Tyler Junior College
When will it end?
Madalyn Garrett
Total Hours = 21 hours
GOVT – 2305
Dr. Khosrowshahi
November 6th, 2017
When will It end? The number of innocents killed change, the settings change, 13 at a high school, 26 at an elementary school campus, 49 inside a night club, 58 outside at a country music festival. The faces to remember change every time, but weapons are the only things that stay consistent. Most of the mass killings in the U.S. are from handguns, but often are legally obtained. The sad truth is that mass killings in the United States will happen regardless of the laws that are put into place to protect us. Twentieth century mass shootings have desensitized us because they happen so frequently, without warning. …show more content…
In the U.S. mental health is brushed aside, usually a thing people try to avoid ever talking about. They claim that mentally ill people are more likely to be violent. They say that the individuals that carry out mass killings, that something had to be messed up in their head to be able to go through with such an awful, evil act. What if the problem wasn’t about mental health, but rather a state of internal struggles? Research shows that as little as 3 to 5 percent of violent crimes are committed by a mentally ill individual. Most of the population believe that mental illness is directly linked to violence, when that is simply not true. People with mental illnesses are more likely to have a violent act committed towards them, than to commit one themselves. Instead, the perpetrators seen as disturbed are living in this state of “internal hell.” What’s left after most of the individuals carrying out the killings, commit suicide, are left up to speculation. Mental illness can’t be lumped into one specific category with a pattern of symptoms that leads to violence, but rather a variety of illnesses. Our society is not comfortable with discussing mental health, since we have a lack of understanding as to “why?” With things such as broken bones we can visualize the problems, but it’s difficult to visualize mental illness. Mental illness is deeply stigmatized so far that people suffering from it …show more content…
They are usually cast out of society, almost alienated. For instance, the man who opened fire at a baseball game in Virginia last summer had previously threatened his own daughter with a knife, struck his neighbor and shot his neighbor’s boyfriend with a shotgun as he fled. The months previous before the shooting happened, he isolated himself in a van, thousands of miles from his home in Illinois. Similarly, The Pulse night club shooter, Omar Mateen, had been beating his wife, threatened the people he worked with and struggled to hold down a job. Even the shooters who did not have criminal pasts, such as Dylann Roof, Elliot Rodger, or Seung-Hui Cho, their families and friends made statements about them making disturbing comments, threats, and they all had begun to withdraw from a normal social life.
Works Cited
Hammack, Maria. “A Brief History of Mass Shootings.” Behind the Tower, http://behindthetower.org/a-brief-history-of-mass-shootings
Johnston, Robert. “Terrorist attacks and related incidents in the United States.” Johnston’s Archive, http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/terrorism/wrjp255a.html
“‘This Was an Act of Terror’: 8 Dead, More Than a Dozen Injured When Truck Strikes Pedestrians in Lower Manhattan.” CBS New York, http://newyork.cbsloca l.com /2017/1
When will it end?
Madalyn Garrett
Total Hours = 21 hours
GOVT – 2305
Dr. Khosrowshahi
November 6th, 2017
When will It end? The number of innocents killed change, the settings change, 13 at a high school, 26 at an elementary school campus, 49 inside a night club, 58 outside at a country music festival. The faces to remember change every time, but weapons are the only things that stay consistent. Most of the mass killings in the U.S. are from handguns, but often are legally obtained. The sad truth is that mass killings in the United States will happen regardless of the laws that are put into place to protect us. Twentieth century mass shootings have desensitized us because they happen so frequently, without warning. …show more content…
In the U.S. mental health is brushed aside, usually a thing people try to avoid ever talking about. They claim that mentally ill people are more likely to be violent. They say that the individuals that carry out mass killings, that something had to be messed up in their head to be able to go through with such an awful, evil act. What if the problem wasn’t about mental health, but rather a state of internal struggles? Research shows that as little as 3 to 5 percent of violent crimes are committed by a mentally ill individual. Most of the population believe that mental illness is directly linked to violence, when that is simply not true. People with mental illnesses are more likely to have a violent act committed towards them, than to commit one themselves. Instead, the perpetrators seen as disturbed are living in this state of “internal hell.” What’s left after most of the individuals carrying out the killings, commit suicide, are left up to speculation. Mental illness can’t be lumped into one specific category with a pattern of symptoms that leads to violence, but rather a variety of illnesses. Our society is not comfortable with discussing mental health, since we have a lack of understanding as to “why?” With things such as broken bones we can visualize the problems, but it’s difficult to visualize mental illness. Mental illness is deeply stigmatized so far that people suffering from it …show more content…
They are usually cast out of society, almost alienated. For instance, the man who opened fire at a baseball game in Virginia last summer had previously threatened his own daughter with a knife, struck his neighbor and shot his neighbor’s boyfriend with a shotgun as he fled. The months previous before the shooting happened, he isolated himself in a van, thousands of miles from his home in Illinois. Similarly, The Pulse night club shooter, Omar Mateen, had been beating his wife, threatened the people he worked with and struggled to hold down a job. Even the shooters who did not have criminal pasts, such as Dylann Roof, Elliot Rodger, or Seung-Hui Cho, their families and friends made statements about them making disturbing comments, threats, and they all had begun to withdraw from a normal social life.
Works Cited
Hammack, Maria. “A Brief History of Mass Shootings.” Behind the Tower, http://behindthetower.org/a-brief-history-of-mass-shootings
Johnston, Robert. “Terrorist attacks and related incidents in the United States.” Johnston’s Archive, http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/terrorism/wrjp255a.html
“‘This Was an Act of Terror’: 8 Dead, More Than a Dozen Injured When Truck Strikes Pedestrians in Lower Manhattan.” CBS New York, http://newyork.cbsloca l.com /2017/1