Buy a bullet proof vest and learn to use and carry a handgun.
Today I am going to leave my political and religious hat aside and concentrate on mental health. The review of how officials handled the massacre at V-Tech came out today.
In it are many flawed statements and the conclusions that sound like CYA to me. However, I plan to speak on an even distressing subject, mental health in America.
My first point is that mental health carries negative stigma attached to it. People, even today, like to ridicule people with mental health issues. This is one principal reason people do not get help.
Another reason people do not get help is that "I have to help my self" mentality in many of us. Therefore, instead of going to a professional when times are hard and unmanageable we try to take care of it our selves.
Other problems come from social service that are disfunctional. At a time in my life I used to guard suicide cases when they entered the E.R. in the county hospital under a medical warrant. Basically a person did or said something that cause the law enforcement person to think the person might be a danger to himself or some one else.
Twice I saw the head psychiatrist come over to the patient, ask "do you want to kill your self", and order the release of the patient after the patient answered "no". Now if I am a person in emotional turmoil, who just tried to kill myself, and I know the best way to get home is to answer "no I do not want to kill myself" what do you think I wil do?
In addition, mental health facilities in USA dont have money to house people with serious problems. People with serious emotional problems tend to be poor and unable to pay for mental health services.
Then, there is the problem of who works in mental health. Staff at mental health facilities are not reliable. They have the same negative attitude the standard generic american worker has about his or her work. In addition, they are unmotivated. I would say, even when there are financial resources, mental health staff ignores the patient and then sends him on his merry little way.
It is obvious to me the Cho, who killed all those students, was psychotic. Interviews, with him where he found a way to tell the mental health staff what they wanted to hear so he could go on his merry little way should of been balanced against what eye witnesses were saying against him.
I remember from the news that one of Cho's English professors made several attemps to inform the "powers that be" about Cho's psychological nature. Now, if I have to decide between a person who people say has violent and aggresive behaviors and an English professor with no mental health problems, I am going to listen to the professional.
However, what can you really do? The rule in mental health therapy is that the person has to want help. Another rule is that unless a person does something you can't do much. You cannot place a person in a secure mental health facility on the grounds he may enter a college class room and start shooting people.
Therefore, here you had professionals who were well aware of the problem but were not able to help Cho. In reality without Cho's cooperation there is not much you can do except wait for him to do something.
However, if mental health issues were taken more seriously in this country, mental health facilities would actually help people, and people would not let their turmoil get the better of them.
I am a firm believer that the best assistance in mental health dilenmas is the person him or her self. It helps a lot to recognize we have an illness and to understand the parameters of the illness.
Unfortunately, child rapist, rapist, muderers, bullies, abusive men and women, and many other people with violent tendencies are not looking for credible mental health therapy.
Therefore, buy a bullet proof vest and learn to use and carry a handgun.