CNN Blatantly Disregards of Mental Health in Analyzing Mass Shootings

Sunday night’s CNN Newsroom with Pamela Brown welcomed Vanderbilt University’s Dr. Jonathon Metzl, to validate CNN’s push for gun control and dismiss other claims of mental health contributing to mass shootings. Metzl easily blew down their statesman; “there is no mental illness like depression or schizophrenia or anxiety whose symptoms are harming someone else let alone shooting someone else.”

In recent cases, Dr. Metzl stated that before looking at the mental illness and outside factors that could have caused these men to act, “you would go through so many factors before that, you know, access to firearms, a past history of violence, substance abuse, guns in the network, aggravated nature, all these factors.”

Each of these guns was legally acquired; however, three of the five above factors may be related to mental health problems.

Brown even said herself, when talking about Uvalde and Buffalo that “these gunmen are clearly, um, deranged,” suggesting to the doctor that if they “had gotten the mental health treated that they needed perhaps they wouldn’t have gone on this shooting rampage.”

Metzl stated, “I wish that was the case.”                                                                                                                               

What took place in Tulsa The shooter committed a crime against the doctor. Due to that external factor and the pain it caused, the shooter decided that he had to cause pain for the doctor as well as the staff.

What was the crime in Uvalde A crime against innocent children. Growing up as a bully, he clearly had mental issues and external factors that made him feel the need to hate others.

What was the incident in Buffalo? Hate crime committed against grocery shoppers on a daily basis. A person who had clearly suffered from mental disorders that motivated him to harm others.

Is it then all down to the guns? The United States’ legislation, law enforcement and leadership can do little to prevent the shootings other than to ban weapons used in the attack. Metzl suggested that what we really need to be doing as a society is what President Biden suggested, “Thinking really hard about what kind of restrictions we want to put on guns.”

Is it not possible for those on the other side to offer assistance to people in crisis? Or identify those ostracized from society and have access to guns before it’s too late?

CNN chose instead of nuance to engage in, to withdraw to its corner.

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For the entire transcript click on “expand”. 

CNN Newsroom: Pamela Brown

06/05/2022

8:15:22 p.m.

PAMELA BROWN: One of the first questions after a mass shooting is, “does the suspect have a history of mental illness?” But, that question could be doing more harm than good. I am joined by Dr. Jonathan Metzl. At Vanderbilt University, he is the Director of Medicine, Health, and Society.

Thank you Professor for joining us and having such an important discussion. We all know that mental health is often blamed after shootings. Is that true?

DR. JONATHON METZL VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY (English): Let me first state that I get why people turn to mental illness stories after these events. It just makes emotional sense that we might think, you know, we live in this civilized world and nobody who plays by the rules of our society would do something like this and so we turn to this mental illness story to sort of make sense for us just of how – you know, just the carnage that’s unimaginable and the other thing is that many people who commit these shootings, particularly the high-profile one do have psychological histories and I really think it’s important to stop the line right there because even if that’s the case there is nothing causal about mental illness that causes somebody to commit a mass shooting, so there’s no mental illness like depression or schizophrenia or anxiety whose symptoms are harming someone else let alone shooting someone else.

You don’t have a diagnosis. So, when I look at mass killings– and I do study them– you will see that you need to consider many things before you can determine the 100 most critical factors. These include access to firearms, past violence, substance abuse and guns within the network. So, in a way what we do when we say it’s mental illness is we really cherry pick this out of one of many factors, and I think it’s important to note, of course, it’s important to think about this as an issue, but really the idea that we can —  you know, psychiatrists like me can pick in advance who is going to commit a shooting is  just factually wrong given what mental illness is and also the tools of our trade which are our diagnosis [sic].

BROWN : Then what?- What would you say. You seem to have hit the nail on the head with this. But I would like to delve a bit more into it, about you people who think Uvalde should be looked at Buffalo. These gunmen are clearly, um, deranged. They could have gotten mental treatment and not gone on the shooting spree killing innocent civilians.

METZL: I wish – I wish that was the case, I wish there was some kind of predictive test that we could do. These are the most important things to consider. I believe it is important that we all work together in order to make a difference. Mental health, however, is an essential part of society.

Um, I think the two important points are, number one, for every one person who meets the profile of kind of angry, aggrieved often young man, there will be millions of people who meet that same profile who, who don’t – who don’t go on to commit mass shootings, and so part of the story here is that there’s nothing predictive about a mental illness diagnosis that lets a psychiatrist like me pick out the one person from the millions of other people, and so in a way it’s not really effective. Another important fact is the 45,000 deaths from gun violence each year. Mass shootings are horrific, they’re terrorizing, and they obviously get a lot of news. But, most gun death is homicides, suicide, partner violence, accidental shootings and even the mass shootings you were talking about on the show before I came on, were very different kinds of mass shootings in terms of how they’re born and so, what we do is we select these very few shootings, maybe 300, 400 deaths a year.

Each life lost is tragic, but we aren’t saying: “What would stop gun violence every day?” Is there a way to stop the daily death? These answers are not about the ability to predict. The question is not so much about which prevention strategies we can put into place to look at gun deaths and subvert them.

BROWN Many of the mass shooters are young men just entering adulthood. This is biologically what makes them more susceptible to violence. I’m not trying to portray all young men in a generalized way, but if you look at the recent majors, Uvalde or Buffalo, it becomes clear that 18-year old man. You are left to decide what you think.

METZL – I believe there is a larger story to be told about guns and age that society needs to consider. Your views are completely mine. 21-18. We do not want to be too intrusive with anyone.

BROWN: Right.

METZL: But I would say that there’s a lot of research coming out now that looks at how – I mean- there are some studies now that show that 40% of gun death in this country and shootings happen — you know, the shooters are between 25 and 17 usually, even though that demographic is only 17% of the population and so beyond just the mass shootings, younger people happen to be shooting – shooting a lot – alright- in a way and I guess I think about that which is on the one hand, again, you don’t want to make people who are just coming into adulthood suspect and say ‘we’re going to watch out for you,’ but we regulate age all the time in our society. Is there a limit on the age you can drink or drive, and what is the maximum age you can get insurance? Insurance can put you at greater risk because of your age. You’re less likely to be in an accident, or to drive too fast, or to get in trouble. So we should think carefully about the age and risk associated with insurance. I believe this is a good time to ask ourselves: Are we truly allowing people that are that young to carry firearms without restrictions?

Yes, that’s right — I reside in Tennessee. Tennessee just reduced the age of purchasing an AR-15 to 18, at which any person can walk around and carry it without training. Therefore, I believe we should do exactly what President Biden stated, which is think hard about the restrictions we wish to put on guns and especially people in this age range, as they face a higher chance of not only getting shot but also shooting other people.

BROWN It was a very interesting conversation, Dr. Jonathan Metzl.  We should all hear what you have to say about the research, and the results.