The Language of Mental Illness in Gun Debates

One problem of broadly inclusive diagnoses as preventing gun ownership is that it would prevent folks who need help from getting it. Unless a condition is really, really directly predictive - I'd be very cautious about stigmatizing folks.

We found in our PTSD/Cop work that officers who suffered would not seek help or see department psychologists as they felt it would hit their job evaluations - even if said to be confidential.
 
Social disorders; guns....

By social disorders I mean someone who has a serious documented problem where they may harm themselves or others. It would also mean they can't work or be employed due to unstable behavior or actions(suicide attempts, involentary commitment, threats, etc).
If you have ED or you stutter(speech empediment) you're not actively trying to kill other people or take hostages or are held in a psych ward.
There are SERIOUS levels of mental health or social disorders which should keep someone from owning guns or ammunition.
You're not "crazy" or unstable "sometimes", you have have a medical condition that requires medication and/or treatment.

Clyde
 
302.71 Hypoactive (low) Sexual Desire Disorder

302.72 Female Sexual Arousal Disorder

302.72 Male Erectile Disorder

302.73 Female Orgasmic Disorder

302.74 Male Orgasmic Disorder

302.75 Premature Ejaculation

302.76 Dyspareunia (Not Due to a General Medical Condition)

302.79 Sexual Aversion Disorder

307.0 Stuttering
Click to expand...

These are all disorders . Is that the same as illness ?

Most if not all that are quoted are physical disorders and not mental , yes ?

"The media" are using words against us. I think we need to use words back at them, to redirect the discussion in more constructive directions. Don't let "them" define the terms. Don't refer to Sandy Hook as a "shooting." Call it what it was: a "massacre." And I don't mean just among ourselves. I mean, especially, when talking to the people who are fence-sitters on the gun control issue
Click to expand...

Yea this is not going to happen . At least not by people in this forum . There was a thread started a month or so ago asking if we should stop using the word weapon and just use gun or firearm . Well lets just say most did not think it was an issue and felt it was caving in and letting the antis win . Instead of us all banding together for one common goal it appears we would rather cannibalize our selves rather then standing together with one language and one voice . Thank god for the NRA . At least somebody is organized
 
Yep -- here ya go:

http://www.atf.gov/forms/download/atf-f-4473-1.pdf

Page 4, Question 11.f. explained...

The key word here is "adjudicated".... i.e. "[determined] by a court, board, commission, or other lawful authority..."

Covers it fairly well. If the states would do their bit, it might do some good in terms of prevention.

But the bottom line is that in a country with 300 m. people, and a world with however-many billions, there will always be some who do evil.
...................

Metal god said:
These are all disorders . Is that the same as illness ?

Most if not all that are quoted are physical disorders and not mental , yes ?
Click to expand...

Actually, no. Those are all labels, and code numbers, taken from the DSM-IV, otherwise known as the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (my emphasis), which is published by the American Psychiatric Association.

But see what I wrote above about the physical/mental distinction not being all that useful here...
 
Unless a condition is really, really directly predictive - I'd be very cautious about stigmatizing folks.
Click to expand...

I was kind of hoping you would go that way. Something interesting about these (full medical term here) total whacked-out-psycho-bunny shooters is that nearly all of them said that they were planning on shooting people to somebody/ somebodys.

I'd say that is pretty predictive.

And yet the actions of the professionals and others on the balance did not approach anything even close to interventive, even when the shooter made clear threats and demonstrated method and intent.

I'd like to think that there is a whole ward full of crazies that were stopped and locked up and just a couple made it through the cracks but I have no way of knowing that.
 
Last edited:
So, then we go forth to another layman's question, recently proposed by Tam, over at View From the Porch:

Neither mental illness nor magazine-fed firearms are new things in this nation (although gun control largely is.)

What kept disturbed kids in the '50s from wandering into the cafeteria with a mail-order M1 carbine and laying waste?
Click to expand...

So, for all the experts here (credentialed and otherwise), what was the difference
 
PawPaw--I grew up in the 50's in the mountains of Northwestern Colorado. We all played cowboys and Indians. We had cap pistols and bb guns and 22 rifles. Hunting deer was a big deal and most of the guys couldn't wait till they were old enough to go big game hunting with dad.

I think the culture was a lot different. We watched Audie Murphy movies and played war for hours on end. We did not have realistic toys (no machine guns or M1 rifles), nor video games that were realistic.

Could M1 rifles be purchased by mail years ago? Just asking--I don't know.

The events of the last decade or so seem to be a snowballing phenomenon. The entertainment industry, toy industry, and media are involved.

And one last thought. When I was much younger, I was having a really tough year, and had been drinking a lot. I got into a brawl with my brothers one evening and a gun came out. There was a lot of stuff I didn't remember about that night. A few days later I made an appointment with a counsler. I saw that guy for a few months, and pretty well got my drinking problem taken care of. In light of some of the stuff that the politicians are bantering about, I might be a person that would not be able to own guns. However this proceeds, it is interesting for me to assess what kind of methodolgy might be used to try and ferret out people that would never be able to own firearms.
 
So, for all the experts here (credentialed and otherwise), what was the difference
Click to expand...

You know the difference. Think back on what America was like, really like, in the 50s, vs today.

In the 50s if some girl got pregnant, it was a disgrace. The precious few girls I knew that got pregnant, went off to live with relatives. I never saw them again in high school or otherwise.

Today, in my old high school, they actually have a day care center for children of students. Most of these students are unwed.

Now, think back at the changes in our culture, all of the changes, that have taken place. Then think of the changes that would be necessary to facilitate such gross immorality.

That's your answer. We threw God out of the schools, public squares, entertainment industry, government, and in many cases, the church.

I remember a true story about a young girl from Chicago from a fine Christian family. She left her family, left the church and left her faith and became a whore. One morning she woke up in an upper story hotel room with a man she didn't know. She got her clothes on, walked to the window, and jumped.

A police officer responded and recognized her, because he was a close friend of the family. He was crying and said he knew her. Somebody asked why she jumped. He said, "Because, when you don't have Jesus Christ all that's left to do is jump."
 
I would have to agree with foghorn leghorn.

Also why would we want to keep a gun out of a felons hands or a person who due to his condition is a danger to himself or others, but at the same time allow them to drive a car?

If a medieval man at arms was transported to the 21st century and had to chose which was deadlier. A big truck or a machine gun if he wanted to kill as many people in a crowded area as possible in a short time. I bet he would pick the truck.

But since hollywood doesn't particularly glamorize mass homicide with vehicles as often as with guns we do not see this happen as often.

So we blame the guns, the illness, the convicted felon, but when do we blame the media?
 
I certainly am no expert in the mental health field, but I have done a bit of reading about it (I do bit of reading on everything, consider me and amateur researcher:p). In my humble and simple minded observations I've found there are few concrete facts and a lot of opinion in the area. It seems that there is consensus on what a healthy mind is and what an extremely sick mind is (schizophrenia, psychopathy, etc.), but in between the extremes there isn't. In the middle of the road no one agrees on what should be done. Do we medicate or use therapy, or use some combination of the two? This is nothing against you Glenn, I'm certain you have forgotten more about about it than I will ever know.

Someone mentioned the use of the word psychopath. You have all almost certainly interacted with one in your life. You may even know one well. They look and act like everyone else, and the vast majority are not inclined toward violence.

So, for all the experts here (credentialed and otherwise), what was the difference
Click to expand...

Well for one thing, in 1950 the U.S. population was about 150,700,000. Today the population is somewhere around 315,100,000 (US Census Bureau estimate as of this writing). Even if the per capita incident rate was the same as today, there would have been half as many incidents per year.

On the other hand, research indicates that we were a far more violent nation at that time than we are now, so are we even sure that school violence wasn't more widespread (per capita) than it is now? Someone posted the number of school incidents and deaths as a result per decade, starting with the 1960s, over in the thread about psychiatric drugs (sorry, can't link to it on my phone). What we haven't considered in that thread is population growth over the years. Does anyone have any pertinent information on school incidents in the 1950s era?

Tying the question back to mental health, we know that treatment of the mentally ill was primitive (even barbarous) and less common back then. If incidents were indeed not as prolific as now, is this a case of less is more, as far as treatment?
 
It's so comforting to believe in a golden age...

But if you look just at murder rates, according to the FBI's statistics, the rate per 100,000 averaged 4.9 between 1950 and 1959. It went up a bunch from 1960 to 1980, then began to go down again. Between 2000 and 2007, the homicide rate averaged 5.7, and in 2010 it averaged 4.8. (This is just what I turned up in a quick search -- dunno what happened in '08 and '09, but my impression is that it's consistent with that trend.)

So overall, if we were in some golden age of low violent crime in the '50's... we're there again now. And if I have to say this -- mass murders of the kind people get so wound up about now are, and always have been, a tiny percentage of the total. What has changed is the news cycle: we hear about them instantly from an increasingly sensationalistic and fear-mongering press, and this makes them seem much more common than they are.

Whether it's blaming guns, blaming the mentally ill, or blaming the media, our obsession with finding a single, "master-molecule" explanation -- a nice, simple, comforting fix to believe in -- prevents us from being open to the complexity of the real world and real people. It's too bad, because I doubt that there's any one-size-fits-all explanation for why people resort to violence.
...............................
http://www.bjs.gov/index.cfm?ty=pbdetail&iid=2221
http://www.bjs.gov/content/homicide/tables/totalstab.cfm
http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0873729.html
 
Last edited:
Wait a second, there is a point that is missing here.
I'm not educated on the level of Dr. Meyer but 20 years of being a nurse plus 2+ decades of taking care of a severely mentally ill daughter gives me some insight, maybe more than most clinicians, I've had to live with someone I love slowly slipping away slowly and being powerless while it happens.
In a lot of these murderers cases there was someone who had a mental health background who was aware of how dangerous they were, and if the current mental health system were different intervention, including locked psych units etc. would have stopped it. These are indisputable facts, I can dig up the references if needed but they are all pretty easy to find.

I've been in parent support group meetings where multiple members described being assaulted by their children. Authorities(LE, Mental health workers) were involved at the appropriate times and in the appropriate manner. The parents(I vividly remember one parent who looked like she got into a fight with a biker gang) were powerless to stop the child/young adults behavior.
I've listened as one parent talked about the possible need to shoot his own child when that child was released from jail in order to protect the rest of the family. The child had been quite clear that he intended to kill them upon his release.
You can tell me that there is no test for this and I will agree. You can tell me that to lock people up using our current state of knowledge is a little nuts in and of itself, and I'll tell you you are talking sense.

But,

At some point it becomes obvious, even to a layman, that a certain person is dangerous.
Let me assure you as things sit there is no good way to handle this, and if there were a great deal of these problems would have been handled before there was bloodshed.
 
Could M1 rifles be purchased by mail years ago? Just asking--I don't know.
Click to expand...

Yeah, they could. I bought my first firearm (a Model 1200 shotgun) by mail.

I remember lots of ads for 1911 pistols and other surplus firearms, prepaid, delivered to your door. Lee Harvey Oswald bought his Carcano and a Model 10 SW by mail.

Surprisingly, you can still order a gun by mail. The CMP will ship an M1 rifle to your door.
 
More differences between the 50's and now:

Well for one thing, in 1950 the U.S. population was about 150,700,000. Today the population is somewhere around 315,100,000 (US Census Bureau estimate as of this writing). Even if the per capita incident rate was the same as today, there would have been half as many incidents per year.
Click to expand...

1- Besides there being twice as many of us now, we are much more crowded- in the 50's we were still a much more rural nation- My uncle never gets tired of telling me that the school bus that rolled into Sherman township in sw Furnas Co. picked up 50+ kids every morning ..... and there are now no inhabited houses in that township. The school that bus went to is closed and there are only 3 schools left in that county. Where did all these people (and theri descendants) go? To the city and suburbs.

1950's America was much more small town deal- Everybody knew your name, and your parents, and if you were "not right" everybody knew it.... and if you really were deemed dangerous by your community ..... you were "institutionalized".

if the current mental health system were different intervention, including locked psych units etc. would have stopped it. These are indisputable facts, I can dig up the references if needed but they are all pretty easy to find.
Click to expand...

2-Now I am not a MH proffessional, either, but I am a bit of a history buff...... I noted that the rise of all these atrocities dovetails fairly closely with the decline of forcible commitments and the shuttering of many of these "institutions" in favor of outpatient drug therapies, in the 1980's..... think about it: When was the first time you heard the term "Off his meds" ?

Now before all the Head Docs here go ballistic, I am not for bringing back Nurse Ratched and Electro-Shock therapy..... but if you have mentally ill people walking the streets that are one missed med dose from losing it ..... and they are responsible for taking their meds ...... this stuff WILL happen, and in the disjointed society that we have today, it will be a complete surprise to most everybody in the affected community, because people today barely know their neighbors, let alone everyone in town.
 
Scrubcedar - you make reasonable points. My original post was to point out to use terms correctly and not to make progun folks look silly.

How we use current psychological or psychiatric techniques to stop Chos, Lanzas, Loughners, etc. is quite a problematic issue.

Mod - hat on - throwing God out of the schools, the golden years etc. is off topic. It was the correct use of terminology.

If we continue to stray, then I will shut myself down and you. :D
 
Sorry for contributing to the thread veer, I deleted an earlier post that I made that was off topic.

Back on topic though, New Years Day I went into the local Wal-Mart and checked to see the state of their ammunition supply. I happened to over-hear two men discussing the Sandy Hook incident. Their references about and knowledge of mental health, prescription meds, etc sounded every bit as lame and uninformed as clips, assault guns, etc that some constantly chide the antis on.

My initial thought is that education is the answer, but I'm not sure how we'd accomplish that. Despite being in the information age, ignorance abounds on many topics and media sound bites, cliches and catch phrases still seem to rule the day.
 
scrubcedar said:
I've listened as one parent talked about the possible need to shoot his own child when that child was released from jail in order to protect the rest of the family. The child had been quite clear that he intended to kill them upon his release.
You can tell me that there is no test for this and I will agree. You can tell me that to lock people up using our current state of knowledge is a little nuts in and of itself, and I'll tell you you are talking sense.

But,

At some point it becomes obvious, even to a layman, that a certain person is dangerous.
Let me assure you as things sit there is no good way to handle this, and if there were a great deal of these problems would have been handled before there was bloodshed.
Click to expand...

Actually, there's a fairly straightforward way of handling this. Most states, if not all, have laws against making terroristic threats or criminal threats. If someone has actually threatened violence in the presence of witnesses, whether against parents, schoolmates, or others, he's committed a crime, and the question of mental illness (and the terminology thereof ;)) is secondary. Charge them under those statutes and let the legal system sort out whether to jail them or commit them.

In any case, the first step is to report the person's behavior to authorities; then it's on those authorities to do their job. In hindsight, it's clear that Pima Community College dropped the ball with Jared Loughner, allowing him to withdraw rather than involving the police and/or mental health system after students and faculty reported his bizarre and threatening behavior. The same is true of the state of Virginia with respect to Seung-Hui Cho: had the state followed the Federally mandated requirement to report that he had been adjudicated mentally ill, things might have turned out differently in that case.

It's probably useful to focus on ways of improving the existing system, including adequately funding mental health care, and unifying and enforcing reporting requirements. It's not useful to play armchair diagnostician, especially after the fact.
 
In any case, the first step is to report the person's behavior to authorities; then it's on those authorities to do their job.
Click to expand...

As I pointed out earlier in many cases the problem was brought to authorities. Little, no or improper actions were taken.
 
Alabama Shooter, that's exactly my point -- hence my references to the Loughner and Cho cases.

I'd add that in my opinion, focusing on mental illness as a response to gun control supporters is mostly a way for gun folks to lay blame on some "other" group... "Oh, no, it's not us nice gun owners who are the problem, it's all those crazy people out there."

It's seriously wrong from a civil rights point of view, and when it's applied to anti-gun folks, it's a strategy with potential to backfire: once you introduce "hoplophobia" (silly term) into the discussion, why shouldn't the other side argue for a diagnostic category called "hoplophilia"? [sarcasm] "Surely anyone who thinks he needs that many guns must be mentally ill..."[/sarcasm]
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top