Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Shane on December 18, 2012 at 4:08pm

FWIW this is my take on Will's post; the incompetence of school officials is overwhelming.  Just about across the board there is an overreaction to perceived threats, with an equally proportionate under reaction to actual threats.

Where harmless young adults are punished to the fullest extent for violating zero-tolerance policies and bringing a butter knife to school for lunch, or six year olds for playing kiss tag. The same types of administrative policies ignore those who make actual threats, have the capability to carry out those threats, have the intent to carry out those threats and have a history of acting violently.

This isn't a hypothetical slippery slope statement.  These are real life examples of idiocy perpetrated by the very same people you want in charge of determining mental fitness.

Permalink Reply by Will on December 20, 2012 at 5:35am

I can follow you just fine.

They are your excuses to not try something,

The second sentence contradicts the first.

Anytime you tell a man what he's thinking, and he says that's not it, he's the one who would know.

I've already proposed at least one thing to try.  Let's get back to that, or to someone else's proposals.

Permalink Reply by Will on December 17, 2012 at 12:15pm

The real lesson of the Sandy Hook shooting is that the government cannot protect you or your family.  These babies were shot while in government custody, behind a security wall, in a gun-free-zone, in the State with the 4th most restrictive gun control laws (according to the Brady Campaign). 

That's pretty much it.  I think we're done, at least with the gun-free school zone idea.  I wish we could be done with it otherwise.

Permalink Reply by Ken D Books on December 17, 2012 at 3:30pm

like the drug free school zone etc .... it's just a bunch of head-in-the-sand feel good about ignoring the truth.... which is the typical mindset of people today...

I'd ask why? Why is it that people can't seem to deal with the truth? Why does everyone want to ignore reality and pretend they've solved societal problems?

Permalink Reply by Titus Techera on December 17, 2012 at 11:21am

Some guy started a shooting in a restaurant, it moved to a movie theater nearby, then some off-duty sheriff or deputy sheriff gunned him down; the shooter isn't even dead. This was in Texas, though...

Permalink Reply by Ken D Books on December 17, 2012 at 11:55am

65 million other gun owners in the United States didn’t kill anybody last Thursday evening. Of course, criminals don’t care about laws; that’s why they’re criminals.

Permalink Reply by Richard on December 17, 2012 at 1:07pm

"65 million other gun owners in the United States didn’t kill anybody last Thursday evening."

I doubt that.

And the idea that somehow we can discriminate between criminals and non- criminals is absurd.  We’ve already seen “John Galt” on this site suggest that he doesn’t need a concealed weapons permit—“2 to the chest/1 to the head will settle down most any cop or other miscreant intent upon attacking my rights. “-- and Will seems to agree.  Are they the “good guys” or the “bad guys”?  The answer inevitably goes something like this:  I’m a good guy.  Anything I would do under the circumstances is reasonable and called for.  Anything beyond what I would do is wrongheaded and criminal and deserves to be punished. 

Permalink Reply by Jack Bauer on December 17, 2012 at 1:24pm

I don't catch your point.  In what regard is it absurd that "we can discriminate between criminals and non-criminals"?

 

JB

Permalink Reply by Dan P. on December 17, 2012 at 1:33pm

"65 million other gun owners in the United States didn’t kill anybody last Thursday evening."

I doubt that.

What do you doubt? His number seems a little high maybe, it's more likely in the 50-million range, but what is there to doubt. Do you really doubt that the vast majority of gun owners didn't kill someone last Thursday?

And as to your reductive ad hominem argument, I hardly think that John Galt represents the mainstream opinion on this site or elsewhere. In fact I'd go so far as to say it's quite easy to distinguish between criminals and non-criminals because Galt has admitted that he ignores concealed carry laws and therefore him and his trigger-happy over-zealousness belongs on the criminal side of that equation. I haven't  seen anything that leads me to believe Will agrees with him. 

Are they the “good guys” or the “bad guys”?  The answer inevitably goes something like this:  I’m a good guy.  Anything I would do under the circumstances is reasonable and called for.  Anything beyond what I would do is wrongheaded and criminal and deserves to be punished.

The only place I've seen this form of logic in this thread is maybe in Galt's post, which as I said his view represents a fringe element at best, and here. It's a nice straw man though.

Permalink Reply by Titus Techera on December 17, 2012 at 2:48pm

Professors Stephen P. Segal’s recent study of murder rates and mental treatment policy, “Civil Commitment Law, Mental Health Services, and U.S. Homicide Rates,” examined state-by-state murder rates and mental-health services and found that “less access to psychiatric inpatient-beds and more poorly rated mental health systems were associated with increases in the homicide rates of 1.08 and 0.26 per 100,000, respectively.” There was an even greater difference in the homicide rate between states with different involuntary civil commitment (ICC) laws. “Broader ICC-criteria were associated with 1.42 less homicides per 100,000.” In short, states where involuntary commitment was easy had roughly a third less murders than states where it was very hard to civilly commit a mentally ill person.

The reason that more mental health services and more relaxed involuntary commitment standards make such a difference in murder rates is very simple: Mentally ill persons are disproportionately involved in violent crimes, including murder. As of 2002, about 26,000 inmates in state prisons across the United States who were convicted of murder were also mentally ill. A detailed examination of Indiana prison inmates convicted of murder found that 18 percent were diagnosed with “schizophrenia or other psychotic disorder, major depression, mania, or bipolar disorder.” Many of the random mass murders that have so plagued not only the United States but many other industrialized societies in the last few years were committed by persons with clear evidence of severe mental illness, usually schizophrenia.

Here's the link.

Permalink Reply by LShieldes on December 17, 2012 at 3:00pm

Exactly where I am wanting to get the conversation going.

Permalink Reply by Titus Techera on December 17, 2012 at 3:23pm

I'm no expert on these things. Mass murders are a very small minority of murders, but they may be more predictable or easier to deal with, if psychosis shows. This means people should pay attention. & that cops should find it easier to arrest. Law enforcement is not stuff like the war on drugs. It means stopping people likely to commit real, scary crimes. Before it comes to the police or some armed professor shooting, it should be a matter of detecting severe mental illness. That can be done, to begin with, where & when psych tests are already implemented. Get people to pay more attention to that; hell, get people to pay more attention to criminal behavior! The more people are aware of what crimes are committed around them, the easier it will be to spot crazy...

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