Reframing the Conversation

  Like many people yesterday I’ve been following the unfolding story of the mass murder of 26 people including 20 children in a Connecticut public school by the use of restricted fire arms in the hands of someone who shouldn’t have access to such weapons. The mass media is doing its usual function of reframing the issue from one of gun control to mental health using a variation of the “guns don’t kill people, people kill people” argument favored by the National Rifle Association. The current variant is the psycho Apsie who due to a physical impairment in his brain is out searching for targets of opportunity because he lacks empathy to other human beings. Last night on the CNN Piers Morgan show, a Dr. Amador – the always available CNN media official psychologist - used this false correlation to exonerate the huge American homicide rate by invoking the psychotic autistic who sees others as objects, an outlier that excuses “normal” folks from owning an arsenal of weapons.

  In the video, Joe Scarborough who is the official MSNBC mass murder expert invokes the crazy asperger theory during a discussion of the mass shooting by James Eagan Holmes at the movie theater in Aurora, Colorado on July 20, 2012 in which he killed 12 and wounded 58 people. No discussion about the legal purchase of two Glock 22 pistols, a Remington Model 87 shotgun or a Smith & Weston MP15 semi automatic rifles. Surely the store owners would wonder if a strange looking person showed up and bought three thousand rounds of pistol ammunition or three thousand rounds of rifle rounds but, hey, this is America where the 2^nd amendment protects your right to prepare for Armageddon or Obama’s socialist government take over.

To be honest, this meme of the sick outsider is international and the Daily Mail in England reported the same theme about mass killing in Norway of 77 folks on July 11, 2011.  From the article:

“Norwegian mass killer Anders Breivik has a rare, high-functioning form of Asperger's that has left him incapable of empathy or real friendship, one of Norway's most prominent psychiatrists has told a court in Oslo.

 

Professor Ulrik Fredrik Malt of Olso University told the court: 'It is plausible that there is Asperger's, Tourette's, and a narcissistic personality disorder.'

 

As evidence, he cited the lack of emotion Breivik showed when discussing those he killed, his impressive memory for details, his obsession with numbers, his hypergraphia [obsessive writing], and his monotonous tone of voice"

   So from the article if you know anyone who has an impressive memory for details, obsesses over numbers and is a compulsive blogger then watch out because they might be coming for you! Let’s have a real conversation about gun control instead of this faux analysis on mental health of certain people.