My Gun Rant
Thank you Governor Cuomo and New York State legislature. You proved that common sense can win out. You also got the extremists calling you extremists, which is a spot on lesson in relativity for the rest of us. In a crazy world, sane looks crazy.
Since way back before Columbine, gun “enthusiasts” have tried to spin the idea that the solution to this mayhem should focus on mental illness, claiming lunacy is the evil and gun ownership is patriotic. Guns don’t kill people, people kill people. When guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns. God, guns and guts made America great. (Funny how they love insipid one-liners unless they’re pro-Obama.)
I personally have no quarrel with looking at the mental health aspect. In fact I welcome it. I’ve been chairperson of the original Spokane, Washington Child Protection Team for thirty years and worked twenty of those years full-time, then part-time as a child abuse and neglect therapist, working with families for whom rage and revenge were as common as meat and potatoes. The professionals who worked – and continue to work – that beat, know exactly where many of these shooters come from, rich and poor. None of us can tell you which ones will shoot and which ones won’t, but we’re all very familiar with the kind of rage, and the range of mental illnesses and personality disorders that shine a light on the shadowy perceptual avenue down which these folks march.
Since the advent of managed care we have watched the lion’s share of funding for our treatment programs fall away. Monies for programs that allowed us six to eighteen months working with the most dysfunctional families dried up, allowing us maybe six visits before we had to go begging for more. Six visits to clear up six generations of brutality and neglect. Add to that the closing of probably eighty to ninety percent of residential treatment facilities over the past twenty years and we have a potpourri of unpredictable folks out there, including what author Brad Meltzer calls “hunters.” The scary thing about “hunters” is they pass background checks because they haven’t acted yet. Down the road they don’t pass the background check because they’re dead.
So, we don’t know exactly who they are, but we know what they’re going to use to do the greatest damage. For God’s sake why not start there? What an idiotic debate we’ve allowed ourselves to get into.
One of the reasons diagnosed gun nut (Axis I) and unconscious asswipe (Axis II) Alex Jones and his ilk should avoid the “focus on mental health” solution is that after his appearance on Piers Morgan’s show there isn’t a mental health professional in the country, save for maybe Wayne LaPierre’s personal therapist, who wouldn’t revoke Jones’ permit to carry a beanie flipper. While certain mental illnesses would get a share of attention, once we got good at pinpointing the danger, personality disorders would come front and center. The narcissistic and antisocial tendencies of people willing to go on radio and television intimating their intention to take up arms against anyone they perceived as a threat to their “personal freedoms” would get their guns taken away faster than a Bic lighter from a serial arsonist.
The problem with the politicians from the extreme right is they have no imagination. When the awful happens they refuse to imagine the personal cost, were that thing to happen to their families. I have long been a critic of James Brady, for whom the Brady bill was named, because as press secretary for Ronald Reagan he was pro-gun all the way. Until there were holes in him he couldn’t see the sense in helping reign in this insanity that hides behind a Second Amendment that was never meant to bring the American experience to this place. And I have to say the moderate right and left look somewhat disingenuous in their righteousness following the Newtown shootings, though I’ll take level headedness whenever it finally rears its headedness. This insanity has been going on since long before Columbine. The only thing Newtown changed was the number and age of victims. I guess Americans can tolerate shooting moviegoers and mall-shoppers and high school students better than grade schoolers. Finally enough people were killed in one shooting and they were young enough that we could at least start a conversation that should have started back when the assault weapons ban was lifted. People! They’re called assault weapons. You hunt game; you don’t assault it, unless you’re Sarah Palin in a helicopter.
If I walked into an airport babbling the drivel we’ve heard from Alex Jones and Larry Ward and Rush Limbaugh since President Obama made his stand, I’d be on the no-fly list long past my death. If we take this mental health approach to shootings seriously, those guys better stock up on short sleeve shirts because wearing them will constitute their only right to bare arms.
Since way back before Columbine, gun “enthusiasts” have tried to spin the idea that the solution to this mayhem should focus on mental illness, claiming lunacy is the evil and gun ownership is patriotic. Guns don’t kill people, people kill people. When guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns. God, guns and guts made America great. (Funny how they love insipid one-liners unless they’re pro-Obama.)
I personally have no quarrel with looking at the mental health aspect. In fact I welcome it. I’ve been chairperson of the original Spokane, Washington Child Protection Team for thirty years and worked twenty of those years full-time, then part-time as a child abuse and neglect therapist, working with families for whom rage and revenge were as common as meat and potatoes. The professionals who worked – and continue to work – that beat, know exactly where many of these shooters come from, rich and poor. None of us can tell you which ones will shoot and which ones won’t, but we’re all very familiar with the kind of rage, and the range of mental illnesses and personality disorders that shine a light on the shadowy perceptual avenue down which these folks march.
Since the advent of managed care we have watched the lion’s share of funding for our treatment programs fall away. Monies for programs that allowed us six to eighteen months working with the most dysfunctional families dried up, allowing us maybe six visits before we had to go begging for more. Six visits to clear up six generations of brutality and neglect. Add to that the closing of probably eighty to ninety percent of residential treatment facilities over the past twenty years and we have a potpourri of unpredictable folks out there, including what author Brad Meltzer calls “hunters.” The scary thing about “hunters” is they pass background checks because they haven’t acted yet. Down the road they don’t pass the background check because they’re dead.
So, we don’t know exactly who they are, but we know what they’re going to use to do the greatest damage. For God’s sake why not start there? What an idiotic debate we’ve allowed ourselves to get into.
One of the reasons diagnosed gun nut (Axis I) and unconscious asswipe (Axis II) Alex Jones and his ilk should avoid the “focus on mental health” solution is that after his appearance on Piers Morgan’s show there isn’t a mental health professional in the country, save for maybe Wayne LaPierre’s personal therapist, who wouldn’t revoke Jones’ permit to carry a beanie flipper. While certain mental illnesses would get a share of attention, once we got good at pinpointing the danger, personality disorders would come front and center. The narcissistic and antisocial tendencies of people willing to go on radio and television intimating their intention to take up arms against anyone they perceived as a threat to their “personal freedoms” would get their guns taken away faster than a Bic lighter from a serial arsonist.
The problem with the politicians from the extreme right is they have no imagination. When the awful happens they refuse to imagine the personal cost, were that thing to happen to their families. I have long been a critic of James Brady, for whom the Brady bill was named, because as press secretary for Ronald Reagan he was pro-gun all the way. Until there were holes in him he couldn’t see the sense in helping reign in this insanity that hides behind a Second Amendment that was never meant to bring the American experience to this place. And I have to say the moderate right and left look somewhat disingenuous in their righteousness following the Newtown shootings, though I’ll take level headedness whenever it finally rears its headedness. This insanity has been going on since long before Columbine. The only thing Newtown changed was the number and age of victims. I guess Americans can tolerate shooting moviegoers and mall-shoppers and high school students better than grade schoolers. Finally enough people were killed in one shooting and they were young enough that we could at least start a conversation that should have started back when the assault weapons ban was lifted. People! They’re called assault weapons. You hunt game; you don’t assault it, unless you’re Sarah Palin in a helicopter.
If I walked into an airport babbling the drivel we’ve heard from Alex Jones and Larry Ward and Rush Limbaugh since President Obama made his stand, I’d be on the no-fly list long past my death. If we take this mental health approach to shootings seriously, those guys better stock up on short sleeve shirts because wearing them will constitute their only right to bare arms.
