re: Buffalo Shooter Was A Known Entity To Police: Made Violent Threats At High School…

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A few Questions. and I’m not trying to be an a-hole.

1. Do you think tying gun ownership to mental health screenings will have people be honest and open with a psychiatrist? Will this help get men (you know, men will do anything before going to a therapist mantra) to accept therapy or will it lead to more distrust and pushback?

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Four points on that.

1. These mass shooters always find a way to let people know where their heads are at. They don't keep it a secret. This guy would've absolutely let a shrink or therapist know he had dark and violent thoughts. He may not have confessed a plan but he certainly would've raised giant red flags.

2. An MMPI (Minnesota multi-phasic personality inventory) would all but certainly tease out his violent thoughts and/or anti-social traits. The test would be near impossible for someone like him to fool.

3. Mental illness didn't cause this. Just sit with that for a moment. I'm not saying he isn't mentally ill. What I'm saying is that an Axis I diagnosis such as psychosis or Bipolar disorder did not trigger this. This behavior is rooted in an Axis II diagnosis of anti-social personality disorder. He, like so many others who fill our prisons see people as objects and not living/feeling entities. He shows the traits of a characterlogical disorder, not a neuro-psychiatric disease.

4. Here's an interesting fact for all of you to sit with. The mentally ill commit acts of violence at the same rate as the general population. No more, no less.

If you were to keep guns out of the hands of the mentally ill, you would do it not because they will use the gun on you but because they are five times more likely to use it on themselves.

Find a way to keep guns out of the hands of a criminal or a fledgling criminal. From a community danger stand point, the mentally ill aren't the problem and they never have been.