Arizona Shooting ctd.

[monk222]

Mental illness is not an explanation for violence:

Shortly after Jared Lee Loughner had been identified as the alleged shooter of Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, online sleuths turned up pages of rambling text and videos he had created. A wave of amateur diagnoses soon followed, most of which concluded that Loughner was not so much a political extremist as a man suffering from " paranoid schizophrenia."

For many, the investigation will stop there. No need to explore personal motives, out-of-control grievances or distorted political anger. The mere mention of mental illness is explanation enough. This presumed link between psychiatric disorders and violence has become so entrenched in the public consciousness that the entire weight of the medical evidence is unable to shift it. Severe mental illness, on its own, is not an explanation for violence, but don't expect to hear that from the media in the coming weeks.

As a practical matter, it is enough for rightists to bury the link between their politics and the violence and murder. The main point here, I suppose, is at least to remind people that being mentally ill does not mean one is also violent and dangerous. There is some need for this, because some leaders are pushing for more aggressive institutionalization policies. One may not have to worry too much about this, though, since such would prove very expensive, especialy now that we are trying to play catch-up with the Chinese military.

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Vaughn Bell at Slate and MSNBC

LJ