American Mass Shootings Is Not A Mental Health Issue.

[Franc Mittelo]

As a nurse who has worked in mental health, I am strongly against the media trying to further stigmatize people, who suffer from mental health issues, by attaching them to these perfectly logical acts of violence.

To premeditate mass shootings type of attacks, you have to think clearly about it. The attacker searches for a weapon of choice, learns to use the weapon of choice, keeps a back weapon, scouts the future scene of the crime, and most importantly, he has enough will power and patience to wait for the perfect opportunity to strike.

This is military style thinking. Are our soldiers "crazy"? In my experience, people with mental health issues will commit suicide before homicide. They often get violent towards others, only when others get in their space. It is rarely premeditated, and most often a reaction towards typically a single individual.

The idea that a human has to be "crazy" to kill a bunch of people is just ridiculous. American soldiers go overseas and kill a bunch of people, who have never directly done anything wrong to them. The motives may be different, but the execution is the same.

 

[jamel]

Nah... We follow orders and act in the interest of our country.

These kids are responding poorly to angst, arrested development and the underlying consequences of inbreeding.

So yeah... They are crazy.
Plain and simple.

 

[PrinceOfPain]

Lol.
So planning your murder spree means you can't be insane?

I would guess that there's a greater number of the mentally ill among military and police recruits than the general population, but your premise is ludicrous.

 

[jamel]

Also i think you using impulse control as a measuring stick for crazy is some ol bullshit.

 

[Franc Mittelo]

Nah... We follow orders and act in the interest of our country.
These kids are responding poorly to angst, arrested development and the underlying consequences of inbreeding.
So yeah... They are crazy.
Plain and simple.

No they are not. It is perfectly logical to kill somebody you have a "beef" with. The merits of the "beef" is a completely different argument.

 

[jonharrison]

As a nurse who has worked in mental health, I am strongly against the media trying to further stigmatize people, who suffer from mental health issues, by attaching them to these perfectly logical acts of violence.

To premeditate mass shootings type of attacks, you have to think clearly about it. The attacker searches for a weapon of choice, learns to use the weapon of choice, keeps a back weapon, scouts the future scene of the crime, and most importantly, he has enough will power and patience to wait for the perfect opportunity to strike.

This is military style thinking. Are our soldiers "crazy"? In my experience, people with mental health issues will commit suicide before homicide. They often get violent towards others, only when others get in their space. It is rarely premeditated, and most often a reaction towards typically a single individual.

The idea that a human has to be "crazy" to kill a bunch of people is just ridiculous. American soldiers go overseas and kill a bunch of people, who have never directly done anything wrong to them. The motives may be different, but the execution is the same.

I can appreciate what you’re saying, in that it isn’t people with a schizophrenic diagnosis who are committing mass shootings. The correlations with antisocial personality disorder, narcissistic personality disorder, depression, ptsd due to childhood trauma, etc. can’t really be ignored either. If you don’t want to include personality disorders as “mental illness” that’s fine, but as far as I know they’re still diagnoses in the DSM.

 

[Franc Mittelo]

Lol.
So planning your murder spree means you can't be insane?
I would guess that there's a greater number of the mentally ill among military and police recruits, but your premise is ludicrous.

It doesn't mean you are. That is what I am arguing.

 

[jamel]

No they are not. It is perfectly logical to kill somebody you have a "beef" with. The merits of the "beef" is a completely different argument.

Dude.

A 19 year old kid following orders vs a 19 year old drop out acting on their own aint the same.

Cut it out.

 

[Franc Mittelo]

I can appreciate what you’re saying, in that it isn’t people with a schizophrenic diagnosis who are committing mass shootings. The correlations with antisocial personality disorder, narcissistic personality disorder, depression, ptsd due to childhood trauma, etc. can’t really be ignored either. If you don’t want to include personality disorders as “mental illness” that’s fine, but as far as I know they’re still diagnoses in the DSM.

Good point. Personality disorders are very complicated. However, you can't tell me that America has more people with personality disorders per capita than all other Western Countries.

I will bet that American glorification of these acts plays a bigger role than mental health issues. Just guessing. No science to back it up.

 

[jonharrison]

Good point. Personality disorders are very complicated. However, you can't tell me that America has more people with personality disorders per capita than all other Western Countries.

I will bet that American glorification of these acts plays a bigger role than mental health issues. Just guessing. No science to back it up.

I would argue that we do. Think about it. What sort of person would willingly leave Ireland, England, France, Germany, etc., travel several weeks on a wooden ship, all to end up in a land of pure wilderness, with the intention of hacking out a living in some of the most inhospitable areas of the world? Factor in that we were an early prison colony before Australia, and that we didn’t lose nearly as many young males in WW1 and WW2 as the rest of the western world, and is it really surprising we’d have a higher prevalence of personality disorders?

 

[Franc Mittelo]

Dude.
A 19 year old kid following orders vs a 19 year old drop out acting on their own aint the same.
Cut it out.

At the core, it is the same. If you want to carry out a certain act, and you understand why, then you are not "crazy."

You are doing as you will. Just because other people may not agree, it doesn't make you "crazy."

"Crazy" people either (1) don't understand and/or (2) they have a fantastical/magical understanding what they are doing.

A "crazy" person doesn't make a good killer.

 

[Damien Karras]

I would argue that we do. Think about it. What sort of person would willingly leave Ireland, England, France, Germany, etc., travel several weeks on a wooden ship, all to end up in a land of pure wilderness, with the intention of hacking out a living in some of the most inhospitable areas of the world? Factor in that we were an early prison colony before Australia, and that we didn’t lose nearly as many young males in WW1 and WW2 as the rest of the western world, and is it really surprising we’d have a higher prevalence of personality disorders?

I don't see correlation you're trying to make make. You can't pin what happened 350 years ago on today's mass murder spree in the U.S. mass shootings are a relatively new phenomenon

 

[Damien Karras]

The U.S does not have a higher rate of mental illness, whether schizoid or personality disorders, compared to the rest of the world.

However the policies that country enacts on how to prevent, treat or provide access to treatment combined with just how easy it is to get your hands on a gun is a bad recipe for this sort of thing.

 

[HereticBD]

At the core, it is the same. If you want to carry out a certain act, and you understand why, then you are not "crazy."

And I'm sure the courts will feel the same, and declare this guy as being fit to stand trial, and he will be punished accordingly.

I don't really see what your point is. "Mental health" represents a very broad spectrum of disorders. It doesn't necessarily mean that you're batshit crazy, and don't know right from wrong, and can't function.

 

[Franc Mittelo]

I would argue that we do. Think about it. What sort of person would willingly leave Ireland, England, France, Germany, etc., travel several weeks on a wooden ship, all to end up in a land of pure wilderness, with the intention of hacking out a living in some of the most inhospitable areas of the world? Factor in that we were an early prison colony before Australia, and that we didn’t lose nearly as many young males in WW1 and WW2 as the rest of the western world, and is it really surprising we’d have a higher prevalence of personality disorders?

Vikings got a ships and sailed until they landed somewhere. Today Viking countries have to close down prisons, because they don't have enough criminals to fill them.

America is in love with its culture of violence. "I will shoot you" is a very common phrase in America. Add a (1) Culture of violence (2) Media glorification and celebration of violence, and (3) laws that facilitate violence, and you get these insane levels of violence for a developed country.

There are super poor countries in Africa and Asia that do not have the level of violence seen in the USA.

 

[jonharrison]

I don't see correlation you're trying to make make. You can't pin what happened 350 years ago on today's mass murder spree in the U.S. mass shootings are a relatively new phenomenon

You don’t see how antisocial personality traits would have been desirable traits for someone settling in the United States? Or that modern warfare in Europe reduced the population of young men with a personality prone towards violent behavior? No doubt that mass shootings are comparatively newer phenomenon but APD is not new to the US, and there are some common sense reasons why. You can argue why some who have APD have started to commit mass murder, that’s a different conversation, but it’s certainly a mental health issue that is heavily correlated with mass shooters.

 

[Franc Mittelo]

And I'm sure the courts will feel the same, and declare this guy as being fit to stand trial, and he will be punished accordingly.

I don't really see what your point is. "Mental health" represents a very broad spectrum of disorders. It doesn't necessarily mean that you're batshit crazy, and don't know right from wrong, and can't function.

He is fit to do stand trial. He is not crazy. He knows what he wanted to do, he planned it, and he carried it out. He understands.

The most important criteria for a mental health condition is "can't function." For a psychological state to be a mental health disorder, it has to cause the person experiencing it distress and impaired function.

This is a mental health professional will not call a Christian or Muslim "crazy," for having magical and unrealistic beliefs. Their religion does not cause them distress and/or impair their ability to function.

That is how I understand it. I am willing to be corrected.

 

[jonharrison]

Vikings got a ships and sailed until they landed somewhere. Today Viking countries have to close down prisons, because they don't have enough criminals to fill them.

America is in love with its culture of violence. "I will shoot you" is a very common phrase in America. Add a (1) Culture of violence (2) Media glorification and celebration of violence, and (3) laws that facilitate violence, and you get these insane levels of violence for a developed country.

There are super poor countries in Africa and Asia that do not have the level of violence seen in the USA.

That doesn’t refute my point about prevalence of APD, though. Other than Columbia, the US has one of the highest rates, by country, of personality disorders in the world.

https://psychnews.psychiatryonline.org/doi/10.1176/pn.44.17.0018a

 

[jonharrison]

The U.S does not have a higher rate of mental illness, whether schizoid or personality disorders, compared to the rest of the world.

However the policies that country enacts on how to prevent, treat or provide access to treatment combined with just how easy it is to get your hands on a gun is a bad recipe for this sort of thing.

This isn’t true. We do have a higher rate of personality disorders than the rest of the world.

https://psychnews.psychiatryonline.org/doi/10.1176/pn.44.17.0018a

 

[Damien Karras]

You don’t see how antisocial personality traits would have been desirable traits for someone settling in the United States? Or that modern warfare in Europe reduced the population of young men with a personality prone towards violent behavior? No doubt that mass shootings are comparatively newer phenomenon but APD is not new to the US, and there are some common sense reasons why. You can argue why some who have APD have started to commit mass murder, that’s a different conversation, but it’s certainly a mental health issue that is heavily correlated with mass shooters.

Your presupposition is also that these traits are genetically transmissible which is far from proven.

A country like Germany who suffered some of the worst male population losses, and whose survivors lived through some of the most horrendous aspects of war as Soviet POW`s present themselves as better candidates for promulgating a lineage of antisocial personality behavior resulting in mass violence to the likes that we see in the U.S. There are too many holes in your logic to support your claim.