Mass shooting in San Bernandino

[Fez]

I'm waiting for conservatives to start talking about the importance of addressing mental health issues, which they'll continue until this blows over. They'll then go back to ignoring those same issues.

House Republicans actually do have a surprisingly good proposed mental health bill that Tim Murphy has been pushing for over two years now. Its not perfect, but it would make a lot of much needed improvements to the mental health system and has been endorsed by a lot of the major advocacy groups, including NAMI. Last time I saw, it had 79 Republican and 38 Democratic co-sponsors.

The problems are that 1) Boehner never tried pushing the bill. Ryan did announce earlier this week that he supports it, so we'll see if that moves the needle; and 2) Democratic leadership has refused to engage in talks over the bill through some combination of not trusting Republican motives and not wanting to give Republicans an actual bona fide good governance policy victory.

The point is, there has been a good faith effort by a decent number of Republicans on this issue. Especially by Murphy, who has been talking about it for years and done a lot of work with former Rep. Patrick Kennedy on it.

And people also have a very wrongly skewed idea of the "mental health issues" that are involved in violence in general. The diagnoses which are byfar MOST related to an increased risk for violence are substance abuse and alcohol abuse, but that never seems to get pointed out. 

Well, substance abuse is part of behavioral health, and a lot of people do say mental health when they actually mean behavioral health. 

 

ETA: For more info on the bill, check out NAMI's press release when it passed out of subcommittee last month. Provisions of it include:

• Supporting innovation and evidence-based practices in mental health care, including early intervention in the treatment of first episode psychosis.
• Protecting access to psychiatric medications in Medicaid and Medicare.
• Scaling back restrictions on Federal Medicaid reimbursement for short term, acute inpatient psychiatric treatment for adults between the ages of 22 and 64.
• Broadening eligibility for funding in Medicaid and Medicare for implementing Health Information Technology in mental health care.
• Achieving a proper balance between protecting the privacy of sensitive health and mental health information while affording families access to information necessary to serve as effective support. 
• Establishing an Assistant Secretary for Mental Health and Substance Use Services to enhance coordination among different agencies within the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). 
• Strengthening funding for certain types of research on serious mental illness at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)

[Disturber of Peace]

The tree of freedom must, every other day, be watered with the blood of tyrants and innocents.

 

You know, i think sometime in the next 500 shootings, there will be a white hero who will shoot down the shooter. And from then on, for a lot of reasons, things will just get worse.

[Trebla]

Police appear to have been in shootout with individual in black SUV. Individual appears to be down and police are approaching the bullet riddled SUV

[Shryke]

We have a lot more violent media, violent speaking, and violent actions compared to most other countries. A really easy way to test this: check out just the toys and commercials and whatnot on typical TV in Europe. It's shocking how much more sex and how much less violence there is. 

Except, you know, Canada is right here and we consume literally all your media. There's very few differences in what we are exposed to when it comes to entertainment media.

And yet, not having these problems.

The bigger difference is simply how we treat guns. People basically don't have guns except for hunting up here.

[Kalbear]

Except, you know, Canada is right here and we consume literally all your media. There's very few differences in what we are exposed to when it comes to entertainment media.

And yet, not having these problems.

Dude, ya'll speak French and have Caillou. Very different culture right there. 

[Manhole Eunuchsbane]

 

Sorry, quote fail.

I have to agree with Shryke on that point. I really don't understand how violence in entertainment can have that much effect. Your connection to reality would have to be so damaged to not understand the difference. 

[Jaxom 1974]

Dude, ya'll speak French and have Caillou. Very different culture right there. 

It's actually remarkable that Caillou hasn't made the violence worse for Canada. 

The problems cannot hope to be solved until all parties want to acknowledge the issues and break then down to work towards solutions as a whole.

[Kalbear]

Sorry, quote fail.

I have to agree with Shryke on that point. I really don't understand how violence in entertainment can have that much effect. Your connection to reality would have to be so damaged to not understand the difference. 

You misunderstand. I'm not saying media violence causes this. I'm saying that it's an indicator that us culture is more violent than other culture.

[Trebla]

NYT reporting 1 suspect dead, 1 captured, 1 still at large

[Fragile Bird]

So 14 confirmed dead, 17 injured, 10 in critical condition.

 

[Relic]

Live stream for anyone who is interested. Watching this in real time is surreal, and feels a bit obscene.  

http://news.yahoo.com/san-bernadino-shooting-live-coverage-193436110.html

[Manhole Eunuchsbane]

You misunderstand. I'm not saying media violence causes this. I'm saying that it's an indicator that us culture is more violent than other culture.

Ah, okay that makes sense. Gotcha. Yeah, I've always wondered why as a culture we seem to prefer violent entertainment to sexy entertainment. Maybe it's just the puritans who have kind of helped shape that dynamic? I don't know, but it seems ass-backwards. 

[The Marquis de Leech]

The bigger difference is simply how we treat guns. People basically don't have guns except for hunting up here.

That sums it up really.

Only in the US do people think of guns as something you use against people. For everyone else, (non-military) guns are for use against animals.

[Bonesy]

Um, what?

The middle east, south and central America, Mexico, Ukraine, Crimea, and Africa spring to mind. And every Western and Eastern power that participates in such things.

[Fragile Bird]

I am watching Canadian news, not American.  But the CBC is monitoring US news organizations and say that American news organizations are reporting that one of the shooters was angered or insulted at the gathering in the conference hall, left, and came back with two friends to gun down the people at the gathering.  Revenge was the motive.  The CBC has cautioned listeners about these reports.  Presumably the police have leaked information to someone, or someone in the hall  during the events has said something.

[Shryke]

I am watching Canadian news, not American.  But the CBC is monitoring US news organizations and say that American news organizations are reporting that one of the shooters was angered or insulted at the gathering in the conference hall, left, and came back with two friends to gun down the people at the gathering.  Revenge was the motive.  The CBC has cautioned listeners about these reports.  Presumably the police have leaked information to someone, or someone in the hall  during the events has said something.

Given the planning involved and there's been reports of a pipe bomb in the car, this seems to premeditated for that to be the whole story.

[Shryke]

Um, what?

 

The middle east, south and central America, Mexico, Ukraine, Crimea, and Africa spring to mind. And every Western and Eastern power that participates in such things.

Kinda completely missing the point. You don't get people in like Canada or the UK or Sweden buying guns for self-defence or some such. Or not in the kind of numbers you see in the US.

[cdawnb]

I am watching Canadian news, not American.  But the CBC is monitoring US news organizations and say that American news organizations are reporting that one of the shooters was angered or insulted at the gathering in the conference hall, left, and came back with two friends to gun down the people at the gathering.  Revenge was the motive.  The CBC has cautioned listeners about these reports.  Presumably the police have leaked information to someone, or someone in the hall  during the events has said something.

It seems way too planned for that. Three shooters in military type gear with a bomb and it was supposed spur of the moment? 

Possible I suppose but unlikely.

It's also possible that we have a lot of misinformation about the shooters themselves and so the "facts" we are speculating on are wrong. 

There is going to be a press conference soon so hopefully we will have more information. 

[Shryke]

People have suggested the whole thing was planned ahead and the argument was basically a last chance to yell at the person/people they were after and make sure the targets were there.

[cdawnb]

People have suggested the whole thing was planned ahead and the argument was basically a last chance to yell at the person/people they were after and make sure the targets were there.

That could be possible. 

The head FBI guy at the scene just said that they just don't have a motive. He's not willing to speculate yet.