Every fucking time there's a shooting in this country we talk about mental illness like mentally ill people are dangerous wild animals who, when given a gun, will just fly off the hook and murder people. On both sides. The gun nuts use mental illness as an excuse not to regulate firearms and the anti-gun-violence side point out that the mentally ill in other countries don't commit mass murder because they don't have guns, but both sides use mental illness as a trigger for the violence.
Mentally ill people are way more likely to be the victims of violence than the perpetrators of it. To say nothing of the fact that if you give a mentally ill person a gun they're far more likely to use it to harm themselves than anyone else. But no, we keep perpetuating the stereotype that the mentally ill are inherently violent and that we need to keep guns away from them. Both sides do this.
Mentally ill people don't commit mass murder with any greater frequency than anyone else. Guns are the issue. Don't throw the mentally ill under the bus. We've got enough problems without being blamed for gun violence too.
#MentalIllness #ActuallyMentallyIll