How to Really Avoid these Things: A Rant

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I woke up yesterday morning, like many of you, to the horrific news of the worst mass shooting in the history of the United States. I was shocked. There still wasn’t a lot of information available 24 hours ago—the suspect wasn’t even named at that time—and as the boys woke up I quickly turned off the TV so that they wouldn’t see what was currently going on in the world.

The last thing I want is for my children to be afraid of going to the movies. The last thing I want is to be afraid of going to the movies.

By yesterday evening, with the approach of the national news I knew there would be no avoiding it. I broached the subject with both of my sons, and Ant opted out of watching any further news coverage—which was something that made me feel much better, too. Kyle and I sat down to watch the reports—both of us looking for some sense of understanding.

That’s normal, you know. When we all are met with a circumstance we just cannot understand, we search for some semblance of meaning. Why did it happen? How can it be avoided? How can I make sure that my children or my loved ones, or even me—how can we make sure that we’re never affected by something like this? We all search for these answers. Sadly, those who live through these tragic encounters cannot articulate how to live through something like this. Usually you hear these witnesses or victims say things along the lines of “There are no words,” or “I cannot really describe it,” or “I don’t know what really happened”. The experts oftentimes cannot tell us—especially in a 90 second news story—why it happened. It’s always more complex than that—which frustrates us, because we MUST understand.

We must feel safer, we must feel as if we are in control, we absolutely must avoid this occurring to ourselves or the ones we care for; so when the true answers are not readily available or easily packaged, we start jumping to little things that really wouldn’t make a damn difference, but in the immediacy, make us feel better.

Case in point: posting off duty police officers at movie theaters. That won’t work. If someone is really dedicated to creating mass terror or harming many individuals, one or two more will not matter to them. It is no deterrent. Making people avoid costumes or masks—it may help people feel better in the short term, but that’s not a solution, either.

Or talking about gun control laws. We have gun control laws. We also have bans on most assault rifles. The suspect was a law abiding citizen with no known previous history  of mental illness. He bought the guns legally. Even if our nation just outright banned guns (and many of you may be surprised that I am a NRA supporting uber-liberal—we’re a rare breed), he may have selected another way to carry out a mass killing. The evidence of this lies in the suspect’s apartment right now—rigged with IEDS and booby traps and who knows what else.

In other words, people usually will find a way, no matter the laws, bans, regulations, or anything else.

People have started blaming Obama (and Romney, to be fair) for not doing something more about gun control. To which I ask, how much more can we actually do? Are we going refuse guns to people who MIGHT become criminals? Or people who MIGHT unhinge and become mentally unstable? Who’s going to be judging this for us? Who can see the future? More gun controls aren’t really going to stop people who want to shoot other people from buying guns.

But—and this is where I get really ranty—the absolute worst thing I’ve seen in the news coverage of this terrible event is those who are chastising and blaming the parents who took their children to a midnight showing of a PG-13 movie with a SUPERHERO IN IT.

Let me rant on about this a bit more. When K was younger than two, I took him to the midnight premiere of the X-Files movie. I loved the X-Files. I wanted to see the movie. I dressed him in his jammies, and he slept on my chest the entire time. My husband and I also used to go to the drive in—letting K sleep in the back seat while we watched adult movies. Parents of young children do this all the time. Also—I took my children to see the midnight premiere of Harry Potter. They loved Harry Potter. They loved the excitement—even though Ant was still a bit too young to really understand it. It was exciting and special and one of my favorite family memories.

So why the hell are we chastising a couple who took their children—with a four year old daughter who loves Batman so much they have pictures of her wearing Batman costumes—to see a movie they were excited to see from a franchise they loved? Why are we not commending a woman who saved both of her young children herself—separated from her boyfriend in the melee—and took a bullet to the leg as she made sure her children made it out of the theater alive? No one believes that they run the risk of being shot at in a movie theater. This woman is a damn hero.

So, if we shouldn’t fixate on these little things—these things that aren’t really going to help us understand, the things that aren’t- really going to help us avoid these tragedies in the future—what should we focus our attention on? I’ll give you my opinion: Mental health services.

When I found out last night that he was a PhD student who dropped out of the program last month millions of questions started racing through my mind. I advise PhD students. What happened? Was it too much? Not what he wanted to do? Did he fail? Did he not pass his qualifying exam? Was there an issue in his cohort of students? When he dropped out, did his adviser counsel him? Did that person have a nagging thought in the back of their mind asking if they should refer him to the school’s counseling services? Did they waiver in walking him over? Did they try and he refused? These are the things I think of—having advised students for years, and after having been trained in mental health first aid.

You see, the only way—in my mind—to avoid this sort of thing is to create a culture of comfort in which a person who is experiencing mental health issues can go to someone, anyone, and say, “I keep thinking about shooting people. I think I’m losing my mind.” And then, the person who is told says, “Okay, we have someone to help you with this.” If we had a culture of comfort in mental health services (and adequate services to back up that comfort), I think many of these tragedies could be avoided.

The issues the suspect may have with his mental health are likely deep-seated and complex. I’m not saying getting some meds and talking to someone once a week would have “fixed” him. I am saying that if we lived in a culture where mental illness was not stigmatized and individuals who start experiencing signs and symptoms knew where to go to get help—perhaps we wouldn’t be living through mass shootings that seem to be escalating in frequency and scale. So, let’s focus on something that could actually help, instead of blaming the parents of young children or yelling at one another about gun control. Let’s talk about making mental health—access and accessibility-- a priority in this nation.

This way, maybe we can all feel a bit safer in public spaces in the near future.