Legislation would require educators to report potentially dangerous people to police

[davidthegnome]

7. McCarthyism

Did I spell that right?

Teachers are not, I repeat, NOT mental health professionals. Their job is to teach academics, to maintain control over a classroom. I think they have enough to do as it is, without referring millions of children to police and psychiatrists for "re-education".

Sick. It's sick. The mentally ill are so frequently made the scape goats in these cases. It's assumed that, because someone is mentally ill, their chances of being a psychopathic murderer are much higher. Now unless we redefine mentally ill to mean "total asshole", that's completely inaccurate. Mentally ill people are those who suffer from mental illness, not serial killers, not deranged lunatics who will rape your dogs and steal your toilet paper to wear on their head.

Ugh. This is how it will begin. Next, perhaps you'll be rewarded for informing the authorities of neighbors who have "odd" habits, you know, like they spend too much time alone, watch too much porn... or frequent a forum that's considered politically active, maybe even radical. This is a damned slippery slope.

Treatment? If our facilities for treatment and our professionals were truly competent on an overall scale, these problems would be greatly diminished to begin with. Rather than being the solution, I would argue that our psychiatric industry is a part of the problem. Treating symptoms with drugs, instead of truly attempting to heal the mind, or to cure illness.

Do these officials have any idea just what they're dealing with? Do they understand mental health? Do they know the first thing about the system? I'd suggest researching psychiatric hospitals and the quality of the treatment as well as the way the mentally ill are actually "treated". Try visiting a psych hospital some time. The staff, (this is Nation-wide, as far as I know, with no known exceptions) that is, nurses and psychiatrists both, spend very little time talking to or interacting with patients. They are afraid of the mentally ill, they are suspicious, they are aloof.

As someone who has spent years in therapy, I am all too painfully aware of these things. Now people like me are to be locked up and forcefully treated because we MIGHT go crazy and kill people? I suppose we had better put the whole fucking Country in a psych hospital then.