I've noticed that no one in the mainstream media seems to want to discuss something many mass shooters have in common: Psychotropic drug use. It's worth your time to read the whole article, but this particular excerpt caught my eye. For some reason all of the focus seems to be on the tools these troubled souls use to commit their heinous crimes, but interest in the motivations or causes of these violent outbursts seem to fall by the wayside to promote some sort of gun control agenda.
"Medication can interfere with the emotions as well as the psychotherapy process. A common side effect of psychotropic medication is difficulty feeling certain emotions once the drug accumulates in a person’s system. For example, many people complain of losing the feelings they used to have, report a reduction in their ability to laugh or cry, or experience a decrease in libido."
Could this be the real problem in this country? Our children are incredibly over-medicated when compared to statistics just 25 years ago. We've seen federal regulations that prevented pharmaceutical companies from advertising directly to patients repealed, no doubt as a result of aggressive lobbying by the pharmaceutical industry. It seems all the power we allow our government to regulate the medical industry has done little to stop some physicians from pushing pills for profit. It's a troubling situation that needs to be addressed.
To address the issue with guns, I ask the reader to look back into the past, when children weren't so heavily medicated and public schools actually had competitive rifle shooting teams. Most people aren't old enough to remember guns being allowed in their school, but it's a fact that competitive school rifle teams were commonplace about half a century ago, and no one seemed to go crazy and gun down their fellow classmates. This seems to me to support the idea that guns themselves aren't the problem.
So, do you agree that guns, drugs, or perhaps both are the problem? I've presented my arguments, you're more than welcome to make yours in the comments.
