December 19, 2012

What Else Can You Do RIGHT NOW?

How to Fix the Safety Net

Tools

There are very few resources for kids who show even the most obvious signs of mental illness, and it often takes a violent act to get an adolescent or an adult into the system—at which point it may be, horrifically, too late. We also face the need to balance our ability to commit the mentally ill to treatment involuntarily while preserving everyone's civil rights.

What can we do? The sad truth is that the unraveling of our mental health safety net has been a long process, and to knit it back together will also take sustained effort over time. If you're concerned about mental health resources—and we all should be—you can join the National Alliance on Mental Illness (namiwa.org), the most effective advocacy and lobbying group around. You can call and e-mail your legislators in Olympia urging them to seek more funding—A LOT MORE funding—for help for mentally ill children, adolescents, and adults. (While you're at it, urge them to move with all due haste toward sane gun control in the US, and join the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence at bradycampaign.org.) And you can donate to organizations that help the homeless and the mentally ill, like DESC of Seattle (desc.org).

Stranger Personals

Also: Don't use gun violence to demonize the mentally ill, and don't let other people do it. The vast majority of people who are mentally ill are at far higher risk of harming themselves than others—if the opposite were true, we'd have mass killings every day, considering the number of mentally ill people we have on the streets. (Likewise, the vast majority of kids who are loners are just that: loners.) These people deserve empathy and support. If you fear someone you know may harm themselves or others, call the Crisis Clinic at 206-461-3222. This 24-hour hotline is staffed by professionals who can discuss your options over the phone or arrange to have someone come to your home, talk to friends and relatives, and determine the best path to treatment. They can also help you constructively confront an unresponsive loved one about their mental health issues.

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That Crisis Hotline, the one that can "help you constructively confront an unresponsive loved one about their mental health issues", is that only there in Seattle? Or is that a national service?

Posted by SiSiSodaPop in Vegas on December 21, 2012 at 11:27 AM · Report

You can get completely hysterical! But don't forget to click on the ads on Stranger web pages or the,Stranger will have to stop glorifying child killers!

Posted by Stranger'sWorstNightmare on December 21, 2012 at 12:23 PM · Report

Wow, "worst nightmare", you really get more pathetic every day. You are scum, and not anyone's nightmare. Scum. Nobody gives a shit what you post, not even me. You arent swaying anyone's opinion.

Know what you are food for? Your cartoonish stupidity, coupled with frequent posting of tour stupidity, goes a long way toward all of us thinking that most conservatives (or whatever the hell you sre) are gibbering idiots never to be taken seriously ever.

Good job, Nightmare. Like Bailo, you constantly reinforce the belief (incorrect that it may be) that your side are all idiots.

Keep it up, scum. It's working, just not how you hope.

Posted by Dr_Awesome on December 21, 2012 at 1:34 PM · Report

@1: I think it's local, here in Seattle, but I'm sure they have information on similar services in other areas.

Posted by Bethany Jean Clement on December 21, 2012 at 3:31 PM · Report

Thank you, Bethany, for the shout-out to DESC. In several years working there, I have never ceased to be amazed at how even small doses of mental health care can stabilize people whose lives had spiraled out of control. These are the services that can help identify the next mass shooter and take preventive action. More importantly, thank you also for pointing out that mental illness and criminality are not linked. Most criminals are not mentally ill, and most people with a mental illness are not criminals. I wince whenever I see reports of crimes casually mentioning that the perpetrator has a history of mental illness, so it's refreshing to see a counter message!

Posted by all together now on December 22, 2012 at 12:47 AM · Report

Mental health resources statewide can be found at win211.org.

Posted by angelguts on December 22, 2012 at 12:53 AM · Report

the mentally ill DO NOT have a higher likelihood to engage in violence than the general population, and that is a clear and proven fact, and in fact, they have a much lower likelihood to harm others and a much higher likelihood to hurt themselves. I am very concerned about this blaming the mentally ill for these massacres. Yes, you are clearly nutz if you kill unprovoked, but no, it is not appropriate to demonize the mentally ill, and in fact, is a major problem that prevents people from seeking help for fear of being branded this way, and it is the left and right that are doing this equally. There should not under any circumstance be any prejudice against the mentally ill on any level, they deserve to have every right that we all do until so time as they do something that deserves the losing of certain rights, and only when convicted duly in a court of law, and like the rest of us, they should be able to earn some or all of those rights back when they have served their sentence. No person that massacres unprovoked should ever get out of the state hospital (preferably), or prison (if under current laws in most states). All that aside, their should be more efficient services to help those that volunteer to be helped.

Posted by scratchmaster joe on December 22, 2012 at 5:45 PM · Report

@ 7: Read what all-together-now posted in #5. They state they work for the DESC, so let's take them at their word;"These are the services that can help identify the next mass shooter and take preventive action."

As for supporting the DESC as the writer of the article suggests, forget it. The way the has DESC trampled the poverty stricken neighborhood of Delridge speaks volumes about how they have been given WAY to much credibility and tax dollars. The big picture view of the DESC is that it is a tool of the downtown business, development and property owner class. The goal of the DESC/City is to rid downtown of the drunks, addicts, scammers and mentally ill and move them into neighborhoods like Delridge that no one cares about. Then Pioneer Square, Belltown and the Waterfront will be sufficiently sterilized for the power brokers and monied folks to really cash in on their increased land values via new, very high-end development.

Posted by DMar on December 22, 2012 at 6:31 PM · Report