[Conservaliberty]

This is just another piece joining the slew of others regarding mental health issues as it pertains to the shootings. I am absolutely steamed about this. As an American citizen who happens to have bipolar disorder, I refuse to be considered a second-class citizen because of my physiological condition. Yes, physiological as well as psychological, as bipolar is generally thought to be caused by a physiological lack of neurotransmitters. I am well treated and not violent.

Other recent articles posted to FR talk about how this is just a ploy to use mental illness as a ploy to take our guns. Not to mention, what about the families of mentally ill? So many people have harped on the mother of the Newtown shooter because she owned guns when her son had a mental illness.

Anyone remember that one case where they tried to hold the father of a bipolar (adult) son responsible because the son broke into his locked house--but the gun wasn't locked up?

You know, this sounds a lot like the mental hygiene stuff they tried in Germany a few decades ago...

I am NOT a second class citizen. Don't deny me my constitutional rights because I have an illness.

People who think that the democrats stand up for the disabled and whatnot are idiots.

Again, I am NOT a second class citizen. Don't take my rights, legislators. I should be able to defend myself like everyone else.

(at least I don't live in Minnesota)

[rashley]

Soon enough, wanting a gun will be considered a mental illness. Then, a revolver, or any weapon that uses a magazine will be considered an assault weapon.

[sickoflibs]

The irony is that this can have the negative effect that those with mental illnesses will avoid getting help so they will not lose their ability to buy guns.

Alternatively certain mental illnesses without treatment will create a dangerous individual to others or themselves.

[Scrambler Bob]

What happens when someone wants to classify PMS as mental???

[freekitty]

Well said.

[SENTINEL]

This is a flanking maneuver.

Do not disarm.

[newheart]

I am NOT a second class citizen. Don't deny me my constitutional rights because I have an illness.

You are exactly right. And I am getting very weary of those on the Right, setting up a false dichotomy between the stupidity of the Left's anti-gun position and the idea that increased scrutiny of the mentally "ill" is the best approach to solving the problem.

Wayne LaPierre (head of the NRA) has repeatedly called for "an active national database of the mentally ill." On the face of it, there is something reasonable about that. But the problem starts when you start to draw the line on what constitutes a severe enough psychological disorder to get someone listed in the database. Is it just the paranoid schizophrenic? How about people with other dissociative disorders, or an oppositionally defiant child, or perhaps just ADHD? Depression? Bi-polar? Generalized anxiety disorder? Maybe impulse control issues, say pyromania or intermittent explosive disorder? Perhaps a pathological gambler or an overeater wouldn't make the list, but those are similar kinds of impulse control issues.

The problem is that the government would look to the American Psychiatric Association for guidance. Those are the same folks who (under political pressure) decided to remove homosexual behavior from it's list of disorders, and who consider sexual re-assignment surgery to be a procedure that the state should pay for in the case of prisoners. Sadly the APA has become too politically correct, who is to say what they would recommend as a threshold disorder, sufficient to land someone in the database?

Even worse it the not-so-far-fetched possibility that the government will simply come up with their own list—in consultation with white-coated experts, of course. But when the government does it, real problems ensue. You are right, this does begin to sound like the mental hygiene programs in Germany. And we should never forget the approach that was taken in the old Soviet Union (that may not have been changed today).

A crime is a deviation from generally recognized standards of behavior frequently caused by mental disorder. Can there be diseases, nervous disorders among certain people in a Communist society? Evidently yes. If that is so, then there will also be offences, which are characteristic of people with abnormal minds. Of those who might start calling for opposition to Communism on this basis, we can say that clearly their mental state is not normal.--Nikita Kruschev

The Left is clearly using this so-called crisis as an excuse to go after guns. Don't think for a moment that they will not use is as a way to start down the road of marginalizing whole classes of people until it becomes possible to simply make dissent a mental illness.

[ConservativeInPA]

There is entirely too much potential for scope creep if mental illness is used for background checks. 2nd amendment rights do not come from government and should not be controlled by government. Why should someone that is mentally ill lose their rights? What about the thousands of soldiers and marines with PTSD? I will even go as far as if someone has served their time for a crime should not be denied their right to self defense.

We don't have a gun problem. We have problems with some that are not treated for mental illness. We have a problem with repeat offenders ... lifelong criminals on the street. We have a problem with government being all things to all people while failing to deliver on its most basic missions.

[taildragger]

Do we use their own system against them, an American with Disabilities Act Attorney might want to take this all the way to the Supreme Court, even though we have Roberts...

I worked around former Soviet Jewish Refugees years ago. I learned then the Soviets used to use Mental Illness as a political tool, do I dare say we history repeats itself ???

[kabumpo]

Is this a joke? Of course a bi-polar person shouldn’t own guns, just like a blind person shouldn’t be a bus driver.

[antidisestablishment]

I appreciate your concerns. The problem is, many folks who are dangerously ill are not treated or reported. I don’t have an answer, but it is a serious issue. Take a look at many of the social media pages of these killers—they are not just mentally ill, they are criminally insane.

Unfortunately, the gatekeepers are not only part of the problem, they are the problem. They are so far from moral balance that they can no longer discriminate between illness and outright evil.

[Boogieman]

“Eight of the nine killers in mass shootings in the United States in 2012 had a history of mental illness or suffered from untreated mental illness.”

And the ninth was perfectly sane?!?

[elpadre]

I recall an article several years ago when the last gun control threat was in full bloom, that when the 1963 Disabilities Act was signed into law, the mentally ill were mainstreamed into society - work places, schools, etc. Thereafter all control of some very sick mentally ill people was lost.

Any validity to the article??

If true then we need to get after Congress to revisit that disability law and tighten it up, IMO.