Who’s the Insane One?

My first reaction on reading this article was complete horror; once that settled down, I thought it was much like the incident described in my last post: someone let their emotions get the better of them, and they did something extreme as a result. Just in case that link goes away, here is a summary (CNN forbids simply quoting it): Two men had a “traffic altercation.” One of them left the scene, then was alleged to have returned later and shoot the other man four times, in broad daylight, in front of witnesses. The victim died, his infant daughter in his arms, on the scene. The shooter was arrested and charged with first degree murder, and pleaded innocent. He has a history of depression and was being medicated for it; his gun was licensed.
What makes this particular ugly incident different is the factor of mental illness. I am willing to bet that when this goes to trial, that innocent plea will become, “innocent by reason of temporary insanity due to mental illness.”
That would be so wrong, on so many levels.
Lest anyone accuse me of lack of sympathy for mental illness, and specifically depression, let me confess that I have had my own struggles with depression, and have been treated for it. I’ve been to counseling and taken medication and I’m not talking about “feeling down” once in a while, but real clinical depression. So I know a bit of what this fellow was probably going through. And I still say, it’s no excuse, and no court should consider it an excuse.
Our society has done far too much in the way of excusing bad behavior by reason of emotional distress. Most mental illness is not of a physiological origin: it’s usually a matter of scrambled or just plain broken emotional conditioning, most likely due to bad experiences in formative years. If a person is truly so badly damaged that they cannot think straight enough to distinguish between emotional distress and murderous rage, they should not be out on the streets. If a person is being treated for any type of mental illness, they really ought to be where they recognize what is happening to them, and take steps to prevent acting on it. Again, if they can’t do this, they shouldn’t be out in the world, and they certainly shouldn’t be licensed to own a handgun. And if such a person is out on the streets, whoever is treating them should be held just as accountable for their deeds as if they had done it themselves. In a sense, they have, because they should have known what their patient’s limits were, and protected them from stepping beyond them.
That said, I still think a person needs to be judged ultimately on what they do, not what led them to do it. I object strongly to the concept of “hate” crimes for example…murder is murder, assault is assault, vandalism is vandalism; and it matters not at all if it’s because you hate an individual or their race, or if you are just acting out a bad mood. It’s time that we no longer even consider motivations and emotions as a factor in a crime. They are irrelevant; what matters is what was done.
Right away, I know there are those who are balking at that idea, and think I’m taking it too far. But I say that far more people than most realize suffer from various degress of mental illness. But they aren’t “acting crazy” because they were never taught it excused them to do whatever they liked, in any way they liked. Many never even get to the point of even realizing they suffer from mental illness, they just go on with their life and do what they can with what they have to deal with. That was me for many years – I suffered, and lived with my depression for many years. When I felt bad, and there was something I needed to do, I forced myself to do it anyway. Likewise, when I got angry or irritated, I kept my rage in check – as violent as my emotions were inclined to get, I never let myself engage in violence because of it. My point? Many suffer this way, and still they are decent people and do the right thing. Those who honestly cannot need to be protected and helped, and the rest of the world protected against them, so things like this incident never happen.