Sandy Hook shooting highlights deficient access to psychiatry in the U.S., expert says

[earthside]

4. Who is buying this?

I think of Klebold and Harris; Seung-Hui Cho; Jared Loughner; James Holmes; and Adam Lanza.
(Examples just off the top of my head.)

When they committed their crimes, these individuals who were in (or had been very recently) in very 'middle class' and/or academic environments where mental health services were available --- indeed, some of them had been inside or identified (to one degree or another) the mental health system.

Surely, we can indeed and ought to provide more resources to mental health care ... however, it seems to me that there is something disturbing about trying to lay-off these mass slaughters to just crazy guys who slip through the cracks. It concerns me that the gun fetishists will agree with the premise that it is not the gun per se, but is an unpreventable action that occurs when an 'evil' crazy person decides to kill.

(I've seen this on Facebook already: "Evil does not exist within a gun. It exists in the minds and hearts of those who pull the trigger for evil purposes.&quot

There is a bigger picture problem in our society that may not be dealt with if this growing problem of gun-enabled mass slaughter is just attributed to 'crazy' individuals and that all we need to do is hire more psychologists and do much more close tracking of Facebook posts (I say that only half factitiously).

We've got a 'culture of violence' problem and a 'tools' of mass slaughter problem in this country -- that's what we've got to deal with and that is going to be uncomfortable not only for the gun nuts, but for liberal defenders of the popular culture, too.