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Where are the lobbyists for Mental Health facilities/monies/care????? There are lobbyists for everything else!
It is well known that all the mentally ill people who are dangerous are either in prison NOT getting treatment, or on the streets homeless NOT getting treatment, or are living with family members who don't know how dangerous they are, making bombs, collecting guns, making plans and lists of who to kill on their computers, etc. in complete privacy and safety. THEY ARE OUT THERE IN MAINSTREAM AMERICA PUTTING US ALL AT RISK! So, with this knowledge, WHY are our politicians NOT doing anything to get them into institutions and treatment?????
Where are the lobbyists for Mental Health facilities/monies/care????? There are lobbyists for everything else!
It is well known that all the mentally ill people who are dangerous are either in prison NOT getting treatment, or on the streets homeless NOT getting treatment, or are living with family members who don't know how dangerous they are, making bombs, collecting guns, making plans and lists of who to kill on their computers, etc. in complete privacy and safety. THEY ARE OUT THERE IN MAINSTREAM AMERICA PUTTING US ALL AT RISK! So, with this knowledge, WHY are our politicians NOT doing anything to get them into institutions and treatment?????
Many state hosptials were closed and residents were turned out to the streets over 30 years ago. This is a lack of priorities in the country. Social workers and psychiatrists are bound by health insurance. Those of us in the field DO lobby for change, and it all comes AFTER someone dies. A teenager who is turned down for instituational care kills himself, so then the parents lobby for a new state law to prevent that from happening to another teen.
Now we have seen several mass shootings prompting calls to action on many fronts. Mental health, insurance, assault weapons ban. Even looking into the "young adult white male" population as to why they are the prime perpetrators. But why are they? What's going on in society to bring this population to the breaking point? The one exception is the Virginia Tech shooter, but even he disapeared off the radar screen.
We don't want to talk about mental health issues. There are contributiing factors to mental health. Not only genetic factors, some types of mental illness develop in late teens or early twenties, but environmental, chemical, medical, social, family stresses, education stresses, economic stresses. We as a society tend to shove mental illness in the background, downplay the importance of a good therapist, until something like this happens.
And that is my point. We all know what you stated, but then when something like Newtown happens, and the theatre before that, and Gabby Gifford before that, and.......... everyone is up in arms and wanting to make sure that NOTHING like this ever happens again.
Also, I believe I read/heard that the US has a very high rate of these occurences. Why can't the powers that be take a lesson from other countries that don't have this problem. However, I know that guns are being blamed for what is happening here in the US, so this suggestion may not be feasible as other countries are not as open to the populace owning guns like we do.
And that is my point. We all know what you stated, but then when something like Newtown happens, and the theatre before that, and Gabby Gifford before that, and.......... everyone is up in arms and wanting to make sure that NOTHING like this ever happens again.
Also, I believe I read/heard that the US has a very high rate of these occurences. Why can't the powers that be take a lesson from other countries that don't have this problem. However, I know that guns are being blamed for what is happening here in the US, so this suggestion may not be feasible as other countries are not as open to the populace owning guns like we do.
There was a Nova on PBS about Adam Lanza's mother, and how she tried. It appears she had no reason to fear him, and had moved to find better schools. I wonder if she'd had more outlets for advise and help if it would have made a difference. Even when the known facts are laid out, why he killed his mother is still a mystery. Except he used a high powered rifle to kill the children, but he got one of the guns he learned to shoot with to kill his mother, who was sleeping in her bed.
That she taught her son to shoot was said to be a bad idea by several who knew both and owned their own guns, but others said she tried to find things they both enjoyed. He hadn't shown any signs that he'd go commando. He wasn't violent.
One man said he has guns, but they are at all times locked up. If she'd kept them locked, apparently she didn't, she might be alive, along with the children and Adam. This is one the most definative moments.
So much tragedy, but it will perhaps never be really known why or if anything would have made a difference for him.
I'm not seeing why the mentally ill need to be specifically targeted as "special interests" for the gun control group. I see it this way: you have to have some pretty serious mental issue to steal a gun for the express purpose of killing strangers. This goes for ALL people who do this, not just the ones with a mental illness diagnosis. All those people in jail for committing first-degree murder - they're ALL nuts. Every single one of them. If they weren't, they wouldn't have committed first-degree murder. Sane people don't do that.
You can control guns or lighten up on gun control til the cows come home, and it won't make a lick of difference. As long as people *can* get their hands on a gun, people *will* get their hands on a gun. Legally or not. Spending millions of tax dollars investigating it isn't going to change that fact. And no matter what the outcome is of that investigation, the end result will be the same: murderers will murder people. And you can't stop them. If they don't murder you, they'll murder someone else. Victims will continue to exist, and the choice of murder weapon is merely a side-bar in the story.
If they plan to target people that have had mental health problems, are they also going to single out people that have anger management problems, and those that seem obsessed with guns and killing animals while calling it a sport? Nuts like Ted Nugent come to mind. For heaven sake don't leave these people out of your special interest group mission.
And as they talk and talk innocent kids are still getting killed by thugs too scared to confront their enemy face to face, and these thugs have very poor aim. As far as school shootings, there have been a good number ever since the 80s. This didn't just start yesterday. Hadiya's killer should have still been locked up, but the system dropped the ball along the way. He's one I'd like to see dropped in the middle of the ocean. A waste of space and money to keep slime like him alive. We think far too much about cuddling the criminals and not enough about the rights of the victims.
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