Maine State Police said Connor MacCalister confessed to stabbing Wendy Boudreau, 59, of Saco, shortly after her arrest, and said she had planned to start her attacks with a "small elderly female whom she knew wouldn't resist."

She later told police she was "angry with life and she wanted to get back at someone."


http://news.yahoo.com/maine-woman-grocery-store-slaying-angry-life-police-142249758.html






its hard to tell , in this age of media it sometimes makes it seem like there is more of something when in truth there are just more people reporting on that thing but that thing has always been around just as much, or maybe more

point being,, is mental illness becoming more common? if so whats to be done about it? whats changed to trigger such an increase? Do we need to be including anger management/problem coping type instruction in our schools along with 'home economics' and 'physical education'?

it SEEMS like people are much quicker to fly off the handle and harm or threaten others,,,,,,and kids are choosing suicide when facing the obstacles of childhood,,,


do you consider it an issue at all and if so what types of solutions might we try?(we, meaning as a community)

Try to prepare your kids for the road. Don't try to prepare the road for your kids.

Is mental illness more common? I dunno. I try to ignore the voices in my head, but sometimes they have extremely interesting **** to say....

In my opinion, yes. We coddle, and shelter, we protect and censor. We invent games without competition, so "everyone's a winner". Kids are growing up in a world where an appropriate response to being offended is to ban or censor the offending object. We cater to childrens' wants, not needs. As my grandmother would say; "The road to hell was paved with good intentions". It seems by protecting children from feelings of disappointment, offense, and discouragement, they are not developing coping skills to deal with life.

In other words, Lookin4home said it best in the previous post...

Here is the truth....

Facts About Mental Illness and Violence

Fact 1: The vast majority of people with mental illness are not violent.

Here is what researchers say about the link between mental illness and violence:

- "Although studies suggest a link between mental illnesses and violence, the contribution of people with mental illnesses to overall rates of violence is small, and further, the magnitude of the relationship is greatly exaggerated in the minds of the general population (Institute of Medicine, 2006)."

- "�the vast majority of people who are violent do not suffer from mental illnesses (American Psychiatric Association, 1994)."

- "The absolute risk of violence among the mentally ill as a group is very small. . . only a small proportion of the violence in our society can be attributed to persons who are mentally ill (Mulvey, 1994)."

-"People with psychiatric disabilities are far more likely to be victims than perpetrators of violent crime (Appleby, et al., 2001). People with severe mental illnesses, schizophrenia, bipolar disorder or psychosis, are 2 ½ times more likely to be attacked, raped or mugged than the general population (Hiday, et al.,1999)."

Fact 2: The public is misinformed about the link between mental illness and violence.

A longitudinal study of American's attitudes on mental health between 1950 and 1996 found, 'the proportion of Americans who describe mental illness in terms consistent with violent or dangerous behavior nearly doubled.' Also, the vast majority of Americans believe that persons with mental illnesses pose a threat for violence towards others and themselves (Pescosolido, et al., 1996, Pescosolido et al., 1999).

Fact 3: Inaccurate beliefs about mental illness and violence lead to widespread stigma and discrimination:

The discrimination and stigma associated with mental illnesses stem in part, from the link between mental illness and violence in the minds of the general public (DHHS, 1999, Corrigan, et al., 2002).

The effects of stigma and discrimination are profound. The President’s New Freedom Commission on Mental Health found that, 'Stigma leads others to avoid living, socializing, or working with, renting to, or employing people with mental disorders - especially severe disorders, such as schizophrenia. It leads to low self-esteem, isolation, and hopelessness. It deters the public from seeking and wanting to pay for care. Responding to stigma, people with mental health problems internalize public attitudes and become so embarrassed or ashamed that they often conceal symptoms and fail to seek treatment (New Freedom Commission, 2003).'

Fact 4: The link between mental illness and violence is promoted by the entertainment and news media.

"Characters in prime time television portrayed as having a mental illness are depicted as the most dangerous of all demographic groups: 60 percent were shown to be involved in crime or violence" (Mental Health American, 1999).

"Most news accounts portray people with mental illness as dangerous" (Wahl, 1995).

"The vast majority of news stories on mental illness either focus on other negative characteristics related to people with the disorder (e.g., unpredictability and unsociability) or on medical treatments. Notably absent are positive stories that highlight recovery of many persons with even the most serious of mental illnesses" (Wahl, et al., 2002).

Citations
American Psychiatric Association. (1994). Fact Sheet: Violence and Mental Illness. Washington, DC: American Psychiatric Association.

Appleby, L., Mortensen, P. B., Dunn, G., & Hiroeh, U. (2001). Death by homicide, suicide, and other unnatural causes in people with mental illness: a population-based study. The Lancet, 358, 2110-2112.

Corrigan, P.W., Rowan, D., Green, A., et al. (2002) .Challenging two mental illness stigmas: Personal responsibility and dangerousness. Schizophrenia Bulletin, 28, 293-309.

DHHS. Mental Health: A Report of the Surgeon General. Rockville, MD: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Substance Abuse and Mental health Services Administration, Center for Mental Health Services, National Institutes of Health, National Institute of Mental Health, 1999. http://www.surgeongeneral.gov/library/mentalhealth/toc.html

Hiday, V. A. (2006). Putting Community Risk in Perspective: a Look at Correlations, Causes and Controls. International Journal of Law and Psychiatry, 29, 316-331.
Institute of Medicine, Improving the Quality of Health Care for Mental and Substance-Use Conditions. Washington, DC: Institute of Medicine, 2006.

Mental Health America. American Opinions on Mental Health Issues. Alexandria: NMHA, 1999.

Mulvey, E. P. (1994). Assessing the evidence of a link between mental illness and violence. Hospital and Community Psychiatry, 45, 663-668.

Pescosolido, B.A., Martin, J.K., Link, B.G., et al. Americans’ Views of Mental Health and Illness at Century’s End: Continuity and Change. Public Report on the MacArthur Mental health Module, 1996General Social Survey. Bloomington: Indiana Consortium for Mental Health Services Research and
Joseph P. Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia University, 2000. Available: http://www.
indiana.edu/~icmhsr/amerview1.pdf

Pescosolido, B.A., Monahan, J. Link, B.G. Stueve, A., & Kikuzawa, S. (1999). The public’s view of the competence, dangerousness, and need for legal coercion of persons with mental health problems. American Journal of Public Health, 89, 1339-1345.

New Freedom Commission on Mental Health, Achieving the Promise: Transforming Mental Health Care in America. Final Report. DHHS Pub. No. SMA-03-3832. Rockville, MD: 2003.

Wahl, O. (1995). Media Madness: Public Images of Mental Illness. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.

Wahl, O.F., et al. (2002). Newspaper coverage of mental illness: is it changing? Psychiatric Rehabilitation Skills, 6, 9-31.

What our children watch on television and view in the media needs to censored by the parent. It is not real life.
I personally think in a society where almost everything is becoming permissable....you reap the consequences.

No. Passive living that is inordinately outraged by violence is, though.


Can't do anything about it.
The way child laws are set up, it's best to have no interaction with another persons kids whatsoever unless you're licensed to by the government.


A greater polarization culturally.
Used to have you, your family, neighbors, community sheltering and training and disciplining and teaching kids directly to conform to local, consistent, culture.

Now it's just you, as a magic special individual who should be free to express yourself, the state wanting federal money and the federal government only giving states money if they conform to what the federal government wants, and the global village.


I think schools are 90% of the problem.
Personally, I would do away with the entire DOE and compulsory education.


I consider it just another symptom of the greater problem of centralization by people that live in distant ivory towers.


Good luck with trying anything that doesn't offer additional powers and moneys to government.

Welcome to my world

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kBfxl_T6ldg

lol,, hmmmm

ya know, there is a path that can be rather wrong ( in a sane person) between whats in our head and what our actions are

somehow that path is dangerously short for some people though,, just curious as to why that might be an increasing trend,, (if , in fact, it is)

I think having gay boy scout leaders will help a lot.

There have not been reliable and stable statistics maintained about mentally ill people committing crimes, so trying to decide if there is a greater percentage of mentally ill people or not isn't definitely possible.

I know a couple of cautionary things to point out.

One, is that the clinical definition of mentally ill is changing all the time. Also, the LEGAL definition of mentally ill is changing as well, and it's only marginally related to the clinical definition.

The other, is that the people who report this stuff to us, are prone to following fads. So one month, while the hot fad is race-on-race crime, THAT will get reported prominently, even if race itself played no role in the actual crime. The next month, wannabe terrorists may be the hot topic, and every time some college kid expresses solidarity with the plight of some middle eastern subgroup, it will make the front page. Then obviously wildly incoherently insane crime will be a fad. And the crimes which were ignored the previous two months, will be headlined every day.

To top that all off, it's very probably true on some level, that ALL crime is a sign of mental illness. Everything except entirely accidental crime, at least.

Simple answer: I don't know if it's increasing or not, but I actually kind of hope that people think that it is. Because if they do, we might be able to finally begin to get our society to commit enough resources to dealing with mental health, that we can actually make more lasting headway against ALL crime.

My thoughts exactly... Also do we hear more about it now. Of course we do because it is politically correct to put a label on everything.. Mentally Ill is a huge vague label.

my understanding is its an illness if it causes a problem for you

so, if everyone just embraced themselves as they are,, there would be no more 'mental illness',, technically speaking

lol

but yeah, I understand what you are saying, I dont put alot of stake in the psychiatric community myself,,,

I wouldn't go so far as to call the talking points 'fads' I think the speed and diversity of media outlets available and what we chose to pay attention to or can't ignore would be a more accurate description--for most. That being said I can understand why you worded it that way.
This topic played a major role in the murder of Harris County Sheriff Deputy Darren Goforth. Sheriff Ron Hickman initially attributed the heinous act to the Black Lives Matter movement and surrounding rhetoric.

In October 2012 Shannon Miles got into an altercation with another homeless man at a shelter in Austin Texas which resulted in him being charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. Before Miles court date he was found "mentally incompetent to stand trial" by a psychiatrist the judge agreed and Miles was sent to a state mental hospital for 6 months. Miles had a few other misdemeanor charges that were penalized with time served but nothing major. (CNN Ed Lavendera)

Sheriff Ron Hickman when questioned by Anderson Cooper
"Is there any new evidence pointing to his alleged motive?"

"We continue to research that issue, certainly we are interested in any connection the two of them ever had.
Thus far we have not found a connection. "

"At this point, do you still believe Deputy Goforth was targeted solely targeted because of his uniform?"

"At this juncture we find no other motivation other than the fact that he eas wearing a uniform which makes it purely a random kind of issue."

"Over the weekend we heard you say black lives matter, white lives matter, well cops lives matter too. At any point when the rhetoric ramps up to the calculated cold blooded assassinations of police officers happen, that rhetoric has gotten out of control. To be clear, do you believe that the black lives matter movement is somehow responsible for Deputy Goforths death?"

"One can speculate that the rhetoric in our area, of course we're only a short distance down the road from Waller county where the Bland case has elevated the tension to those issues to a very high level. So it isn't a far stretch to believe that that kind of rhetoric could influence someone."

"But you have no direct evidence at this point of what was in this alleged killers mind?"
"No. Certainly not."
"There has been some criticism of your statement. Texas State Representative Garnett Coleman said that he thinks your statement is politicizing his death and it says it quote,"shows a lack of understanding what's occurring in this country when it comes to the singling out of African-Americans." I want you to be able to respond to that. Do you think there is any validity to the concerns of the black lives matter movement?"

"Well, I think he may misunderstand my purpose there. There will be people who want to make this a political issue. That's not my interest. I have visited with the wife of the slain Deputy and she very clearly indicated that she wants to communicate that we're on target. All lives do matter. If we have any connection whatsoever with the public we want to convey that message."

"An organizer of with a group called The Organization for the Black Struggle also criticized your statement saying "the Black lives matter movement has never condoned any violence against police officers and if you can't understand why people are saying black lives matter than that's the problem." I want you to be able to respond to that. "

"There will be people that pervert this, twist it for their own purposes and to pursue their own agendas. Clearly, my agenda is to make sure that we tone down the temperament of all rhetoric when it gets so inflammatory."

"So to those who say they will continue to protest in the Black lives matter movement, what do you say? Is your concern just bringing down some of the rhetoric, is it the movement in general?"

"I don't think the movement in general is what we're talking about. I think what we're talking about is the extremes. When you start talking about taking people's lives, and taking pictures (Roanoke) you know, killing cops on radio talkshows (this) kind of rhetoric can get out of hand."

"The President of the Fraternal Order of Police said that he thinks this should be labeled a hate crime. Do you think that's the case?"

"I think if we can demonstrate that he was isolated and selected because he's wearing a uniform I think that would qualify."

Transcript of entire interview lest I be blamed for taking it out of context. Subpoenas are in order for mental health records of Miles from the state hospital and any others. A six month State hospitalization on court order for awdw being his hand(s) would undeniably be a sign of mental illness. While Deputy Goforth was one of the good guys, Travis County court has proven that mental illness is without doubt a factor in his tragic death. May he rest in peace.

Holistic medicine psychology and psychiatry are different but share the fact that they are not widely accepted by insurance companies and the majority of hospitals. As anyone who has had any kind of medical problems not able to be addressed by their primary doctor knows it's difficult to get specialty care of any kind without having to pay an arm and a leg for it. Dental and optical are even seen as separate by many insurance companies, even basic dental and optical care gets extremely expensive if you can't afford add on or separate policies. What is sad is that even though these companies and hospitals know how important these things are for everyone, as far as the world has come in all these practices, and as cheap as mass production and assembly lines even robotic factories they still deny most of their payers needed care and stick us all with higher premiums and co-pays for the few that do get it. We can do better.

The Minneapolis march has come under criticism by police for a 30-second chant "pigs in a blanket, fry 'em like bacon" uttered by some protesters during Saturday's four-hour march. Rashad Turner, the lead organizer of the Black Lives Matter protest, said the chant was meant to call for similar treatment between black people and police officers.

"We're not going to get caught up in one chant out of four hours and apologize for that," he said.

http://news.yahoo.com/black-lives-matter-movement-experiencing-growing-pains-071308603--politics.html;_ylt=A0LEVjoY3eVVJh4AGvMnnIlQ;_ylu=X3oDMTByMjB0aG5zBGNvbG8DYmYxBHBvcwMxBHZ0aWQDBHNlYwNzYw--

Mental issues can be sumed up by the very many commercials promoting various anti-depression, anti-anxiaty medications.

One commercial, I think was cymbalta said, " you may experience suicidal thoughts, if you do, stop taking cymbalta and consult your doctor."

Modern medicine is obviously helpful, however, what exactly is in this stuff, who's making them, and who's getting rich from them?

I think, society today is over medicated to the extent that they need new medications to combat the adverse effect of alot of the medications used today.

Yes invictus this did happen. If you look at the video of that one protest during that specific chant you will also see that those marching in front of the banner some holding the banner and some behind the banner are white. Marching hand in hand chanting alongside the black protesters.

The Sheriff in the incident in Texas had a fair chance on national tv to respond to criticism to specific questions from specific named critics. His responses are listed above. The particular response that he conveyed to anyone watching or reading is,

"Clearly, my agenda is to make sure that we tone down the temperament of all rhetoric when it gets so inflammatory."

Water is not regulated by the FDA. There's something in the water, lithium, an anti-psychotic. How much? We don't know because the FDA doesn't require water bottlers to list ingredients. Jesse Ventura covered that on his show.

I'll sign the petition to bring back involuntary electro conclusive therapy for the mentally ill.