Mental illness expert: We should be asking whether political climate helped trigger shooting

[Swede]

By Greg Sargent
A leading expert in mental illness tells me that asking whether the Arizona shooter's violent behavior might have been partly triggered by the nation's political climate is a wholly appropriate line of inquiry -- even if the shooter is found to be insane.

"It's a reasonable question to ask," Dr. Marvin Swartz, a psychiatry professor at Duke University who specializes in how environment impacts the behavior of the mentally ill, said in an interview this morning. "The nature of someone's delusions is affected by culture. It's a reasonable line of inquiry to ask, `How does a political culture affect the content of people's delusions?'"

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/plum-line/2011/01/mental_illness_expert_we_shoul.html

[LemmingWarrior]

1. Exactly!

Dr. Swartz, is completely correct to point this out and Sarah Palin acting like there's no gorilla-in-the-room makes her appear very disingenuous.

[uppityperson]

k&r

[uppityperson]

2. k&r

[foxfeet]

3. I'm a retired social worker and spent my career working people with mental illness.

I used to live in New York City. There, people with persecutory delusions often feared that the Mafia was out to get them, When I moved to Seattle, I quickly noticed that people here often had persecutory delusions involving the Green River Killer. The effects of culture on the content of delusions are obvious.

[AspenRose]

7. Exactly

Social Workers are trained re: "Person-in-Environment" - things just don't happen in a vacuum

[EFerrari]

18. The claim it doesn't only demonstrates how relationally challenged

the right wing is.

[Imajika]

4. Well, if that is the case...

...it would open the pandora's box to also asking whether violent video games helped trigger the shooter, whether violent movies helped trigger the shooter, whether mature hip hop music helped trigger the shooter, and on, and on, and on.

Go down that road and you open society to the entire debate over whether we need to censor entertainment because of its harmful influence on young adults and mentally disturbed people. And you can absolutely bet there are legions of fundie groups that would love to pry this argument back open so they can start suing musicians and game makers again.

This is a bad line of reasoning in my opinion and everyone on the left pushing this notion may well regret the consequences. It is increasingly obvious that "the tone of the debate" had zero to do with Laughner's assassination/killing spree. Make no mistake, the "tone of the debate" will most certainly NOT change. Pushing this ridiculous idea opens the door to censorship arguments where music, movies, games, etc are concerned, and self censorship on the left to avoid appearing hypocritical. No good comes from this nonsense.

[HuckleB]

6. There is nothing "increasingly obvious" that violent rhetoric "had zero to do" with it.

That is a claim made in a vacuum.

[Imajika]

10. There is about as much chance violent political rhetoric...

...had something to do with Laughner's killing spree as there is violent video games, violent movies, or aggressive music. In fact, for all we know the only political rally he ever attended was Giffords - once in 2007 and a second time to kill her. And absolutely nothing can be divined by his question to her "what is government if words don't mean anything"?

And yes, as time passes and we learn more and more about Laughner and hear from his friends and associates, we find out he was seriously mentally deranged, very likely a paranoid schizophrenic, lived in his own fantasy world, did not link to or focus on political figures, etc, etc.

"That is a claim made in a vacuum."

No, this is a claim bolstered by the fact there is simply no evidence otherwise as of yet - and time is passing and more and more information is emerging. You want to say "the tone of our political debate" influenced him? Anyone can reply right back that it was the violence in movies, video games, music, etc, that desensitized him. There is zero evidence for any of that. It is very likely as bogus an argument as it would be to have claimed the "tone of our political debate" had something to do with Hinckley trying to kill Reagan.

[HuckleB]

11. No, it's not.

A Dem in AZ was shot, after facing ugly criticism for her votes on HCR, as well as her criticism of the AZ immigration bill. She had spoken out against Palin's ugly attacks. She had shared her fears. She had just been through a campaign against an opponent who used events such as this: "Get on Target for Victory in November. Help remove Gabrielle Giffords from office. Shoot a fully automatic M16 with Jesse Kelly."

See: http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/01/flashback-gi... for more.

Further, we were given information, and that information stands, even if you choose to ignore it.

Jared Lee Loughner: erratic, disturbed and prone to rightwing rants
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/jan/09/jared-lee-l...

Finally, knowing the MSM, we can also make a safe assumption that if he were on the left, they would have advertised that fact loud and clear.

Nothing is set in stone, but it makes no sense to pretend that there is no evidence to date.

[Imajika]

15. All of that is utterly irrelevent...

..if Laughner tried to assassinate Giffords for his own twisted reasons - and based on what we know of him so far that is very likely.

By the way, neither of your links work.

[HuckleB]

19. They both work fine.

Nice way to ignore information you don't want to see.

[Imajika]

21. Sorry, they don't open for me...

I think I've read the Guardian one previously though as it was from a few days ago.

Here is one from today for you:

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Politics/2011/0112/As-portrait-of-Jared-Loughner-sharpens-vitriol-blame-fades

As portrait of Jared Loughner sharpens, 'vitriol' blame fades

The suggestion that the shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords Saturday might have been influenced by political 'vitriol' seems less likely as more becomes known about suspect Jared Loughner.

The wave of national soul-searching about the level of political vitriol and how it might have played a part in Saturday's shootings in Tucson, Ariz., now appears to be ebbing....(more at link)

[SharonAnn]

29. Oh, for Heaven's sake. You're grasping at straws.

[KT2000]

8. Not at all

We need to think more clearly about all of these things. Garbage in - garbage out.
Consideration of consequences and taking responsiblity for those consequences is what grown-ups do. The censorship rests with individual decisions.
I do have to wonder who the violent rhetoric is directed to as well as the murderous video games. The answer is anyone who is willing to buy - and likely not the most sane among us.

As they say: Genetics loads the gun and environment pulls the trigger.

[Hannah Bell]

13. Saying that culture affects the nature of delusions doesn't set you on any slippery slope at all.

Nor is it nonsense.

[Imajika]

14. This "tone of the debate" meme is crap..

Period.

If you want to start arguing the "tone of the debate" thing then you open DU and forums like it up to being massively criticized for our "tone of the debate". Some of the very people arguing we must "dial back the rhetoric" in the media (your Matthews, Joey Scab's, etc of the world - basically, your "no labels" middle of the road gas bags) would ALSO consider referring to the Bush administration as the Bush Family Evil Empire, or suggesting the Bush administration LIHOP or MIHOP as a "tone of debate" that must ALSO be changed. While I consider some of the incendiary arguments right here on DU to sometimes be extreme and counterproductive, I do not in any way consider those arguments out of bounds for discussion. Nor, do I think aggressive speech on our side encourages ANYONE to go assassinate Republicans. The same applies to the other side, and especially in this case, I doubt one solitary thing Palin or any teabagger said caused Laughner to go on his killing rampage. Jared probably couldn't give a squirt of piss about the "tone of the debate", Palin's crosshairs target list, fatass Limabugh, etc. Paranoid schizophrenics, if that does indeed turn out to be Laughner's diagnosis, are deranged - and in addition to living in his own fantasy world he could have been influenced by ANYTHING. For all we know he watched the Matrix one too many times, or had some bizarre crush on Giffords, or played a lot of Counter Strike and loved shooting people. You go down this road, your basically just opening the door to censorship and not the kind you'd probably hope for.

This whole change the "tone of the debate" argument is pure drivel. The more I see it echo'd here and elsewhere, the more convinced I am no one means it anyway. What people are really saying is THEY should change the "tone of the debate" but not us - and trust me, that is NOT going to happen. They (the right wing) will change nothing, and we are setting ourselves up for self censorship by putting ourselves on record calling for changing the "tone of the debate". The right isn't going to change anything. The answer to the right wing is more firebrands on our side and less watching our language lest we offend anyone.

We are probably going to find out as seems increasingly evident, that Laughner was an untreated paranoid schizophrenic. Trying to link him to the right to score political points will NOT work and may even backfire.

Hannah, this whole change the "tone of the debate" thing can not lead anywhere good. It opens the door to censorship, self censorship when the right will never reciprocate, arguments that the movies, games and music should be restricted due to violence or sex or anything else those who'd like to censor society can dream up. And even worse for those who think we can score political points with this - it is my guess the public will not agree with this line of reasoning anyway.

[Hannah Bell]

16. I said, "Saying 'culture affects the nature of delusions' doesn't set you on any slippery slope"

It's just a plain truth. The content of delusions comes from the culture the delusionary person is planted in.

I don't know how your follow-up post has anything to do with what i said.

[Imajika]

17. So by saying culture has this effect in general...

...are you saying movies, music, games, etc are equally liable to cause someone to go on a killing spree - and therefore should be open to censorship?

Because I don't buy that. I HATE censorship and I think I see where this is going.

Sane people are responsible for their own actions. Insane people need mental health assistance.

[Hannah Bell]

22. can you read? or just "read into"? i didn't say "culture makes people crazy" though sometimes it

does.

i said, culture affects the nature of delusions.

you're pushing your own agenda.

[HuckleB]

23. No, it needs to be addressed.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=439&topic_id=176149

Choosing the easy out by ignoring it leads to no good end.

[LisaL]

25. And? Should we banned violent movies and video games while

we are at it?

[Hannah Bell]

26. another non-reader strewing straw.

where do *you* think the delusions of the delusional come from, alpha centauri?

schizophrenics in tribal societies don't imagine the cia is out to get them, or that "liberals" are destroying the nation.

[bettyellen]

28. no -because we have a right to demand resposible rational behaviour from politicians and news men

and not equate them with artists and video games or normal citizens for fucks sake. Because they can loan this lunacy legitimacy.
It os not, by any stretch "all the same".

[HuckleB]

5. K & R.

Some logic and sense, finally.

[kestrel91316]

9. Well, duh. The psychotic are not deaf. And the voices coming from

the tv and radio telling them to kill are, these days at least, NOT IMAGINARY.

[uppityperson]

12. Does he mean The Quitter's delusions of grandeur?

[Kurovski]

20. K&R. (nt)

[me b zola]

24. k&r

[HuckleB]

27. A Message To Sarah Palin from Media Matters CEO David Brock

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=385x543232