Severe Mental Health Continues to be Ignored

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Hey folks Jim Wallace here again from gun owners action league. Well in the news it certainly seems that once again mental health is at the forefront of a serious tragedy.

You know ever since the Newtown massacre happened, Sandy Hook, we have been trying I guess in vain, to point out that behind every one of these killings, especially in schools, is severe probably undiagnosed or untreated mental health.

Of course the only anomaly for that is the Vegas massacre which we still have no idea who that person was or why they did it, but you know after Sandy Hook most of the Second Amendment community kind of turtled up didn't want to talk about the situation. We took a completely different approach because there was a story to be told and facts needed to get out there and after Sandy Hook, I think in the next 60 days, I did something like 150 interviews because I wanted the public to understand: number one that the Second Amendment community you know was grieving just as much as everybody else, but #2 there is a common denominator behind these things and it always seems to be undiagnosed or untreated mental health. During that time when I was doing these interviews I was actually getting emails from perfect strangers from all around the country begging for help, mental health help, for a friend a family member or a brother or sister something and I found it astonishing that they were reaching out to the Second Amendment community spokesperson or at least myself begging for help. So that tells you how bad things are out there.

Now one of the things we saw in Lewiston was the military knew there was something wrong with him he had made threats I guess on base or wherever where the commander actually sent him to a mental health facility. Now as I understand it, and perfectly willing to be corrected on this, but as I understand it the facility would only keep him for 12 days because if they kept him longer than that they would have to diagnose him and then keep him and there seems to be this big thing in the mental health community that they don't want to diagnose people because it gives them some kind of stigma.

The other thing that that we have been facing ever since we've brought this to the forefront is that the mental health community does not want to repeat what took place prior to I guess the 80s maybe even the 70s, where mental health facilities were not good places. I mean they were referred to as snake pits where people with mental health severe mental health issues were dumped and weren't treated well. But instead of actually fixing that, they just shut them all down and as a result they really don't want to deal with the more severe mental health issues because they're afraid that it's going to bring mental health back into those days.

Now I'll be the first one to tell you I've been dealing with these issues you know for 10 years now probably more and I can honestly say that anybody with the mental health issue of any level, 99.9% of them are not violent they're not a danger -some may be a danger to themselves- but certainly not to the general public in most cases they are more likely to be a victim of something. But there is that very very small percentage of people who I truly believe shouldn't be walking amongst us but that's a tough tough row to hoe because people don't want to go back to those days and I understand it. But by ignoring that small percentage of people who desperately need to be maybe institutionalized or at least kept for an extended period of time, we're putting ourselves jeopardy and we're seeing that now. We have been seeing that for quite a long time.

Now in in dealing with the issue it it's going to be very difficult to get the government, or I guess the mental health community, to basically do what needs to be done because it's not just the mental health issue it's also the crime issue; and we see that specifically here in Massachusetts where the government and society in general does not want to deal with the human element. It's always the thing; whether it's the gun or something else, they don't want to deal with the person you know. In crime they don't want to hold the person responsible because it might give them a bad rap in the future or whatever it might be. Mental health the same thing they don't want to diagnose them because it gives them a stigma.

I went through this a little bit with a family member that was entering into dementia and of course this isn't anywhere near the mental health issue that we have been seeing with these shootings. But when we had her assessed she literally could not do anything they asked her to do or answer a single question but they didn't diagnose her. As a matter of fact when she asked them “ohh did I pass” they said “ohh yeah you're great.” Subsequently had a conversation with that physician in the hallway and said “what are you talking about she couldn't do anything you asked,” she couldn't answer a single question you asked her. That's when I realized, because they told me well we don't like to diagnose them because then that gives them a stigma and you know it carries with them. But unfortunately because of that we couldn't get our help for almost two years.

So there is a serious issue that we're going to have to solve at some point and the longer we wait to solve that issue we're going to see more and more of these tragedies. You know as far as the firearm goes you gotta remember the Timothy McVeigh killed over 100 people including children and never used a gun. So if they're bent on destruction, they're going to find a way and as always it seems again, other than the Vegas massacre, they're choosing schools because they know they're gun free zones and there's nobody there unless there happens to be some sort of officer which is probably rare. But there's nobody there that's going to stop them from doing what they want to do. So the answers are out there, the problem is how much louder do we have to yell to get the people that can make these decisions to make those decisions? Been working on that for at least 10 years now, we will continue to work on that and we will continue to expose the problems that are out there. Thanks folks.