like she’s full of shit, BUT if she could help shine a light on mental illness in this country (doubtful), and increase the chances of people getting properly diagnosed, that could be a good outcome… depending on how it was handled.
Honestly, I think that to some degree they are. They are certainly not in their right minds – provided the source of the violence isn’t because they are psycho- or sociopaths. And if they are, are those not mental illnesses? It could be a temporary disconnect, or the tip of a bigger iceberg. But it’s not fucking sane.
In my opinion.
As a layman, I see entitlement as a form of delusion. Anger is one of our core emotions. How a person channels or expresses their anger is their choice. If they channel it in a way to hurt others, something is fundamentally wrong with that person.
In my opinion.
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Well, I’m going to disagree, and suggest that your perspective is completely incorrect.
Do a Google search for “spree killers extreme depression.” This was the second thing out of a lifetime’s worth of reading:
Sorry some of you get sooooo defensive when it’s ever implied that sometimes people with mental illness do bad things, often in a way that is intertwined with their mental illness. Your perspective doesn’t seem to have much to do with reality. And that’s fine, we’re all allowed to disagree. I just happen to think your perspectives on the issue are off-base and actually probably dangerously misleading.
And just to add: I believe the main way to deal with this issue is stronger gun control. I think the second thing we should be talking about is a national healthcare system that includes mental healthcare. It’s stupid to look at one area exclusively.
The Spirit of BBS says: “Okay. And…?”
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That gif makes me want to vault off a rooftop with an exploding bomb attached to my body.
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The people they put on trial for genocide at Nuremberg were never diagnosed with mental illness. And boy howdy did they try. Evil is just evil, it doesn’t need – and often doesn’t have – a convenient trigger to scapegoat, or some helpful thing we can point to in order to distance it from ourselves. Perfectly normal, totally sane people are completely capable of doing monstrous things. And they do.
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I eventually came to the conclusion that I wasn’t. Most likely.
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You absolutely do not come off as such an authority. You come off as someone spouting nonsense with no backing that actively hurts people like me. What i am saying is:
PLEASE STOP!
The idea that people with mental illness do bad things is not the problem. Neither is the idea that, when they do, their actions are intertwined with with their mental illness as everything that they do is so intertwined*. The problem comes with the implied correlation (which then implies causation). Mixed with this is the tiny number of mass killers. The fact that “Mother Jones found a similarly high rate of potential mental health problems among perpetrators of mass shootings — 61% …” when they studied “…62 cases in 2012” doesn’t mean anything when the problem is people thinking that mental illness implies danger, when the truth is that this shows that the overwhelming majority of mentally ill people, much like the overwhelming majority of “sane” people, do not commit mass murder. But bringing it up, puts us in the cross-hairs and additionally excludes more determitative factors such as a history of domestic abuse.
* Everything i do, from having breakfast to ruining a friendship, is informed and affected by my bipolarity. But, how it affects the way i treat others is largely up to me and the culture i was raised in. See (PDF) Hearing Voices in different cultures: a social kindling hypothesis | Padmavati Ramachandran and tanya luhrmann - Academia.edu
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A wise decision. Not many job opportunities or health bennies out for dragons, so I hear.
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“Evil” doesn’t actually mean anything.
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Except you’re wrong – there IS peer-reviewed evidence. See the article I just posted, that had links to such research.
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Oh, I don’t know about that.
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Um. I’m not sure where it was that I said that all mass shootings are caused by the mentally ill. If I did… oops? Mea culpa?
But I really think if we were able to dial down into it, there is something mentally wrong with evil people. Something that has disconnected them from empathy and the rest of humanity.
You will not convince me that being evil is a sane state of existing, just because they couldn’t diagnose people in Nuremberg of having identifiable (at that time) mental illnesses.
Oh, and this is probably a “duh” statement, but I’m not a religious person. I don’t believe in a devil that makes anyone do anything, or a god that’s going to give me cookies if I behave. So theology isn’t keeping me in check, or giving me a pass to be a monster.
… capable?
Sure. I’m capable of killing a dozen people if I really put my mind to it. However I’m perfectly normal and sane enough to not want to do that.
If things change, and I suddenly decide that I do want to do that… I would have to turn in my perfectly-normal-and-sane card because that shit would be nuts.
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Wow. I wasn’t aware that you had gained ownership over the BoingBoing forums and decreed all conversation had to meet with your approval.
For the record, you engaged me in this discussion. I likely wouldn’t have said a further word on it if you hadn’t asked me to.
Now that I’ve been properly put in my place, I shall fuck right the hell off.
Ta.
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You may want to consider not being involved in online discussions about mass shootings with people who may disagree with you, if it’s going to be extremely distressing the moment somebody suggests that “mental illness” may be a factor in spree killings sometimes. Because… that’s generally going to enter into the conversation.
You are (virtually) screaming at people to exit the conversation, people who are putting their own perspectives out there, which are legitimate and do not violate any of the site’s policies.
You’re obviously and admittedly putting your own situation and experiences out there as a victim of discrimination as a person with mental illness as a primary factor in your own perspective. I am sorry that this probably inappropriate discrimination (I obviously have no way of knowing the specifics, nor do I want to nor feel I have a right to) has caused you hurt. Trust me, you have my genuine empathy – I myself have gone to therapists at several points over the years, and know plenty of people (nonviolent!) with mental illness, including close friends and family.
You are choosing to be about as confrontational as possible, with folks who at the end of the day, you probably mostly agree with, when it comes to many issues. So again I suggest, maybe you should step back from this thread, or be willing to tolerate the fact that some of us think that sometimes, mental illness along with access to weapons, can lead to bad outcomes. I mean, just reading that sentence, I can’t think of any mental health professionals I’ve ever known who would disagree with it.
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I for one have enjoyed your perspective, and agree with it.
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Well, it’s completely understandable that you’d think so, given that media outlets seem to be far more interested in fomenting discord between Americans than finding solutions or educating the public.
So, in the interest of the latter point:
There have been school shootings committed by women. Brenda Ann Spencer, 29 January 1979, Cleveland Elementary School in San Diego, for one example. There have been 4 or 5 others.
There have also been horrific school massacres committed without guns. The deadliest in American history was Bath Consolidated School, Bath Township, Michigan, May 18, 1927. 38 elementary schoolchildren and six adults killed, at least 58 more injured. But there have also been school mass murders committed with knives and axes, mostly outside the USA in countries where guns are hard to obtain.
Nonetheless the majority of school shooters are alienated, disaffected men, and in the USA, the majority of such crimes are committed with guns.
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This whole thread devoted to politics, porn, and pistols, and not a peep about straight shooters…
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I blame republican politicians in Tennessee on porn. They obviously haven’t gotten enough or perhaps that stick up their ass is making them impotent.
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