Some thoughts on our unwillingness to force treatment or confinement on the dangerously mentally ill. Of course, it’s a fine balance of civil liberties:
No one who knew him seems surprised by what he did. On the contrary, dorm chatter characterized him explicitly as a future school-shooter. One of his professors, the poet Nikki Giovanni, saw him as a disruptive bully and kicked him out of her class. Other teachers viewed him as disturbed and referred him for the ubiquitous “counseling”–an outcome that is ambiguous to the point of meaninglessness and akin to “treatment” for a patient with metastasized cancer.
But even that minimal care wasn’t given. The shooter didn’t want it and no one tried to force him to get it. While it’s been reported that he was involuntarily committed to a “Behavioral Health Center” in December 2005, those reports also say he was released the very next morning. Even if the will to segregate an obvious menace had been in place, the legal mechanisms to provide even temporary “warehousing” were absent. The rest is terrible history.
That is not to say that anyone who pens violence-laden poetry or lets slip the occasional hostile remark should be protectively incarcerated. But when the level of threat rises to college freshmen and faculty prophesying accurately, perhaps we should err on the side of public safety rather than protect individual liberty at all costs.
If the Virginia Tech shooter had been locked up for careful observation in a humane mental hospital, the worst-case scenario would’ve been a minor league civil liberties goof: an unpleasant semester break for an odd and hostile young misanthrope who might’ve even have learned to be more polite. Yes, it’s possible confinement would’ve been futile or even stoked his rage. But a third outcome is also possible: Simply getting a patient through a crisis point can prevent disaster, as happens with suicidal people restrained from self-destruction who lose their enthusiasm for repeat performances.
Most familiar with the history of the second world war are aware of the failed attempt to assassinate Hitler in 1944. But this is the first time I heard of one a year earlier. If the story is true, it’s ironic that the Fuehrer was saved by a British bombing raid.
We went for a walk on the beach in Spanish River Park yesterday afternoon. I saw several of these washed up on shore.
You can’t really get that much scale from the sand and seaweed, but the body was about the size of my hand. I’ve heard they can get larger, but I’ve never seen any much bigger than this one around here.
It makes one a little nervous, walking barelegged through the surf, because the surging waters could deliver one unto your legs and wrap the tentacles around them without your even being able to see it coming. Fortunately, there were no incidents. This one was still alive, but probably not for long. And I wasn’t going to try to pick it up and toss it back. Particularly given the almost certain futility of it.
We went for a walk on the beach in Spanish River Park yesterday afternoon. I saw several of these washed up on shore.
You can’t really get that much scale from the sand and seaweed, but the body was about the size of my hand. I’ve heard they can get larger, but I’ve never seen any much bigger than this one around here.
It makes one a little nervous, walking barelegged through the surf, because the surging waters could deliver one unto your legs and wrap the tentacles around them without your even being able to see it coming. Fortunately, there were no incidents. This one was still alive, but probably not for long. And I wasn’t going to try to pick it up and toss it back. Particularly given the almost certain futility of it.
We went for a walk on the beach in Spanish River Park yesterday afternoon. I saw several of these washed up on shore.
You can’t really get that much scale from the sand and seaweed, but the body was about the size of my hand. I’ve heard they can get larger, but I’ve never seen any much bigger than this one around here.
It makes one a little nervous, walking barelegged through the surf, because the surging waters could deliver one unto your legs and wrap the tentacles around them without your even being able to see it coming. Fortunately, there were no incidents. This one was still alive, but probably not for long. And I wasn’t going to try to pick it up and toss it back. Particularly given the almost certain futility of it.
The attack occurred as the train from the Bay Area neared the I Street Bridge to Sacramento’s rail station and slowed for a signal, said Eugene Skoropowski, managing director of the Capitol Corridor, said. A group of people stood on the tracks to block the train, which stopped. When the engineer went downstairs and opened the door, he was dragged off the train and assaulted, Skoropowski said.
It wouldn’t hurt to let the engineers have firearms, either, if they’re trained.
The attack occurred as the train from the Bay Area neared the I Street Bridge to Sacramento’s rail station and slowed for a signal, said Eugene Skoropowski, managing director of the Capitol Corridor, said. A group of people stood on the tracks to block the train, which stopped. When the engineer went downstairs and opened the door, he was dragged off the train and assaulted, Skoropowski said.
It wouldn’t hurt to let the engineers have firearms, either, if they’re trained.
The attack occurred as the train from the Bay Area neared the I Street Bridge to Sacramento’s rail station and slowed for a signal, said Eugene Skoropowski, managing director of the Capitol Corridor, said. A group of people stood on the tracks to block the train, which stopped. When the engineer went downstairs and opened the door, he was dragged off the train and assaulted, Skoropowski said.
It wouldn’t hurt to let the engineers have firearms, either, if they’re trained.
