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Post by Admin on Aug 6, 2019 14:58:35 GMT -4
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Post by Jason Singh on Aug 6, 2019 18:23:13 GMT -4
The statements by Trump do stigmatize mental illness and I anticipate his words to unfortunately influence the general social perspective on mental illness. Unfortunately, this stems from perpetrators sharing certain characteristics while these characteristics are not diagnostic of one being a perpetrator. I believe that the shooters have trouble dealing with their negativity and this has spiraled them into being motivated enough to commit their actions. The truth is that everyone has some negativity in their life course, but some more than others - we can do our best to help them control this negativity with mental health provisions, but sometimes these negative influences are out of our control. What we can control is the level of gun control. Greater measures and research are needed to see what is appropriate to allow gun ownership. In doing so, we must definitely consider obliteration of any fun control whatsoever.
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Post by Bushra Hashmi on Aug 6, 2019 19:13:57 GMT -4
Stigmatizing mental illness in order to push a political agenda is an unfortunate demonstration by the current administration. Blaming mental health on the issues at hand is a way to distract from the real problem, which is gun control. Certain politicians in the office are profiting from the NRA and other organizations, so denouncing the use of automatic or semi-automatic weapons could negatively affect their profits. The current president of the United States unfortunately has a long history of using inflammatory language against minority groups. The constant vilifying and dehumanization of these minority groups by the leader of the free world has reached a base (mostly white-supremacists), and has promoted violence against these groups. It is true that only a sick individual could do what the shooters have done, however, it is not fair to say that they suffer from mental health issues and should only be looked at as such. The American Psychiatric Association has said that this rhetoric will further stigmatize mental health and interfere with people accessing needed treatment. This could have a profound negative effect on the care that several Americans get for their mental health, and it is incredibly sad and unfortunate.
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Post by Daniel Yuen on Aug 6, 2019 21:21:02 GMT -4
One would assume, with the numerous mass shootings, Trump would know what the politically correct statement is: Thoughts and prayers. With his recent press conference he once again struggles with telling the truth. It is the access to guns that lead to the killing of innocent people, not Mental illness and hatred. If its mental illness is the blame then he should have reformed the health care when he was trying to make American great again. If it was hatred that pull the trigger, then... well we all know whats coming out of his twitter account. While its certainly funny to see a spray tanned reality show host struggling to act like a president, the underlying cause is a lot more sinister. Lobbied by the NRA and led by Representative Jay Dickey of Arkansas, the Dickey Amendment added a provision to a 1996 spending bill declaring that “[n]one of the funds made available in this title may be used, in whole or in part, to advocate or promote gun control." Note how the language of that provision didn't specifically state a "ban" on gun violence research, but it was enough to intimidate federal employee to not risk their careers and allow politicians to say there isn't a ban on research. Whats even more shocking is that this provision on spending is added EVERY YEAR in the appropriations legislation that funds the CDC. I guess this only makes sense since NRA "contributes" to politicians' campaigns every year as well. While its hard to say figuratively who "pulled the trigger" in gun violence, we can certainly conclude that politicians aren't willing to put their career at risk to save innocent lives being lost each year to mass shootings.
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Post by Joshua Lowry on Aug 6, 2019 21:28:16 GMT -4
While I agree that you cant just pin 'mental illness' as the reason that people do these types of things. I don't agree that making very strict gun laws is the answer to stopping these types of events from happening. It is very sad that people stigmatize these types of events to the mentally ill as medical professionals we need to do our best to educate those around us that just because someone is mentally ill doesn't mean they are going to go out and try to hurt others. I do think that there is more research to be done in these types of events. As was stated in the articles this is very hard because of the 1996 Dickey amendment and because of this lots of research attempts have been hindered. I think that the more research that can be done the more it would open a dialog on how to prevent events like this from happening.
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Nicole Vazquez Plaza
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Post by Nicole Vazquez Plaza on Aug 6, 2019 21:56:11 GMT -4
A person who opens fire on a crowd of innocent people cannot possibly be in his right mind but that does not mean that his mental health issues are the cause of their murderous rampage. There must have been a trigger that caused them to do what they did and the fact that they have such easy access to guns does not help. Having a president that preaches white supremacy and racism certainly doesn’t help either.
The fact that the Constitution allows people to own guns should not be an excuse for the lack of response from the government towards gun control. There should be test that disqualify people from owning guns.
I particularly agree with Dr. Seth Trueger’s analogy about motor vehicles and guns. Funded research has made driving cars safer, the same approach should be applied to gun violence.
Japan’s suicide rate last year, specially in young people, are the highest in 30 years. That being said, death by gun in Japan is at an all-time low because of its gun control laws. Mental health issues are evidently high in Japan but the lack of access to guns show that mass shootings and mental illness are not correlated.
Even if the president says that the cause of mass shooters’ behavior is mental illness he offers no solution to the problem which only affects those who are suffering from mental illness. They would be less likely to seek help because of fear of being compare to this people and not getting the treatment that they need.
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