The examples they gave were all sad cases. In common I noticed
youth. An adolescent brain is a strange mix as it is. An
adolescent brain on powerful medicines moreso.
Yet, it should be expected that mental illness is behind
killings. Not that mental illness is the cause but rather, a
factor.
There's poor social support for mental illness. AT one time,
churches were more common. I'm not saying they are the answer
per se, but rather, some sort of community support or
cohesiveness, wherever it comes from.
I remember growing up and in the methodist church I was in,
there were several people who were mentally ill - maybe 3 or 4 -
that were watched over by the people in the church. One women
faked being raped for sympathy; cut up her own clothes, wrote
poison pen letters. But they stood behind her, didn't reject
her, treated like a sick member of a family, when she had none.
Certainly there's social support services available in every
community somewhere. Hit or miss though.
Who picks up the slack?
It's easy in a "safe place" behind a computer keyboard to say,
god this or that, church this or that. But what's there to
replace the community support programs done by small churches of
whatever religion?
Where's the atheist community houses designed to provide the
same level of support?
I'm not talking about the extremists here. They're easy to spot
and notice. They're a problem.
But community isolation is ALSO a problem and who is picking up
the slack?
Kid goes to school. Has a problem. Recommendation is medicine.
It helps. But then...
...what else? What if the kid has a social problem as well in
school? What if the parents are a problem?
I believe the "it takes a village", as corny as that is.
Community support for all members of the community has to come
from somewhere other than government or social services.
I dunno. I suppose some of this has been replaced by the
Internet; you can form your own subcultures and in that sense,
it's much better now. There are likely many crimes that will
NEVER happen because someone found a supportive online
community.
But I just worry about the people that fall through the cracks.
I don't care who catches them.. but somebody needs to.
