From Alicia Curtis –

Husbands ridding themselves of wives via the psychiatric institution was still enough of a problem in the 1930s that the first woman in Maine’s legislature, Gail Laughlin, authorized a bill penalizing husbands for bringing false testimony in the involuntary commitment hearings of their wives. I worked with a patient who in the 1960s had been brought to the hospital by her husband. The chief complaint listed on the admitting record was: “Patient does not do her housework.” I think she did actually have a recurrent depression, a symptom of which was her inability to care for herself and her home, but there was obviously a large overlap conceptually between mental illness and not functioning in a proscribed social role. There is also a large history of the forced treatment of homosexuality as mental “illness.” One gay man I know has a familiar story. He was brought, as a teenager, to a psychiatric hospital in the Midwest by his parents, when they found out he had been having gay sex. He was involuntarily committed to the institution and treated for his homosexuality. (The treatment didn’t work).

There is some talk in Congress about returning the warm, wonderful days of involuntary committment. Our national experience with this practice was less than edifying. Thousands of people were thrown into facilities often for the crime of “being different.”

We are being called upon once again to repeat the mistakes of the past.

From The New Republic, William Galston –

Warning label: This article will make civil libertarians unhappy. Read at your own risk.

We are embroiled, alas, in a politicized argument about the slaughter in Tucson. While most of the charges being flung about rest on a scanty basis (at best), the most important and least contestable facts are getting lost: Jared Lee Loughner was mentally ill when he pulled the trigger, there were multiple signs of his descent into delusion over the past year, and no one did very much about it.

To be sure, the authorities at Pima Community College finally suspended him after five contacts with the police and conditioned his return on clearance from a mental health professional. Police delivered the letter of suspension to Loughner’s home and talked with him and his parents. We do not know what happened next. Perhaps his parents tried to persuade him to seek help and were rebuffed; perhaps they were reluctant to have further involvement with the authorities; perhaps they were too confused or conflicted even to try. In any event, there’s no evidence that he did receive treatment, and according to college officials, he did not attempt to return to school.

What do you say to this kind of argument? Let’s lock them all up! It would have prevented the Arizona massacre!

No, it wouldn’t have. The argument is based on fantasy. Let’s go through the elements.

First I have to admire the opening, “This will make civil libertarians unhappy.” The author has now established that he is bold and tough willing to say the unpopular but necessary truth. The actual meaning of the opening line runs more like this, “I’m going to put it to those left wingers this time.” It’s not bold to argue for tough measures after a national tragedy. It’s a particular good time for the silly, fringe ideas to gain traction.

First paragraph, he argues that you all are engaged in a political argument while I deal in facts. Political assassinations shouldn’t be discussed politically? The assassin put his manifesto of currency not based on gold and government mind control on the web. He shot those people to forward a political agenda. All I have to do to accept this gentleman’s “facts” is to disregard the evidence.

 “No one did very much about it.” Great line. Except the next paragraph eviscerate his own argument. Suspended from college, five contacts with the police, the police personally delivered the notice of suspension to the parents and discussed it with him and his parents, the authorities acted in measured response to the situation. The authorities acted reasonably and intelligently.

Yes, he made people uncomfortable. Show me one shred of evidence of any viable warning that he was dangerous to anyone, anywhere, at anytime. Unless something shows up new, I haven’t seen it.

The circumstances of the case would not have merited involuntary committment without more evidence. The very cure being offered would not have prevented the tragedy.

You could argue back that, “If we loosen the restrictions on involuntary commitment, we would probably have got him.”

Okay, you are going to involuntary commit people for being disruptive in a social environment (college) and acting oddly. Doesn’t that cover a high proportion of the homeless? Doesn’t that cover countless eccentrics you have spent time with in high school or college? How about you personally? Have you every acted oddly in the wake of a financial disaster, the death of a loved one, the end of a marriage? Don’t many people?

Once we remove the standard of dangerous to others or to himself, it gets pretty fluid. Who do you put in?

I challenge you. Phrase the requirement for involuntary committment so that it gets this assassin and doesn’t net several million people. Go for it.

Not possible.

Now, let’s try my facts. The tragedy in Arizona was a calculated murder. You will hear in the next few months, “Oh, he’ll probably got off on the insanity defense.” Not a chance. He carefully planned the murders over a lengthy period of time. He has clearly indicated by his actions that he knew his actions would be considered wrong.

The attempted assassination of President Reagan was by a delusional gunman. His idea of making Jodie Foster love him by killing the President made it arguable that he was incapable of fully apprehending the nature of his actions.

The Arizona gunman killed for political motivations. He told the world in detail.

He may be crazy by the standards of daily conversation. It won’t keep him from the death penalty.

Returning to the bad old days of grabbing people and throwing them in asylums because they disturb others is not a solution to what happened. It is highly unlikely that had such a policy been in effect, it would have applied to the gunman.

Frankly, I am tired of the “lock em up” mentality.

We skip any shred of intelligent argument and go straight to chest beating toughness. “We’re gonna put the hammer down!” Have you ever noticed that the people making these arguments tend to be political honchos who have never done police work or social work? Have you ever noticed that all their chest beating masculinity is done from a very safe distance?

No one ever talks about the millions of people being called upon to “fix” this problem. 

So, we are going to call upon educators and administrators to be responsible not just for the education of their students but police them for mental defects?

So, we are calling on the police to go out and grab people whose only crime is acting oddly as if the police had no better use of their time?

So, we are calling for the establishment of a giant network of mental institutions with a capacity for several million “patients?”

Do you have any money for that?

This is all just nonsense.

James Pilant