RE: Why it's Not the Boys in the Above Picture Who Grow Up to be School Shooters
My problem is strictly with your usage of the term "mentally ill" because it's nothing more than a scapegoat and an excuse. There is no excuse for mass murder, it's just being evil. Saying that "murderers are mentally ill" plants the seed in peoples' minds that "mental illness = bad, murderer, scary", etc. which does much, much, much more harm than good, especially considering mentall illness affects most people, in America at least, throughout at least a small portion of their lives (depression, anxiety, for example). You should drop that they are "mentally ill" and focus on their specific issues that are causing the problems you perceive.
For example, if a politician votes to enact genocide, blame their corruption and greed for profit and power, not a "mental illness" that may not even exist in the first place. All that language does is divide people at the bottom.
I'm saying that it takes a mentally ill person to commit mass murder. I'm not saying that mentally ill people will become mass murderers. There is a difference.
Did I not do that in my original comment?
So, a politician that "votes to enact genocide" is not a mentally ill person?
Not at all. It's the ridiculous "Don't correctly identify them!" that is the problem. Politicians and their supporters who believe that it's perfectly acceptable to violently force non-aggressive individuals to do things against their will are, in fact, mentally ill people. They are the bullies and the murderers that you continue to blame for society's problems, are they not? Should we call them sane and normal instead, so as not to offend another person who may have some other form of mental illness?
This is absurd. I'm not going to pussy-foot around a word or a topic because of a comprehension issue. You may choose to do that, but it's not my thing. Words have meanings.
Words have meanings, and you're refusing to acknowledge those meanings in a broader context and are also choosing to perpetuate a hateful stereotype of mentally ill people that gets them killed and makes them suffer from isolation. This does nothing good for anyone involved.
No, a politician can vote for genocide and still not be mentally ill, just evil. Evil and mental illness are not the same thing, and the sooner people like you understand that, the sooner the stupid culture war that breeds school shootings can be put to an end.
This isn't correctly identifying anybody, this is painting people with a broad brush because you don't like them. Just because you don't like somebody, doesn't make them mentally ill. What do George W. Bush and some random person off the street with social anxiety have in common? Nothing. Stop pretending like they're one in the same.
This isn't language policing, this is educating people on how to correctly identify what problems are and to stop scapegoating innocent people and perpetuating a culture of propaganda. You're doing precisely what they want and you're too blinded by the emotional desire to say mean words to realize it.