Another unspeakable tragedy has taken place in Newtown,
Connecticut. A familiar story – a mentally
troubled person gets access to assault weapons and plenty of ammunition. Then he senseless takes the lives of
innocents he doesn't even know (notice the use of the pronoun “he”). And again the clamor for gun control echoes
across the land. Gun control alone will
not address the complex problems that have led to a rash – dare I say an
epidemic - of random violence.
A comprehensive approach to the problem of random violence is
needed.
Firstly, a massive overhaul of our mental health system is
required. We need to find a way to de-stigmatize
mental health care and those who access mental health services. We need to overhaul the laws that make it
difficult or impossible to identify and treat troubled individuals who
demonstrate a propensity for hurting themselves and others – even without their
consent. We need to find creative ways
to make schools safer without turning them into fortresses. And finally, we need to get assault weapons and
assault weapons ammunition off the streets and out of the homes. Perhaps
we need to examine what are the legitimate uses of body armor. Who needs it in a civil society?
An overhaul of the mental healthcare system will require a
complete rethinking of how mental healthcare is provided. We need to provide mental healthcare as an
integral part of the primary healthcare system.
And it needs to be covered by insurance.
Families who are dealing with troubled loved ones need to have access to
counseling and care as well as the legal means to take action when individuals cross
the line from troubled to dangerously disturbed.
Access to schools needs to be dramatically tightened
up. Right now almost anyone can walk into most schools
in America with or without a weapon. If this means more personnel dedicated to
school security, so be it. We have a
crisis of unemployment anyway. Using a
combination of technology, social media, and human and physical barriers,
access to schools must be denied to those who have no need to be there.
Speaking of gun control.
We cannot rely on politicians to solve this issue for us. Citizens need to take this issue up by voting
out all those who refuse to budge. As
long as the gun lobby has more power than the citizen lobby, we will not have
any progress on controlling access to guns, including automatic assault weapons
intended to kill enemies on the battle field. If nothing happens, we only have ourselves
to blame.
