A tragic public safety, civil rights conundrum
By William Charles Yates II
It seems we Americans have this uncanny ability to create a problem, let it fester to epidemic proportions, then panic and collectively demand something be done. We then proceed to convene committees, fund studies and enact a bunch of laws and regulations that punish law-abiding citizens and do nothing but perpetuate the problem.
It is clear that we have a problem. We cannot continue to send our children to school with targets on their backs while demented people use them as expendable steps to some sort of misguided path to become famous.
Yates, of Pulaski, is an air space quality engineer for Space Systems/Loral in Palo Alto, Calif.
January 26, 2013 - 7:51 AM
Until a viable solution is put in place, train and arm the teachers…Or, we could just put that idea on the back burner, bitch about it for God knows how long, until it happens again. Action trumps `noise`.
Some shooters are paranoid schizophrenics, but most are not, and most schizophrenics never become dangerous. Shooters tend to be disturbed and hostile loners.
One of the problems with identifying these persons is that schizophrenia generally first develops in young adults. A shooter may be in the process of becoming mentally ill, but not yet have a clear history of mental illness.
Although I doubt that this would go over well, one thing that might help would be to restrict the sale of handguns to persons who are at least 25 years old, except when a younger adult needs to use a gun at work. A history of mental illness could be identified more easily in a 25-year-old than in a younger adult who might be just starting to show symptoms. Younger adults could be permitted to buy a hunting rifle.
Shooters who dress in black and carry an assault weapon are acting out a fantasy. The assault weapon is an important part of the fantasy. The sale of these weapons should be restricted, along with the games that program this behavior. If we can prohibit pornography, we can prohibit games that condition persons to behave violently.
applewood says: “Until a viable solution is put in place, train and arm the teachers…” Why not just go ahead with a viable solution? There is nothing new about the problem, after all.
Having read about, met and experienced some severely hate filled people, I am not convinced that mass shooters or even most murderers are “mentally ill” in the sense that they need treatment and can get better so much as they are evil and believe because of our “individual freedom” mantra they have every right to be. Think of the “Sovereign Citizens” and other “militia groups”, the KKK, the Black Panthers and the religious fundamentalists of Christian and Muslim stripes, they are not all mentally ill, but they all believe they have rights not to conform, not to obey laws and rights to harass, intimidate, insult and even harm those they dislike or disagree with.
We need to do more with mental health services and families need to stop covering for the mentally ill but there are no beds, there are no skilled facilities other than prisons where any of these people can end up. That remains the truth that we are dealing with. Two weeks in a “rehab” does little to heal a truly sick mind and that too has become the “norm”.
Freedom is just not all it is cracked up to be.
#4 “Freedom is just not all it is cracked up to be.”
Believe this, from this blogger…..and those like-minded, just about says it all.
Orwell smiles….sort of.