Posted by baseball55 on October 5, 2015, at 20:47:39
In reply to Re: Shooters and Psychiatry, posted by SLS on October 5, 2015, at 19:44:39
This is too cool, Scott. This is the complexity of mental illness, violence, anger, disempowerment. If you've never read it, there's this great book called Violence by Patrick Gilligan. Gilligan was the medical director of the Massachusetts state prison system and a psychiatrist at Bridgewater State Hospital for the criminally insane. It's a powerful book that looks at these complex interactions of shame, rage, violence and mental illness, based on years of interviews with frighteningly violent men in the Mass prison system.
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> 1. Bartholomew was born without any genes that would predispose him to mental illness.
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> 2. Bartholomew had a childhood predominated by physical and emotional abuse, neglect, and exposure to domestic violence.
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> 3. Bartholomew grew up feeling inferior because his family didn't have as much money as his peers did. He was teased and bullied. He swore that he would one day have money.
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> 4. Now out of high school, Bartholomew continued to feel poor and inferior. He couldn't find a job. College was out of the question.
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> 5. Bartholomew's mother noticed that her son's behavior had become erratic and that he was often quiet and uncommunicative. He was ruminating in his anger and indignation. She thinks that his quietness is depression, and convinces him to go to the family doctor. She would accompany him.
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> 6. The doctor of internal medicine hears the word "depression". This is enough to convinces the doctor to prescribe Lexapro.
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> 7. After six months, nothing changes.
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> 8. 18 years previously, a law abiding citizen bought a hand gun legally.
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> 9. This law abiding citizen had his house robbed while he was out at the cinema watching a mediocre remake of "King Kong". The gun was stolen along with a box of Fruit Loops.
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> 10. The gun eventually found its way into Bartholomew's hands. He now felt empowered. He could use it to get the money and respect that he never had growing up. Society owed it to him.
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> 11. Bartholomew was still angry. He decided to rob a convenience store. On impulse and filled with anxiety, he burst through the door and ran up to the counter waving his gun around and screaming for everyone to get down on the floor. He just happened to notice a box of Fruit Loops on the shelf. He was not distracted, though.
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> 12. Bartholomew demands that the clerk give him all the money in the cash register. When the clerk raised his hands in the air to show Bartholomew that he was unarmed, Bartholomew panicked and shot him. Several patrons got up off the floor and began to run for the door. Bartholomew shot them all.
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> 13. Realizing what he had done, Bartholomew felt trapped. He would surely be executed - or worse. There was no way out except by suicide. Suicide was not an unfamiliar thought. He used the gun one more time.
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> 14. The coroner determined that Bartholomew's body contained Lexapro and Fruit Loops.
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> 15. Upon investigation, Bartholomew's mother and doctor corroborated this finding and described that Bartholomew was taking Lexapro for depression.
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> 16. In the media and on official public records, Bartholomew was taking an antidepressant for a mental illness and committed mass murder.
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> 17. Bartholomew was not mentally ill.
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> 18. Strange, though. Bartholomew didn't even like Fruit Loops.
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poster:baseball55
thread:1083163
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20150929/msgs/1083250.html