I don't think all mass shootings deal with mental illness. Or, by default, all murders. I'm sure the many who have have been mentally ill but there are people out there who just enjoy killing people--and if someone tells me the gun was created for sport, hunting, and/or defense, I think of them as idiotic.
Some people enjoy killing other people, and I don't necessarily feel that is a "defect".
-Nam
Let us not assume I’m thinking something I’m not.
To begin, I agree wholeheartedly. Not ALL of them are mental illness, but these recent mass shootings are. I don’t blame the gang or cartel violence under mental illness, but I am trying to talk of the single mass shooters like the 2 we had, the Sikh shooting, the Virginia Tech Massacre, the Columbine shooting etc.
I agree that there are some freaks out there who love to kill for the sake of it, and those people tend to have a criminal history involved. Overall, there will be an exception within every rule, but in general, we are able and have the technology to be able to notice patterns within people, which is how people can predict what may happen.
For a fact on guns, you’ll never hear me say that. Another myth is the phrase “assault rifle” or “assault gun”. There is no such thing as an assault rifle or assault gun because ALL of the guns are assault, or NONE of them are assault. There is no degree of assault. Guns were created for shooting. That’s it. There are no other alternate ways to use a gun as a tool (other than pistol-whipping, but that’s assault
)
Now that we are defining what a gun actually is and does, we can move on to the idea that I was thinking of.
I personally don’t feel that people who enjoy killing people is a “defect” as well, since it is our primal nature. However, if there is a case of schizophrenia, emotional breakdowns cause of bullying, suicidal ideals, PTSD for Veterans etc. I think this mental issue needs to be taken into consideration when we evaluate these mass shooters.
Even with what I’m talking about, this isn’t going to stop all shootings all the time, but it is a great step in the right direction where if somebody needs help, we can give them help, which will probably save lives. Remember with the Aurora shooting, had the Doctor looked at his’ journal before the shooting happened, we probably would not have 12+ dead and 60+ injured.
What do you think is the reason that America has so much more mental illness than other industrialized nations?
I don’t think America has much more mental illness than other industrialized nations. I just think we are far more ignorant of mental illness than the others, and we see the results of it. We still have a blood-thirsty mentality instead of learning about the victims and the shooters, and how we can change and alter them to avoid this happening again. Instead, as it is, people shoot, people die, the society wants the shooter to be given the death penalty, and thus we give it to them, and the cycle continues. Nobody want’s to break the cycle, and that is why I feel that America as opposed to the rest of the industrialized nations, is very ignorant when it comes to mental and psychological problems. This is part of prison reform imo.
There are more and worse shootings there, after all, and if mental illness - rather than guns - is the cause of the shootings, then there must be more mental illness where there are more shootings.
Ironically enough, the worst of all these shootings happen in Colorado. What’s funny is, how the Bible Belt is pretty bad when it comes to this, and the Red States in general. Yes, there are Blue States with this problem like California and Arizona, but overall, places where religion is placed much higher than Science, or logic, reason, rational, tend to be where these shootings are taken place.
As mentioned, there will always be exceptions to the rule. But notice the patterns. Notice the uber-religious, Conservative, Red States, gun-toters, tend to have the areas with the violence much more than the Blue, Liberal, Secular states. Notice the civilized cities and the gang-ridden cities. The one thing I will point out is indeed what Nam said, there are a lot of Democrats who are against removing the right to bear arms. Even Barack Obama is against the repeal of the 2nd Amendment.
The point once again is outright banning guns is only going to lead to more turmoil, which will fuel the fire of the idiots who think the government is out to get us, which is why like the Red Scare, the very presence of the word “Socialist” or dare I say “Communist” is so “bad, negative, evil” that anything to help improve our quality of life is going to go out the door because the more government we give the power to, the more they will take away our freedoms and tell us what and how to do. Once again though, how are you going to take the guns out of the gangs hands? I don’t see gang members just gladly giving their guns to the government.
However, the majority of America agrees with the removal of the NRA, and to promote gun control. Gun control is the measure that is needed to take, and then we can move on to the outside factors that cause the shootings like criminal history, mental illness, education, sources of income, wealth/poverty, etc.
But....... I wonder if a place like Aurora CO will toughen gun laws? Jetson mentioned it as an arms race - such a common human solution. 
This may sound harsh, and I agree with your post, but the answer is no. This is a big problem of guns. Nobody is willing to break the cycle.
All that’s going to happen is just like Columbine, just like Loughner, just like the Virginia Tech, just like the Sikh shooting, etc. all people do is cry tears, make publicity, and then a few years down the road, act like everything is handy dandy, and then once the same thing happens again, even in the same location, all anybody does is woe are us, cry, then move on with life like nothing happened.
The only people who will actually try to make a difference would be the victims themselves.
Personally, if America want’s to remember the 12 at Aurora, they would stop talking, and start actively getting involved with bringing up a charity/organization that will not only help the victims, but become large enough that they can actually combat, and defeat the NRA’ influence of guns in everybody’s hands. Until the nation attempts to break the cycle and until the NRA is removed, the victims of the Sikhs and the Aurora shooting, is all in vein.
If the USA could band together and break the cycle instead of letting more mass shootings happen, that imo, is America saying to the victims, “We will remember!”
With all due respect though, I don’t believe a prayer vigil is honestly remembering the victims. It’s one of the greatest things I hate about the concept of prayer. Only through prayer, do people think they are actively doing something to change the world when in reality, they are doing absolutely nothing at all. And that’s why I think if we were to remember, instead of the Christian’s praying, they get involved in combating the NRA’s grip hold on this subject in politics.
