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In the early part of the 1970s, mentally ill people were institutionalized. Towards the end of the decade, there was a movement towards mental patient rights.
In the 1980s, the government cut spending on mental health. Mental patients were released from mental hospitals and left to care for themselves unsupervised.
Thank Ronald Reagan for those spending cuts and the return of school shootings. Within just a few years of his presidency, school shootings shot up dramatically.
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wasnt reagan..this started under CARTER....and was the liberals in congress that states institutions was ""in-humane""
Early 1980's: the liberal congress directed the Social Security Administration to pare the SSI and SSDI rolls. Social Security administrators responded by developing definitions of mental illness that diverged from those used in the past and those employed by mental health professionals. The resulting dislocations ultimately produced a public outcry that compelled the administration and Social Security to back down.
1981: The 1981 the Democrat controlled congress passed the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act which repealed the provisions of the National Mental Health Systems Act, cut federal mental health and substance abuse allocations by twenty-five percent, and converted them to block grants disbursed with few strings attached. New York State, which used block-grant monies to fund community-based programs, and other states have to cut mental health programs.
1979 in Texas and around the country, state governments got this brilliant idea to close the state hospitals for being "inhumane" in favor of opening neighborhood outpatient centers. What they really wanted to do was take that money and blow it on their pet projects. All neighborhoods said not in our backyard. So you have mental patients on the street. Which incidentally indirectly affected Reagan personally when John Hinckley shot him.
Mayor Dianne Feinstein (now a us senator) gathered religious leaders together in 1982 to discuss a shocking wave of homeless people on city streets.
The solution, they thought, was to temporarily set up cots and soup kitchens in a few church basements.
What they didn't realize then was they faced the genesis of a generational crisis brought on by complicated social factors out of their control.
At the time, Feinstein said, she thought homelessness was only a temporary problem, and the solution was to provide short-term housing. Her attention was also split with the emerging AIDS epidemic.
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its like when you hear about the so-called ""AUTISM EPEDEMIC"""...prior to 1985 most childhoold autism was classified as """juvenile schitzipherenia"""(forgive my spelling) and retarded.....the percent of kids with (using an old outdated term) retardation/mental incompacity/autism has stayed mostly level...the difference is that instead of having 3 JS, 1 AUT, 6 retards (10 kids) out of 1000....now its just 10 autism/asperger out of 1000 (1 in 100)
the same with in the 80's when the liberals have many of the institutions closed because it was 'inhumane' to lock these people up....now they are the growing population of HOMELESS (85% of homeless at mentally ill).
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The problem with the mentally ill is that there really isn't some magic drug or treatment plan that will cure them all. They might decide they don't like some side effect of the drugs they were given and stop taking them. Or they might decide they like some of the street drugs better or in addition and make themselves worse.
The problem with the mentally ill is that there really isn't some magic drug or treatment plan that will cure them all. They might decide they don't like some side effect of the drugs they were given and stop taking them. Or they might decide they like some of the street drugs better or in addition and make themselves worse.
That's why the ones who exhibit violent behavior should be institutionalized PERMANENTLY.
I agree, for once, with "workingclasshero". We do an abysmally poor job with our mentally disturbed people. For instance a friend of mine worked in a facility essentially babysitting a group of very dangerous people with violent tendencies. These people knew they might do very evil things if they failed to take their medication or did not get the therapy that allowed them to remain sane. The problem is that New Hampshire, as part of its cost cutting measures, has closed a number of these facilities saving the state’s taxpayers a relatively trivial amount of money (I believe less than the cost of sanding the roads in winter) while forcing these sick people, and incidentally their keepers, literally, our into the cold.
IMHO this is a great example of "penny wise (short term savings) and Dollar foolish (long term potential for actual violence by mentally irresponsible people).
At least you are looking at part of the real problem. The rest of the problem probably started with Carter too. Let's not hurt the feelings of violent people by locking them up. Pat them on the head and send them back out into society to do more crime and we won't really pay any attention to what they do until they kill somebody. I see this all the time on the news. I have thought about starting a list of the names I see on the news of people commiting crimes and see how many of them are repeat offenders. Usually by the time a person kills someone they have a whole list of crimes under their names.
Gun laws are useless. What we need is a crack down on crime. I am talking about all criminals including anyone that slipped over the border.
Some people have determined guns are the problem.
Others have determined it's a mental illness problem.
Not all of these shooters were SPED kids in school taking medications.
Most of them were rather smart and had no history of mental health issues.
And every time a mass shooting occurs these are the 2 big responses:
Get rid of the guns
Better mental healthcare
And these "solutions" are pushed without even knowing what the problem is ?
Sociologists have named this as "social revenge", blaming society for their problems, whatever they may be, and getting even. They don't just "snap" because these mass killings are planned.
you might have a point if "mental illness" was disease that could be verified, but as it is just about any behaviour can be deemed such if not agreed with or misunderstood.
Last edited by Frank DeForrest; 12-17-2012 at 07:29 AM..
That's because lots happened that decade with how we managed the mentally ill.
In the early part of the 1970s, mentally ill people were institutionalized. Towards the end of the decade, there was a movement towards mental patient rights.
In the 1980s, the government cut spending on mental health. Mental patients were released from mental hospitals and left to care for themselves unsupervised.
Thank Ronald Reagan for those spending cuts and the return of school shootings. Within just a few years of his presidency, school shootings shot up dramatically.
Under his reign, the United States went from 6 school shootings in the 1970s to 19 school shootings in the 1980s.
Of those 19 shoots that happened in the 1980s, 6 happened in 1985 alone!
If you go after the guns or try to restrict who owns guns, school shootings will still happen.
If we institutionalize people with mental disorders who exhibit violent behavior, school shootings will go down.
Earlier this year, Pittsburgh had a shooting at Western Psych Hospital. The shooter had schizophrenia for many years.
Even though he was in treatment, he wasn't taking his meds and wasn't monitored.
Authorities were aware of his violent tendancies twice, but nothing was done about it.
The first time was a few years prior, he was arrested in Portland for hitting a police officer with a flash light.
The second time was a few days before the shooting. He went into a Pittsburgh hospital and threatened people with a baseball bat.
The shooting could have been prevented if he had been institutionalized. I'm not saying institutionalize everyone with mental illness, but the ones who are violent should be.
Sadly, our government prefers to keep mental health spending low to balance budgets. School shootings is the price our country pays.
Amen. Finally some real root causes.......
there are no "magic bullets" to reducing the mass murders.....there are however multiple causes and they should all be addressed in some way.....
Eliminate them and put our lives in the hands of the likes of Nancy Pelosi, Shelia Jackson Lee and the rest of the DC clowns.
Problem solved!
Ask a legislator how to solve a problem and they will hand you a law....ask a surgeon how to cure your ailment and he will suggest surgery.
The surgeon has a 50/50 chance of affecting a cure, your legislators have no chance in hell of doing any good.
The responsibility lies with individuals, not some career politician who owns their office due to some gerrymandered voring district and pretends to speak for the entire country.
Without the use of firearms the mass murder toll is staggering with the use of indiscriminate bombings. Odd huh, guns are everywhere in those countries and the most damage is done when the bad guys put down their guns and pick up their bombs.
I live in NY,one of the strictest states on guns...its EASIER(and many times cheaper) for me to buy a gun illegally out of somebodies truck of their car, than it is for me to get one legally
but if you look at most of thse incidents that have been happening (the movie theater shootings, and this last one) they involve a MENTALLY ILL person....this kid (according to reports) had split personality...he should have been committed to an institution
How does gun control hurt law abiding citizens.
Gun control will never be 100% effective, what's the point in strict laws as is the case in NY when you can easily buy a gun illegaly or in fact legally in another state with no background check. Yes some will always find a way, that doesn't mean we need to make it easier.
We need to address noth mental health issues and gun control.
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The problem is people not weapons
