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In reply to the discussion: Why are people buying the line that this was driven primarily mental illness [View all]Jamastiene
(38,206 posts)too. But, the difference between you and I is that I am one of "the mentally ill." I don't appreciate being compared to the person who committed these horrific acts. Not all mentally ill people are violent. I know I have never been a danger to anyone. Yet, you are saying the person who committed this atrocious slaughter HAD to be mentally ill, like me. How would you like it if you had to admit the person was possibly sane and in control of their own actions? In other words, just like YOU? Would you want that on your doorstep? Does that mean YOU would be responsible for what the shooter did? Does that mean the blood would be on YOUR hands? Do you see how preposterous that kind of logic and scapegoating sounds? I do. Obviously, neither you nor I were the shooter. Yet, I am classified in the group you insist MUST be the ONLY group who could do such a thing.
Scapegoating "the mentally ill" is refusing to face the facts:
Sunday, May 07, 2000
By Anita Srikameswaran, Post-Gazette Staff Writer
Correction/Clarification: (Published May 9, 2000) Experts estimate that 0.7 percent of the population will suffer from schizophrenia over a lifetime. A story about mental illness and violence in Sundays editions incorrectly cited a figure 10 times higher.
Only rarely are violent acts committed by people who are mentally ill.
It's a message that has been emphasized for years -- but each time there is a deadly shooting spree, such as the recent ones for which Ronald Taylor of Wilkinsburg and Richard Baumhammers of Mt. Lebanon have been charged, many people are inherently skeptical of that assertion.
Still, experts insist that large studies support the idea that mentally ill people are no more likely to commit violent acts than anyone else, and in fact may not commit them as often as would be expected from their proportion of the population.
http://old.post-gazette.com/regionstate/20000507mental8.asp