Mass Shootings And Their Effect On The American Psyche
http://thedianerehmshow.org/shows/2012-12-17/mass-shootings-and-their-effect-american-psyche
Reaction to Friday’s school shooting in Newtown, Conn., has been loud and swift. New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg called on President Barack Obama to make gun control his No. 1 agenda. The dean of Washington’s National Cathedral said, “enough is enough ... the massacre of these 28 people in Connecticut is ... the last straw." A sense of helplessness and frustration is palpable across the nation. While many are calling for more controls on guns and ammunition, others say we must focus on creating a more accessible mental health system. They worry we aren’t doing enough to de-stigmatize treatment. Diane and her guests discuss the effects of mass shootings on the American psyche.
Guests
Ladd Everitt
director of communications at the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence.
Daniel Webster
co-director of the Center for Gun Policy and Research at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
Dr. Alan Lipman
director of the Center for the Study of Violence and professor at the George Washington University Medical Center.
Dr. Jana Martin
clinical psychologist with 30 years of practice with children and families. Dr. Martin also leads public education efforts with the American Psychological Association.
Comments
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CONFISCATORY gun legislation is called for and justified, right away. The 1994 assault weapons ban is too weak for our current gun saturated situation.
President Obama can exhibit outrage and cry big tears, but he must remember he presides over a violence dominated culture addicted to murder by media and by war. Here is a guy who OKs drone murder of women and kids every week but can't admit how chickens have come home to roost. The wealthy class profits most from guns and arms and their money is the main barrier to a rational solution. Violence in America will not lessen until our sadistic hierarchy and structured violence is remedied with egalitarian justice. The 1% needs gunism way more than the 99%.
I will not respond to rebuttal, because it is always from Rich Citizerns United and their dupes.
Dawn Castle: pp is using his other name(s).
These are not citizen listeners and DRShow fans but paid lobbyists who spout nihilism and sadism, calling it "entertainment" just like Limbaugh or Joseph Goebbels. They are threateners (gun thugs, bullies), just like armed attendees at a school board meeting.
I have been a clinical social worker for 30 years. Twice in my career I had an opportunity to prevent a school shooting. One was a child with a gun and a hit list of 21 people; the other was a man with schizophrenia who was stalking my daughter's playground with a hunting rifle who believed he was being commanded to kill the children. Both opportunities to intervene came in a state that adequately funded community mental health in the 80's and 90's. Mental health funding for the public sector is currently woefully inadequate to address the costs of effective evaluations and involuntary hospitalizations of those who are dangerous to others.
My deepest sympathy to all of those who have lost a loved one in this tragic shooting.
If anyone is seriously interested in understanding why these tragedies occur they should read Dr. Alice Miller's books, especially "For Your Own Good". Dr. Miller was a Swiss Psychoanalysis for many years and died not long ago. She had remarkable insight into the origin of these and many other tragedies.
James Hildebrand MD
Recent "sick" violent movies and video games need banning more than guns need banning. Killings of this nature never occurred until the 1980's, when violent video games and violent movies started coming out, giving sick, twisted ideas to those with evil in their hearts. If it's not from "evil in their hearts", these shooters have "personality disorders" as this shooter Lanza is described as having. Or most likely mass murderers do not possess any positive values such as belief in God or goodness.
We'd be better off tackling the mental illness problems of our population -- and especially the cultural depravity -- before we take away gun rights -- although more restrictions (with enforcement) on who can get guns is certainly needed
Certain that this will go over like a lead balloon (the biggest elephant in our global living rooms) AND along with our conversations about guns, mental illness etc. is there perhaps something that we need to address about how we raise our young males?
One thing that never seems to be addressed is the possible role of medications in these incidents. We know that medications for conditions ranging depression to learning challenges can not be tested on youth. We know they can increase the risk of suicide in some people-why not the risk of acting out against others?
On gun control-would as many lives have been lost if teachers had concealed carry permits?
To Shawn, probably a crazy Jesus-lovin' redneck:
The right of a child not to be shot in their own school trumps your right to bear arms. It's as simple as that.
Cas Saint Denis
Living in America's Third World, aka Alabama, where my gun toting neighbors scare me more than any terrorist group.
One thing that never seems to be addressed is the possible role of medications in these incidents. We know that medications for conditions ranging depression to learning challenges can not be tested on youth. We know they can increase the risk of suicide in some people-why not the risk of acting out against others?
On gun control-would as many lives have been lost if teachers had concealed carry permits?
It is not enough to simply talk about the perpetrator of these actions. These actions are only imagined because of the AVAILABILITY of these weapons. No "restrictions" are going to change what's possible. These guns are almost always gained legally.
Last week in China, a man attacked school aged children with a knife, not a gun, and the relative harm committed was VASTLY different.
Aren't we really supporting racism with the second amendment now? I wonder who buys the most guns? Is there a correlation with gun use and poverty?? We spend so much time analyzing the situation in the middle east and no time on issues right here that are so complex that a tragedy like this is only resulting in a conversation about mental illness?? That is adjunct to the larger issue.
These types of attacks did happen previously, the difference is the media was more responsible and choose not to give the shooter any celebrity, there by incentivizing others to do the same. The movies and video games aren't nearly as much to blame as the 24 hour news cycle.
e.g. A person who is a little off decides that they do not have the recognition that they believe they deserve and then they see the Columbine massacre and think. My name will be remembered if I do something like that. Keep guns out of the hands of the mentally ill and teach children about gun safety and these things wont happen.
Based on what I have read, there were red flags related to this young man. The words loner, goth, quiet, odd have all been used to describe him. We keep talking about mental health care.....this young man's father is an executive at Ernst and Young, and he is of an age eligible for coverage under a parents' insurance. Was he receiving medical help for his mental illness? If not, why not?
If your child is receiving mental health services, or he is described as any of the angry, a loner, goth, or quiet in an odd way, why on earth would you provide access to numerous automatic weapons? Forego your love of target practice, and be a responsible parent, and a responsible citizen.
AS I sat listening to the news, planning my day and just crying, crying for the lost lives, the altered lives, the sheer horror the families directly affected by these events and those of us indirectly affected as members of this human family, I realize that much of my shock lies in the "Train wreck" effect. We want to know what happened, but we don't NEED to know what happened. Not in the minute detail we are hearing. To know that one of the little boys being buried today was shot 11 times is more than I needed to know. I think as we discuss the needs for people with mental/emotional struggles, we need to focus on the possibility that these tragic events seem to be becoming more effecient and effective. An event happens and EVERY detail is reported ad naseum, and then 6 months, a year later, something else happens and it is more heinous, more egregious, more shocking. I agree with one expert who suggests that we don't report the perpetrator's name. Keep this person anonymous. Let this person who chose to create such pain, horror and mayhem die in the memories of everyone forever.
We are paying money to encourage Hollywood to keep putting out violent movies and saturating developing young minds with a wicked brew of violence and sexuality...and this is what we do to "relax" and for "mindless fun"? I am to blame here as well. Why is it so strange to consider saying, "I am not going to see violent movies as entertainment any more?"
Thank you for your discussion today. I agree that we have to improve our institutions and attitudes about mental illness, to create an understanding that mental health is every bit as important as physical health. I agree that we must impose more restrictions on the availability of guns.
I think however, that concurrent with those changes, we must also change our current cultural and institutional acceptance of violence as a way of dealing with those who challenge or disagree with us.
The email from Sean that you read earlier seemed to echo so much of what we hear from conservative radio and TV personalities. Glenn Beck frequently encourages his listeners to arm themselves--to protect themselves against the government. The hatefulness, paranoia and provacative nature of these types of comments could certainly contribute to much of the gun violence that is destroying our country.
You can say outlaw guns, you can say fix the mental problem.
However you can't legislate this away.
Even IF you could remove ALL the guns from the country, these things would still happen but in different ways.
Even IF you could identify ALL the people who might commit these crimes, you would only create a society even more fearful of of mental medicine due to the stigma attached to such a diagnosis. And what would that mean for those diagnosed? Are we going to prosecute pre-crime now?
1) Take military-style assault rifles, body armor, etc. off the market. These are not required for home defense, target shooting, or hunting.
2) Put far more resources into mental health care.
3) Deploy security personnel in schools.
4) The media must stop publicizing these killers. Their names should not be mentioned or printed.
Could the panel please comment on John Lott who is very vocal about "gun regulation" being the cause, asserting that countries like Germany, which have stricter rules, have more fatal school shootings? He is the author of "More Guns, Less Crime: Understanding Crime and Gun Control Laws, Third Edition".
I grew up in Europe and there must be many mentally ill people there, and yet there are no mass shootings in Europe because no one has ACCESS to GUNS. The gun laws have to be changed, this is the only real solution.
Writers like Shawn really worry me. I think people like this must have had a lot of emotional abuse growing up and I hate to say this but are cowards hiding behind their guns. If you want to hurt someone it should happen the old fashioned way up close and personal (physically) with the lurking reality that the tables could easily be turned and the attacker could wind up on the losing end of the altercation. I know this comment will receive negative feedback but that is the way I feel
jjubert: When the idolized and role models are depicted as pirates and violent thugs in media (too big to fail or jail) the entire culture exhibits psychotic behaviors and it is ineffectual to treat individuals. I've seen some sick gun nuts professionally, but they were not rare types. Just a little extra stress in a hair-trigger society (of structural injustice) does the awful trick. And when I testified their guns should be taken away violence became much less likely (disarmed and under scrutiny).
Please respond to your first on air email. That was a racist statement. It was sent from a person who is unbalanced. "grab your guns and ammunition". This is not the way civilized, balanced people discuss their differences.
Thank you,
Gary
When will we stop sticking our heads in the sand: if there was treatment for mental illness that WORKED, we wouldn't be having this conversation today. Show me one documented instance where a mentally ill/bi-polar/schizoprenic/autistic has been cured!
To the caller who said if her son had lukemia, people would be helping her: someone's lukemia can't harm me or my family; your out of control, mentally ill child will.
Was it not the case that Ronald Reagan gutted the mental health system in the 1980s?
I grew up with a brother, 9 years older, who suffered from paranoid schizophrenia. He was violent, but *thank God* did not have access to guns.
If he had, my family's lives could have been vastly different.
Cas Saint Denis,
I recommend you don't hobble your valid argument by being offensive to those who have faith.
Please talk about the meds.
How many guns does one need to have for it to be an "arsenal"? I have many guns, but I don't have an arsenal and I don't think that Mrs. Lanza did either.
from an ignorant, but open minded, mother of two healthy kids. how does a child with aspergers design, orchstrate something like a shooting? How do they think this up?