Free Republic

If a former believer says that Christianity made her depressed, obsessive, or post-traumatic, she is likely to be dismissed as an exaggerator. She might describe panic attacks about the rapture; moods that swung from ecstasy about God’s overwhelming love to suicidal self-loathing about repeated sins; or an obsession with sexual purity. A symptom like one of these clearly has a religious component, yet many people instinctively blame the victim. They will say that the wounded former believer was prone to anxiety or depression or obsession in the first place—that his Christianity somehow got corrupted by his predisposition to psychological problems....

A Missouri state senator believes the town of Ferguson is suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder following the fatal shooting of 18-year-old Michael Brown in August. Speaking to CNN on Thursday, state Sen. Maria Chappelle-Nadal said that there should have been health care professionals dispatched to the streets to help the residents of Ferguson. “What should have happened since day one is we should have had counselors out in the streets and psychologists because this community is experiencing PTSD right now and frankly, I think some officers are, too,” she explained to CNN....

Contrary to what some would have us believe, there is an ongoing war against religion in general and Christianity in particular underway in our country. For years we have seen the surface action. Under the guise of a twisted and corrupted interpretation of the First Amendment, Christianity has gradually been forced from the public square. Christmas displays have been forced from public areas — we’ve seen the Mass of Christ reduced to “Happy Holidays. Churches have been attacked for instructing their congregations on the importance of voting their faith. Prayers at sporting events are suppressed. This strategy of attacking...

New SAMHSA report shows that 24.6 million Americans aged 12 or older were current (past month) illicit drug users – 9.4 percent of this age group. Marijuana was by far the most commonly used illicit drug with approximately 19.8 million current users aged 12 and older. In terms of other illicit drugs, the report indicates that among those aged 12 and older, there were 4.5 million current nonmedical users of prescription pain relievers (1.7 percent), 1.5 million current cocaine users (0.6 percent), 595,000 methamphetamine users (0.2 percent), and 289,000 current heroin users (0.1 percent). Although an estimated 22.7 million persons...

Armed Doctor Who Opened Fire on Active Shooter in Hospital Shooting Could Lose His Job July 25 2014 by Dan Cannon Share This Post As we reported yesterday, it would seem that an armed doctor in Pennsylvania prevented a possible mass shooting at the hospital he was working at. The doctor managed to land several chest hits on the suspect after he had shot another person and wounded the doctor. However, despite his heroic, likely life saving acts, the doctor (identified as Lee Silverman), may end up unemployed as gratitude. According to the Employee Code of Conduct for Mercy Health...

*The largest ever study of the effects of the main psychoactive component of cannabis suggests that it can cause paranoia in vulnerable individuals* To discover whether cannabis really does cause paranoia in vulnerable individuals, we carried out the largest ever study of the effects of THC (∆9-tetrahydrocannabinol, the drug’s principal psychoactive ingredient). We recruited 121 volunteers, all of whom had taken cannabis at least once before, and all of whom reported having experienced paranoid thoughts in the previous month (which is typical of half the population). None had been diagnosed with a mental illness. The volunteers were randomly chosen to...

Is there common ground for supporters of gun rights and gun control to stop random, senseless shootings in this country? Perhaps. Hours after the awful shooting at Seattle Pacific University, Mayor Ed Murray appeared on campus and said, “Once again the epidemic of gun violence has come to Seattle — the epidemic of gun violence that is haunting this nation.” Other politicians, activists and liberal clergy echoed his words. It will surprise the mayor and many other people to learn that gun violence isn’t rising in America, it’s falling. In fact, it’s plummeting. Gun deaths are down nearly 40 percent...

Justina Pelletier finally went home today. Justina is the 16-year-old Connecticut girl who has been held against her will by child welfare officials in Massachusetts for the past 16 months. Her story has resulted in a firestorm of controversy about the treatment of children with rare diseases and parental rights to make medical decisions for their children. The best coverage of the story has probably been provided by The Boston Globe, which did a series of stories a few months ago that can be found here: http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2013/12/15/justina/vnwzbbNdiodSD7WDTh6xZI/story.html A story about the girl's homecoming can be found here: http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2014/06/17/judge-orders-custody-justina-pelletier-returned-parents/mDWtuGURNawSuObO0pDX4J/story.html As the...

Los Angeles County jails have “deplorable” conditions that have contributed to a dramatic increase in suicides and the system isn’t doing enough to help mentally ill inmates, according to a federal report released Friday. Fifteen inmates have killed themselves in less than 2½ years, with the number increasing from four in 2012 to 10 the next year, and “dimly lit, vermin-infested, noisy, unsanitary, cramped and crowded” conditions contributed to the suicides, according to the U.S. Justice Department’s assessment of jail mental health care. …

I was on a UC Santa Cruz public forum panel last week, where we were discussing gun control (myself, Adam Winkler from UCLA Law, some out-gunned chap from the Brady Campaign, and a co-founder of the Liberal Gun Club (yes, they do exist). While running through the various sources of gun deaths (62% of which are suicides and thus clearly a mental health issue) it occurred to me that your garden variety street gang member isn't mentally stable ... at very least a sociopath, and in many instances an utter psychopath. So this link is to my opening investigations into...

Guns: The Santa Barbara shooter had legally purchased and registered firearms, and passed prior questioning by the police who saw no danger to himself or others. More gun laws won't stop the next such shooter, either. It is eerie how the mental health of the shooter consistently seems to emerge as a key factor in mass shootings such as the rampage by Elliot Rodger, who killed six and wounded 13 on Friday. The shooter had been in therapy since age 8 and police had been warned by his parents to check him out. Yet few liberals cry for tougher mental...

A furious Richard Martinez delivered a four-letter stomping to do-nothing politicians who have called him to cry crocodile tears over his son’s brutal killing. “I don’t give a s--- that you feel sorry for me,” a weeping Martinez said about the congressional condolence calls... “Get to work and do something . . . Getting a call from a politician doesn’t impress me,” he told the Washington Post...

"This time the shooter is 22-year-old Elliot Rodger. Like clockwork, the cry goes up blaming the National Rifle Association and calling for tougher gun laws. But this time there’s a problem for believers in gun control. The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence and the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence gave an “A-” to California's gun control laws, passed as they were by one of the most liberal state governments in the country."

We don’t have a gun problem in this country. We have a brain problem. And it is going to get worse. After reading just some of this killer’s autobiography, only up to age 12, I am starting to believe that we need to STOP MAINSTREAMING kids with asperger’s or highly functioning autism. And I have a son with it, same age as this guy. His childhood parallels my son’s except: I DIDNT FORCE HIM INTO SCHOOL. By 4th grade he was homeschooled all the way through. You will not see my son in the news for killing people. First, the...

WASHINGTON — New mental health screening that supporters say could help stem the high rate of military suicides or even stop shooting rampages passed the House on Thursday as part of the massive 2015 defense budget. The House bill, sponsored by Rep. Glenn Thompson, R-Pa., orders the National Institutes of Health to create a universal mental health evaluation for potential recruits that would catch past suicide attempts and psychiatric disorders. The data could be used by the services to weed out candidates with potentially dangerous mental health issues. Already, potential recruits are asked about past suicide attempts or mental disorders,...

<p>Karl Rove stunned a conference when he suggested Hillary Clinton might have brain damage.</p> <p>Onstage with Robert Gibbs and CBS correspondent and “Spies Against Armageddon” co-author Dan Raviv, Rove said Republicans should keep the Benghazi issue alive.</p> <p>He said if Clinton runs for president, voters must be told what happened when she suffered a fall in December 2012.</p>

While Americans of all ages in Colorado happily celebrate the legalization of marijuana in various forms on April 20, 2014 as a “smoking holiday” the mental health and safety risks are being ignored by the media.

FORT HOOD, Texas (AP) — An Iraq War veteran being treated for mental illness was the gunman who opened fire at Fort Hood, killing three people and wounding 16 others before committing suicide, in an attack on the same Texas military base where more than a dozen people were slain in 2009, authorities said. Within hours of the Wednesday attack, investigators started looking into whether the man’s combat experience had caused lingering psychological trauma. Fort Hood’s senior officer, Lt. Gen. Mark Milley, said the gunman had sought help for depression, anxiety and other problems.

HARTFORD — Mary Jo Andrews, Carol Poehnert and several other West Hartford mothers of children with mental-health problems had quietly met for eight years, usually over dinner, to share their experiences and frustrations, and to trade tips and shortcuts learned while navigating the treatment system. Then the Sandy Hook School tragedy happened in December 2012. "And we decided we needed to get out and do some advocating,'' Andrews told 70 parents and health care professionals at a forum at the Institute of Living Wednesday evening. It is the first of a handful of planned sessions — part of an effort...

Sleep loss may be more serious than previously thought, causing a permanent loss of brain cells, research suggests. In mice, prolonged lack of sleep led to 25% of certain brain cells dying, according to a study in The Journal of Neuroscience. If the same is true in humans, it may be futile to try to catch up on missed sleep, say US scientists. They think it may one day be possible to develop a drug to protect the brain from the side-effects of lost sleep. …