In this op-ed, writer Lux Alptraum explains why the call to make a mental health database to prevent guns from being purchased by people living with mental illness is stigmatizing and harmful.
In the wake of multiple mass shootings in El Paso,…
— Read on www.bustle.com/p/a-mental-health-database-is-stigmatizing-harmful-not-the-answer-to-gun-violence-18563484
‘Stranger Things’ star David Harbour: Blaming mental illness cowardly
‘We are not violent’: Those struggling with mental illness fight stigma, blame – al.com
‘We are not violent’: Those struggling with mental illness fight stigma, blame – al.com
— Read on www.al.com/news/2019/08/we-are-not-violent-those-struggling-with-mental-illness-fight-against-stigma-blame.html
Mental Illness Is Not Hate
I’m really tired of politics and news equating mass shootings with mental illness. I see it as a cheap excuse and also a means of showing “sympathy” to mass shooters. It’s too bad that everyday Americans are not given this kind of… “sympathy”. When a person with mental illness discloses their condition, it’s dismissed as a weakness or laziness or condition (particularly with those who live with anxiety and depressive disorders) that “everyone” goes through or as a way of “getting attention”. But when it’s a mass shooter, they are automatically assumed their are “mentally ill.” Suddenly every news station in the nation starts debating about the seriousness of mental illness. Society has built such a stigma around mental illness and now all of a sudden society can “tell” when a person has mental illness??? Ha!
But you know who’s making the stigma worse? Trump and his posse in congress. This is what Trump said last week:
“We must reform our mental health laws to better identify mentally disturbed individuals who may commit acts of violence and make sure those people, not only get treatment, but when necessary, involuntary confinement…mental illness and hatred pulls the trigger, not the gun.”
I can’t stand this guy. He’s ALWAYS picking on the voiceless or the people who are easily forgotten or shunned and then blaming them for something they have little to no contribute to. This means anyone with mental illness like you or I could be “confined” for being a “potential threat” to society. So don’t be surprised in a couple of years we (if we’re not careful to vote) may no better off than illegal immigrants being rounded out by ICE. You might say at least we’re legal, but Trump won’t see reason. As long as he’s proving to his base he’s “doing” something regardless of the harm he’s causing, he’ll do it.
It’s so sad that instead of having universal background checks for guns, he wants to pinpoint another particular group of people to dehumanize. Why not he and his posse just call a spade a spade and just call these shooters a group of wicked people? What’s hard and wrong to say about that? Yes, there are wicked people in the world, but no, not all of them have mental illness. I mean,hell I have mental illness…am I going to shoot up people??? No.
Besides why are there people treating universal background checks like some modern day boogie man? No their guns aren’t going to be taken away…unless those same people are planning to do some kind of heinous crime, then they should have nothing to hide…right? And do we have to always make shootings a race thing? Are politicians afraid that it’s going to cause an uprising against white people if they say the mass shooter is wicked? Are they feeling that by saying that, it would be saying they’re wicked too because they are also white? Do they think that we, the American people, really think that way?When a shooting happens you wonder where it’s coming from or are the victims safe or if the gunman was caught. Anyways, there’s no need in perpetuating such a lies like “mental illness and hate pull the trigger” because we all REALLY know hate pulls the gun NOT mental illness. We need universal background checks now.
Admitting Your Fears
Ways A Therapist Helps You
Wondering how a therapist will help you? Wondering is there a point to therapy? Hopefully this circle will explain and perhaps give you an idea how to use therapy.
The Moon and The Sun
