It wasn't perfect. But since the 1960's-1970's, there has been a movement to make it so difficult to institutionalize some people that those who should be obviously institutionalized for their OWN safety (not to mention the safety of others) simply cannot be committed.
There has to be some reasonable middle ground, and a way to get there, but the answer simply isn't to make it impossible to institutionalize someone until they kill someone else.
I would like to recommend a book on this topic—Madness in the Streets by Rael Jean Isaac. I don’t agree with her on everything, but she provides some valuable historical perspectives. What I found most interesting is the way mental illness has been portrayed, romanticized, even, in the culture, according to her. Mostly in movies and novels.
Yes, and in a better world, where the government isn’t run by people, people who hate people, (sorry, Barbara Streisand moment) that would be best.
Unfortunately the cards we’ve been dealt don’t currently allow moderation and reason in public discourse.
I’ll settle for the slight possibility of a random death at the hands of an individual wacko over the near certainty of extermination at the hands of a criminally insane government and its agents.
Perhaps our children will be blessed by advances in medicine and psychology that will allow accurate and objective identification and effective treatment of the true psychopaths and dangerously insane.