Dec 2023. Blues Vol 39 No. 12

GUEST COMENTARY
Dave Smith
Hearing Voices.
Oct. 25, 2023, a mentally ill
subject entered a bowling alley
in Lewiston, Maine, and opened
fire with a Ruger semi-automatic
.308 rifle; he then drove
to a nearby bar and opened
fire again. That is the sterile
description of the horror that
occurred that night.
First responders spent the
next two days searching the
area with a seriously high
pucker factor since the shooter
was a military trained firearms
instructor who had been institutionalized
the previous summer
after confessing at a training
exercise that he had heard
voices telling him to shoot up a
military facility. Then, in September,
a Sheriff’s Sergeant
was dispatched to contact the
obviously mentally ill fellow
because some were concerned
that “the reservist was going
to snap and commit a mass
shooting.”
Wow, just wow. What the
heck is going on? Eighteen
people murdered, 13 others
wounded, in a highly politicized
tragedy. “Gun Control!” was the
almost immediate and universal
cry, but the deeper, more
important issue is why have
we failed to deal with mental
illness in any effective way?
Drive down any major urban
street and you are not the least
surprised to see a homeless
person gesticulating and talking
in an obvious intense debate
with…nobody. At least nobody
that you and I can see.
Pick any newscast and a large
number of stories often involve
mental illness at some point.
Children suffering depression,
suicide, gender dysphoria, and
other problems were further
impacted by the efforts to control
the COVID virus by forcing
them into unnatural seclusion.
Educators, physicians, psychologists,
and counselors, seem to
pander instead of treat, encourage
instead of heal, and accept
no other opinions on how to
deal with these issues than their
own, which have been ineffective.
Mass shooters undergoing
“transitioning” are not to be analyzed,
much less their manifesto
read, as in the instance of the
Nashville shooting suspect. Law
enforcement is constantly told,
as is the general public, that the
mentally ill are no more dangerous
than the general population
and need to be protected, not
criticized, treated, or actually
helped.
There exists a national con job
of pseudo-therapy programs,
halfway houses, and other charities
pretending to help the people
in crisis, yet the only thing
getting better is the charities’
bank accounts. I sit regularly at
my county board of supervisors
meeting and go over the grants
and funds being expended on the
variety of groups pretending to
help the homeless (almost universally
mentally ill and chemically
dependent, illegal aliens,
and the poor) and the magnitude
is amazing. These programs are
requiring more and more public
funding with no feedback mechanism.
We are caught in the
futile cycle of, “spend a fortune -
things get worse - ask for more
of the public’s money.” And too
often the mantra is, “Take funds
from the police and give it to this
or that social service group.”
While defunding the police
is no longer a credible option,
too many politicians still “act”
on that principle and allocate
resources to the useless while
denying the necessary. The police
function is a basic principle
of governing and is also a way to
improve the lives of the common
folk as well as the mentally ill.
Too often, the only public servant
that actually interacts effectively
with the person suffering
a mental crisis is the police
officer. “Tough love” is not just
a saying, it is an ancient wisdom
that needs to be fully embraced.
Forcing someone into a controlled
environment is often the
only way to treat many mental
illnesses. Many former alcoholics
and drug-addicted folks describe
their arrest as the catalyst
that forced them into the therapy
that saved their lives. Yeppers,
those nasty police actually
26 The Blues 40th Anniversary Issue