Who is Responsible?

Last week I wrote about displaced anger and this week we witnessed how displaced anger can be devastating to so many people. All mass shootings are a form of displaced anger, when someone is angry at life, their parents, their upbringing, someone who belittled them at one point in their life, and they project it to a group, a particular race, or demographic.  

Who is responsible?

Two major conversations are on the table. Mental Health and guns can be used by people who are not mentally healthy to destroy, damage, or kill others.  

Many say that mass shootings are due to mental illness or conditions. The desire to kill another human being has been glorified by many movies, television shows (every major television program after 8 PM), and mostly in the gaming industry. Last year, the most listened-to podcast was about murder. The local news constantly showcases killing and murder. The international news is about war. When violence and killing another human being is what we hear all day and night, it may appear to be the norm in society rather than only a small group who are mentally ill. When politicians’ campaign ads are about cocking guns, shooting gestures, and firing guns, then it appears that it has become the interest of the majority and not one in a million mentally ill people. What does this say about our society? Are we all mentally Ill? Are we fed violence because we watch violence and therefore the entertainment and gaming industry feeds us more violence and killing because they think we like it and will pay good money for it?  

If we as a society are not mentally Ill and there are only a few percentages of people who have mental illness who tend to kill and harm other human beings, then wouldn’t it be the responsibility of society's healthy population to keep tools that can be used by the mentally ill population easily to harm others out of the reach of these groups? Any good parent watches for their children not to be harmed nor for the children to harm their siblings or others. Parents childproof the house so that the child who is not yet responsible nor knowledgeable or skilled has access to the dangerous material. Shouldn’t the mentally healthy and responsible society do the same for the part of the society that is not healthy enough to distinguish or be responsible for their actions? Parents could be deemed negligent and punished for allowing guns, poison, bleach, or any hazardous material to be accessible to their children. Shouldn’t a mentally healthy society be deemed negligent for allowing access to harmful tools to other members of the society who are not mentally healthy? On the other hand, if all the society is mentally healthy, then they would not need tools to kill each other with and therefore no need for those tools to be sold or available.

In the past 30 years working as a Mental Health Provider, I have worked with many people who are suffering from one or more of the DSM diagnoses and never had the desire to kill anyone or carry a gun.  I have worked with many suicidal patients that I have had to ask their families and community to be sure to take all harmful tools away from them, due to their impulse to use those tools to harm themselves.  I have worked with many angry people who needed to get revenge on another person who they were harmed, and by law, I had to deescalate them and take all forms of guns and harmful weapons from them to assure the safety of other people. When apparent and have reasonable doubt that someone is harmful to themselves or others, we hospitalize them and buy time for them to heal and no longer have the intention to harm. Unfortunately, we don’t have the luxury of trusting that every person has access to mental health providers and institutions nor that they would recognize that they are not mentally and emotionally unstable and need to get help. Therefore, as a healthy society, we are responsible and obligated to keep weapons, guns, and military-grade weapons away from the hands of impulsive and not emotionally sound people.  

I hear the argument that guns don’t kill. Guns are made to harm and kill. Machine guns are made to kill the mass. That is the purpose of these tools. They are not made for gardening, decoration, meal preparation, or anything else. 

Just harming and killing. Machine guns and regular guns are not used for hunting animals. They are used for killing other human beings. So, when there is easy access to guns and you have people who get excited about killing others for whatever reason – mental illness, personality disorder, revenge, ideology, following a fad, etc. – this is the result we get in the U.S.  

The ratio of mentally ill is not higher in the U.S. than in other countries, however, we don’t have mass shootings in other countries. Scotland and Australia regulated and called back guns and they no longer had mass shootings; the ratio of their mentally ill community did not necessarily get lowered to zero percentage.  

What are we responsible for?

I believe that each one of us is responsible for how we are promoting or demoting violence, in our home, our schools, our work and career, and even in our own minds. We are responsible for the politicians we elect for office. We are responsible for the shows and entertainment that promote violence and killing. We are responsible for making the industry of violence a very lucrative business.   

In the same way, pharmaceutical companies were held responsible for the opioid crisis, maybe the industries that fuel the violence also need to be responsible for the impact of their product. 

We can also promote training for parents and teachers to promote healthy emotionally regulating and violence-free homes and classrooms which can promote raising mentally and emotionally healthy citizens.

All and all – we are all one way or another responsible for the outcome of violence in our communities and the world at large. Let’s take our responsibilities seriously and create a world where we can be safe and raise our children in a safe environment.

For more observational and integrational skills to become fully present and whole get my book - Life Reset: The Awareness Integration Path to Create the Life You Want.

Love 

Foojan