Every time another mass shooting happens, I start to worry. I’m not scared for my children, or worried that it would happen to me. I worry that this time the push to use mental illness as a scapegoat for evil will rob me of my Second Amendment rights.
It doesn’t matter that it has been proven that fewer than 5% of mass shooters have any kind of qualifying Serious Mental Illness. Time after time, families looking for an explanation that will absolve them, and politicians (on both sides of the aisle) looking for an easy-out, claim that the shooter was mentally ill, and the media accepts it without question. Most recently, the Louisville Bank shooter’s parents declared that he was mentally ill and getting help for depression. The Nashville shooter’s family said she was “under a doctor’s care for a mental illness.” After the Uvalde school shooting, Republican Governor Greg Abbott declared that the shooter had a “mental health issue” and that Texas had to “do a better job with mental health.”
Mental illness is NOT an excuse for evil.
Evil is Evil. Evil is NOT a mental illness.
All of this "it's the mental illness" and "we need better mental health in this country" is hot garbage. Every healthcare plan has mental health coverage to some degree. There is a proliferation of online Mental Health companies that will let you talk to a therapist for about $60. There are FREE hotlines people can call to talk to someone. Mental Health is not an excuse for evil actions, and people need to stop using it as one.
I was diagnosed with Clinical Depression and Autism (Asperger’s Syndrome) in 2009. I am on medication for Depression, and there is no medication for Autism. I have a solid support system in place. I am not a threat to anyone, not even myself. I was on Dana’s radio show discussing this after Sandy Hook, and here we are, eight years later, still universally blaming mental health and ignoring the existence of evil.
The real problem in America is that we no longer value life.
Red Flags laws are not the answer either. Under Red Flag Laws, I lose my rights before I get adjudicated and then have to go through a very expensive fight to win them back afterward. Red Flag Laws violate my due process rights.
If someone is truly a danger to themselves or others, there are things family can do to get them help, and get them adjudicated legally unfit. In the recent case of the Nashville school shooter, the family felt she was enough of a danger that they demanded she sell the one gun they knew she had — but they did not take any steps to make sure that she couldn’t buy any more. They did not take her to a judge and have her added to NICS as a prohibited possessor, as federal and Tennessee law allows.
I said it in 2015, and I’ll say it again, the real problem in America is that we no longer value life.
Abortion says that life has no value at the beginning. The push for “Physician-Assisted Suicide,” already legal in 10 states and DC, says that life has no value at the end. The skyrocketing crime rates and dramatic increase in violent crime shows that many people don’t value life in between those stages.
As long as we continue to treat life as disposable, these types of tragic events will continue.
Lorraine Yuriar is a wife, mother, and a lifelong conservative, currently stuck in a very blue state.
Brilliant and sensible article. Thank you
Well said Lorraine, 100%