re: #67 HappyWarrior

Making it a “mental health” issue is a cop out. We don’t want to admit that a person of sound capacities could do this. And the right in this country has never cared about the mentally ill except as a crunch to prevent sensible gun legislation.

It is a cop out, but it’s very much a “why not both?” issue.

The #1 cause of gun deaths is male suicide via handgun. That’s a mental health issue. We need to address it.

But mass shootings…a shooter may be mentally ill (schizophrenia, bipolar) but from what I’ve seen mass shootings are people on the anti-social continuum. In other words, someone bipolar can also be a sociopath but those are two different things and do not necessarily travel together.

So we should be able to address mental health issues apart from guns as well as gun control independent of mental illness. Where they intersect the most is male suicide. Which has nothing to do with mass shootings.

Vested interest. I’m bipolar with delusional affect unless I am on some strong meds. If you met me in person you would never know. And for my own safety I do not EVER want a gun.