Posted on 04/18/2007 1:29:40 PM PDT by harwood
Just heard anchorette report this on pMSNBC
Where did you find the above paragraph? It is interesting that he says, "Jesus loves crucifying me.
...and we are still paying the price for Abe’s lack of faith in God’s spoken Word.
I missed that. I referred [too obliquely, at that!] to his verbal abuse toward people ‘of means’ such as the fellow college students he slaughtered. They have to be the ones he alluded to on the video. Yet he’s in the group that he chastised.
Sounds like a lot of rather mainstream liberals these days.
If we strip away the terrorist theory...then it would appear that it was a hate crime, hate that was generated, by the fact he was in college, and wasn't academically qualified...he was there, on a minority preference...
He may not have been selective on whom he shot, but he definitely was selective in whom he did not shoot. He definitely left the guy at the Post Office alone. On the whole, kind of ironic in a way, redefining the term, “going postal”...
What are the points were they agree or are close?
Hmm, at any rate, the whole situation was just a mess.... It’s really pretty awful that no one caught on sooner as to what a ticking time bomb this guy was.
If we place a huge scarlet letter on everyone who exhibits or incurs some sort of psychological problem during his or her lifetime
As I understand it, that would include 100% of the population at some time or other in their lives! Aren't we all just a bit what they used to call "neurotic"?
Millions seek help on their own for depression and the related psychological problems, some of which obviously plagued this shooter.
Not to pick on you, but this guy clearly had a lot more going on than depression. Maybe schizophrenic? I just worry that people will start seeing a mass murderer inside every person who is or ever has been depressed. And that would truly be a sad thing!
That said, the vast majority of people who suffer from schizophrenia are not dangerous. The two people I have known that had it were sweet as pie and have never been in the least bit violent.
I think the best thing we can do as a free society and one that wants to remain free, is to do more to remove the stigma, and not make it worse.
Amen. The more I learn about mental illness, the more I can say "there but for the Grace of God go I". These people really cannot help what their dysfunctional brain chemistry is doing to them, anymore than people with MS or Parkinson's or pick-any-disease can help what their illness does to them.
It seems to me we have two different tacks of discussion here.
One is about how the LAW treats those deemed mentally ill.
But the other addresses how school officials should deal with disruptive, mentally ill, scary students (or teachers, for that matter). I think we’ve reached the point where school officials MUST be given the option to expel a student...especially after a judge ruled him “a danger to himself and others”. If we’re going to make them responsible for student safety, we must also agree to back them up and not second guess their decisions.
I just don’t understand that thinking. The question is NOT whether they should be stigmatized or whether we are sympathetic to their fate.
The paramount question must be whether they pose a danger. For example, I feel sorry for the person with highly contagious tuberculosis. However, that doesn’t mean I think he should move freely among the populace. If he refuses isolation, we must do it for him.
Once Cho was identified as dangerous, it should have been reported to the school and they should have expelled him. I’m not taking a position on institutionalization...just that we shouldn’t have to pretend he’s not a threat.
Great point. I don’t think the law could’ve done anything else with Cho, given what was known at the time. He stalked the female students, they got a restraining order. He started talking suicidally, they got a temporary detention order and basically forced him to get outpatient help. He was a sulking, closed-in loner, eventually his roommates ignored him. Nothing out of the ordinary, really.
But I’m really surprised that the authorities at Tech didn’t do something when the guy started disrupting a class to the point of keeping the majority of them away in fear. That’s a little more than garden-variety depression.
God knows I don’t want to lower the boom on any student who’s the least bit nonconformist or “off” (I was a huge misfit when I was in college). But when somebody starts being consistently disruptive to a class, something needs to be done.
}:-)4
“Yesterday the Federal Communication Agency rightly cleared
Mr. Imus of “indecency” Now the FCA needs to take a look at NBC, again.
Showing a nonfiction real breathing example of madness has
benefited WHO? It was easier to know why NBC decided to add
to their problems, than to waste time understanding that an insane person can be a killer, be it 1 or 31 persons. NBC is
not insane and needs to be accountable in their shameful lust for ratings.”
I understand what you are saying, and frankly, my first response was to do exactly as you suggested, but I've had time to contemplate the results of doing so.
The wy it works now, is to use voluntary commitment to a course of treatment in lieu of forced compliance. The carrot is that it won't go on your public record, unless you require hospitalization. In most cases, hospitalization is not warranted any way, and secondly, there are few beds available.
Cho told them he would comply, but he obviously lied. He did not return for treatment when we walked out with a appointment slip in his hand.
What we are really lacking, is a way to followup on people who intentionally break their agreements with the mental health treatment organizations. It think that this aspect can be strengthened and fixed, but it will take resources to do so.
But it can be done without taking away freedoms, or causing someone to be labeled with a crazy tag and affecting their future and their rights and privileges.
As to guns, I think that once a person is under a doctors care for a mental illness, the gun rights should be suspended until the treatment is no longer needed.
This is big step. It may well cause people to avoid help, but it may be the only rational thing we can do.
Currently, the only people who are tagged with this restriction are those who are involuntarily committed or are hospitalized, which add up to a very small portion or those being treated and this tag never goes away, which I view as a part of the problem perhaps.
In Cho's case, his ethnicity was a huge factor in why he never sought treatment and refused to seek help. It is a bad stigma in his ethnic society to be weak or a failure to play the assigned role in the family.
You look at the picture of the return address on NBC’s web site.
It is “A. Ishmael”.
This young man was a dangerous psychopath, and neither the courts, nor the University, nor mental health officials dealt with him appropriately.
Then read his new last name again.
agreed and how many times does a guy have to come up on law enforcement and college radar until he is considered a threat?
i thought i saw situations where someone was arrested for making “terroristic threats” over something meanial....i guess that only applies when you threaten the politically correct.
Wasn’t it written backwards on his arm? Isn’t that the way Koreans usually write their names, backwards (to us anyway?)
Certainly true, but the field of psychology is far too complicated to make generalizations. We really don't appear to know enough.
I mentioned depression only because I believe Cho's untreated depression led to other manifestations, like paranoia, persecution complex and other personality disorders that were cumulative.
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