The shooting tragedy

Quicksearch

Blog Administration

Open login screen

RSS Readers

Tuesday, January 11. 2011

The Three Media Stooges, via Legal Ins

Insty: Mental Illness and mass murder

And also, a book: Madness in the Streets : How Psychiatry and the Law Abandoned the Mentally Ill. The PW blurb at Amazon says:

Taking aim at advocacy groups who view the homeless as ordinary people down on their luck, the authors of this scorching critique cite findings that 30% to 40% of the homeless suffer from major mental illness, and that a high proportion are substance abusers. Isaac, a sociologist, and freelance journalist Armat, blame the abandonment of the homeless mentally ill on the anti-psychiatry movement (led by Thomas Szasz, Ronald Laing, among others), on civil libertarians and on psychiatrists who foster the "delusion that preventive community psychiatry could eliminate mental illness." Arguing that we have replaced the mental hospital with the 18th-century poorhouse which threw together the mentally ill, the retarded, criminals and the displaced, they warn that a humane system of care will be costly and might involve treatment of some mentally ill persons against their will. Their support for judicious use of electroshock therapy will also stir controversy.
Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Posted by The News Junkie in Hot News & Misc. Short Subjects at 11:02 | Comments (3) | Trackbacks (0)

Trackbacks

Trackback specific URI for this entry

No Trackbacks

Comments

Display comments as (Linear | Threaded)

The Arizona shooter is reported to have asked the Arizona congresswoman at a previous occasion "What is government if words have no meaning?" She apparently didn't answer to his satisfaction. Most commenters say the question is nonsensical.

Well, I guess my sanity is being called into question because I think it's quite sensical. Today, many say the Constitution is a living document that changes interpretion with the changes of times. The outcry over the recent reading of the Constitution in the House of Representatives was mostly over the argument that it is not the responsibility of the House to interprete the Constitution but the Supreme Court.

What is the Constitution but words? Words that are the basic foundation of our government. Words, that to some, you and I and every other citizen except the SCOTUS Justices cannot interpret. Even when the SCOTUS does interpret them for the unwashed masses the interpretion is good only for the time until they re-interpret them for a new era.

So,if the words of the Constitution have only changing and fleeting meaning they have no meaning at all, So, what is our government if the Constitution has no Meaning?

#1 Rick on 2011-01-11 17:05 (Reply)

I am suprised that only 30 - 40% of the homeless are mentally ill. But since they separated out the substance abuse as a category it may be right. I would guess that only 10 to 15% of the homeless are capable of improving their situations without mental health assistance.

One complaint of the homeless helping agencies is there is not enough funding for mental health. Feeding and housing is not enough to solve an individual's problem. It only stabilizes the easy fixable part of their life.

On the other hand the legal advocates are so busy protecting the rights of the homeless that the help they need is blocked or limited. One man in the housing complex could be stablized on meds but the law required he be given a 30 day supply. That would last 2-3 days of partying or sale and he was a basket case the rest of the month. If his case worker could dispense the drug daily, the man would be more capable of managing himself. The advocates and the law handicapped the individual treatment needed.

The 10 year federal initiative to End Homelessness is predicated on housing the homeless not solving the causes of individual's homelessness. JP

#2 JP Blickenstaff on 2011-01-11 18:14 (Reply)

I saw the first two lines:
The Three Media Stooges, via Legal Ins

Insty: Mental Illness and mass murder
and the associated photo of the Three and figured there was a direct link between the Stooges and the "Mental Illness"

#3 joated (Link) on 2011-01-12 08:08 (Reply)

Add Comment

Name
Email	(Your e-mail will not show in your comment)
Homepage
In reply to
Comment	By commenting on this site you agree to the site rules listed here. Email addresses will not be displayed and will only be used for email notifications. Quick reference guide: [i] italics [/i], [b] bold [/b], [u] underline [/u], [url] (web address) [/url]. More tips here. Enclosing asterisks marks text as bold (word), underscore are made via _word_. E-Mail addresses will not be displayed and will only be used for E-Mail notifications. To prevent automated Bots from commentspamming, please enter the string you see in the image below in the appropriate input box. Your comment will only be submitted if the strings match. Please ensure that your browser supports and accepts cookies, or your comment cannot be verified correctly. Enter the string from the spam-prevention image above: BBCode format allowed
	Remember Information? Subscribe to this entry

Maggie's Farm

Our Recent Essays Behind the Front Page

Categories

Quicksearch

Links

Blog Administration

RSS Readers

Tuesday, January 11. 2011

The shooting tragedy