we "mentally-ill" are not sub-human

On this 15th of December, I'm deeply saddened for two reasons: the violent deaths of 27 human souls in Connecticut(many of them in the first flower of early youth,) and secondly by the response of the media and certain public officials like Gov. Ed Rendell, a man who I'd naively believed to be rather compassionate and judicious. As a pacific father of two, I am of course given cold-chills by the slaughter of kindergarteners trapped in a claustrophobic classroom.

But every bit as looming and ugly as America's problem with gun violence is her inhuman treatment of the mentally different and sometimes ill. We(along with the chemically dependent) are the scape-goats and the new N-word boogey-men for every hateful and/or ambitious hack on either side of the political isle, and on epidemic levels, we are the victims of violent crime neither the police nor the system seem willing to shield us against. And the remarkable scientific fact is that, when substance abuse is taken out of the equation, the diagnosed mentally ill are not one iota more likely to commit a violent crime than those whose mental health has never been questioned. And this is a remarkable fact because the impoverished and philosophically "deviant" are far more often diagnosed, and when they are... they constantly have to deal with invasions of their rights and feelings. However, scientifically, they're quite unlikely to turn to violence. This is, because, in my experience: so many of "the mentally ill" are the the most giving, gentle, and sensitive members of our society.

See, when there's a mass murder by someone like Breikivic(a popular blue-collar redneck whose mental health was never previously questioned,) the media doesn't clearly note this: as a matter of fact, they often state the opposite... nor do they discuss our constant bullying and victimhood. But the moment someone with psychological issues is on the wrong side of a violent trigger, there's a mass media demonization followed by an unquestioning howl to strip citizen-hood rights from absolutely everyone who ever sought out therapy to deal with this rushing, anarchic modern world. Me, I'm joining the N.R.A..