Very sad

[Scouse]

I don't buy the whole society failed him bollocks

Really? When a man with a history of mental illness walks into his doctors and says "I need psychiatric help as I think I might hurt someone" and doesn't get it, there's no societal culpability?

 

[Access Denied]

Really? When a man with a history of mental illness walks into his doctors and says "I need psychiatric help as I think I might hurt someone" and doesn't get it, there's no societal culpability?

Nope, there's MEDICAL culpability. Gross clinical negligence leading to the deaths of the patient and two other people and the wounding of a third person. Why should society as a whole take the blame for one doctor not doing their job properly?

 

[Job]

Undoubtedly the system is failing, just look at that schoolgirl knifed to death in the park, there is no longer a social cohesion backing up a mental health infrastructure, mentally unstable people are let on the streets on a daily basis.
My next door nieghbour won't walk to the shops because we have a local partial schizophrenic who hangs around and has decided to hurl foul abuse at her, the police say 'there is nothing we can do, until she harms someone'. She threatens to kill my neigbour, to break in and kill her dog or burn her house down and the police have given up interviewing her because she just has a carer with her who promises to make her take her medication. It's a complete frustrating farce and in the heat of the moment another neighbour threatened to take her out and the police arrested him for an hour and he received a caution.
She follows people down the street , steps out in front of cars and they won't section her.
She is protected by a giant lumbering bureaucracy and the public just have to put up with it.

 

[DaGaffer]

Respect for what he did with what he had, not so much for ending life(even if i think it should be a human right to do so, but doesn't remove lack of respect for doing it), and that's all i'm saying on it. Not getting into human rights stuff

.. but to me the act of suicide is that of a coward .. he gave in was tempted to fall etc etc ... if he was brave he would be here today

I fucking hate that attitude. Before bandying around words like "lack of respect" or "cowardice", you need to walk in his shoes. Apart from the fact that your attitude is an entirely subjective value judgement driven entirely by your Judeo-Christian upbring (and yes that includes you Toht) that condemns suicide as a sin (even if you're not a christian, you come from that culture). I have absolutely no problem with someone saying "enough of this shit" and taking themselves out of the game.

 

[old.Tohtori]

That's an opinion that is in no way based on religion. Stop trying to rationalise someone elses different opinion with some bullshit.

I don't have to respect someone for taking their life to acknowledge their right to do so.

 

[throdgrain]

Really? When a man with a history of mental illness walks into his doctors and says "I need psychiatric help as I think I might hurt someone" and doesn't get it, there's no societal culpability?

Why should there be a system for everything? The state cant hold your hand all the time unfortunately, despite what you hand wringers think. Truth of the matter is, that selfish wanker shot a policeman in the face with birdshot, he didnt even have the good manners to use buck. He ruined and shortened the policemans life for his own amusement.

If the policeman had been armed and able to defend himself chances are that situation would have ended right there.

 

[Hawkwind]

Why should there be a system for everything? The state cant hold your hand all the time unfortunately, despite what you hand wringers think. Truth of the matter is, that selfish wanker shot a policeman in the face with birdshot, he didnt even have the good manners to use buck. He ruined and shortened the policemans life for his own amusement.

If the policeman had been armed and able to defend himself chances are that situation would have ended right there.

Nail on head . Biggest problem today is that people seem unwilling to take responsibility for their own actions. Always someone else to blame. Like parents who complain that they cannot control their kids! Fucking unbelievable!

 

[Scouse]

Rubbish

The guy was mental. Mental. I.E. His mind was broken and he didn't feel like he was in control of his actions.

He went to the doctors and said "help! I'm going mental! I might hurt someone!" and he didn't get that help he, quite responsibly, asked for. Then surprise surprise, eh?


If you're not in your right mind, you can't think responsibly. Your actions are not responsible because you've lost the capacity to be responsible.

Said it before: If people understand you can't walk on broken legs, why do people expect you to function on a broken mind?

 

[throdgrain]

Stop making excuses man, you cant rationalise everything. I know in a (terrifying) ideal world maybe you could, but the world isnt ideal is it, basically, shit happens. And if that geezer was so mental what about the other people involved in helping him, did they all spontaneously go mental at the same time? And even if they did, as I have said, it aint anybodys fault but thiers.

Honestly Scouse you would blame anybody for anything, sometimes its not anybodys fault other than the bloke that did it. I know you will struggle to get your head round that one, but it's a fact.

 

[Scouse]

I'm not saying it wasn't his fault, throddington. What I'm saying is that he was not in control of his mental faculties when he did it.

I'm not willing to jump on the "I hate people like that" bandwagon. It's over-simplifies the problem. There were many things that contributed, perhaps in a "perfect storm"-type way, to the end result - his mental state, the help of others etc. etc.

However, I don't see why I shouldn't sympathise with both of the primary protagonists.

Copper killed himself - tragic.
Mental madman who asked for help shot copper - also tragic.


If we had proper mental health care services in this country there's a very good chance this would never have happened. Why do people not like it when that fact is pointed out?

 

[throdgrain]

I dont give a fuck about the mental bloke, I wish the copper had a gun in the first place, and shot him dead.

We'll have to agree to disagree on that one

 

[Scouse]

To be fair, I don't really give a fuck about either of them. It's not like I knew them personally. It's just how I see the situation...

 

[Job]

Not giving a fuck is not a trait to be proud of, it's nihilism by proxy.

 

[Scouse]

Not giving a fuck is not a trait to be proud of, it's nihilism by proxy.

Philosophy is dead.

But to humour it. Neitzche was wrong. Nihilism doesn't remove value or meaning in life. He was scared of the fact that meaning is subjective. He wanted objective meaning to life where there is none.

He needed to embrace his dispair

 

[Job]

I don't think philosophy is dead.
You shouldn't attach the ponderings of the masses to some trumped up 'expert' with clever words
and labels, the mental journey he took, everyone takes at some time, especially when assisted by hallucinogenics, being able to vocalise it doesn't make yours any wiser.

 

[noblok]

Philosophy is dead.

But to humour it. Neitzche was wrong. Nihilism doesn't remove value or meaning in life. He was scared of the fact that meaning is subjective. He wanted objective meaning to life where there is none.

He needed to embrace his dispair

That's sort of what Nietzsche did, though... (Embracing the creativity of the child vs lion and camel etc.)

 

[TdC]

I dont give a fuck about the mental bloke, I wish the copper had a gun in the first place, and shot him dead.

wait...what? firstly, I don't particularly believe that, armed or not, anyone has any kind of chance against a surprise shotgun to the face, and secondly the problem occurred way upstream of the copper. Don't get me wrong, it's a damn shame that policeman got blinded, and is now dead, but the whole thing could have been avoided if there was a decent watch kept and care given to the nutter that lost it in the first place.

Sadly, and I do mean sadly, it's probably going to turn out cheaper to arm police so they can kill nutbags rather than give said nutbags the care they deserve as human beings. Ofc until the governmental bean-counters decide that guns will go the way of psychiatric nurses and doctors in the next budget cut. Or the officers start having problems themselves.

 

[Scouse]

I don't think philosophy is dead.

It is. It sounds great. Probably has many truths. But it's not much better than religion tbfh. It doesn't require empricial evidence and, unfortunately for philosophy, empirical evidence is king when searching for the truth of anything.

 

[Job]

You must remember that everything we are is evolution.
It is the meaning of life, it created guilt, longing, love, pain, yearning, the desire to understand, the draw of the distant horizon..etc..etc.
Even the urge to understand it all.

 

[Scouse]

It is the meaning of life

No it isn't. Evolution is a meaningless process that just happens...

You subjectively attach meaning to it - and that's fine by me - but it quite obviously isn't actually the "meaning of life".

 

[throdgrain]

wait...what? firstly, I don't particularly believe that, armed or not, anyone has any kind of chance against a surprise shotgun to the face, and secondly the problem occurred way upstream of the copper. Don't get me wrong, it's a damn shame that policeman got blinded, and is now dead, but the whole thing could have been avoided if there was a decent watch kept and care given to the nutter that lost it in the first place.

Sadly, and I do mean sadly, it's probably going to turn out cheaper to arm police so they can kill nutbags rather than give said nutbags the care they deserve as human beings. Ofc until the governmental bean-counters decide that guns will go the way of psychiatric nurses and doctors in the next budget cut. Or the officers start having problems themselves.

As far as I am aware the bloke just walked over to the copper and shot him in the face. If the copper had been armed he would have been able (possibly) to deal with it. Either way, he would have had a better chance than with no gun, when he had NO chance.

My point is that we all cry and wail for our inperfect society, that failed this or that or whatever. But the truth is, as I said earlier, put into simple terms, shit happens, and thank god there isnt an all-encompassing government to "care and protect" us all

 

[rynnor]

But the truth is, as I said earlier, put into simple terms, shit happens, and thank god there isnt an all-encompassing government to "care and protect" us all

Hmm well I can remember in my lifetime when we used to lock up the potentially dangerous ones, now we let them out so as not to impact their human rights.

I dont think thats an example of the state improving tbh. No doubt we saved a few quid because nearly all the mental hospitals shutdown but it just means we have more civilian deaths - is that a good change?

 

[Scouse]

Personally, I'm not talking about locking them up. I'm talking about the provision of medical care when a person says "I think I may be a danger, can you help me please".

It's quite possible that quality therapy and/or a combination of drugs, on a regular basis, could have helped Moat function normally.

 

[Chilly]

Making any kind of policy decision based on one freak event is lunacy. you need to get high quality statistics and deep studies into the causes of things before jumping to conclusions.

 

[rynnor]

Personally, I'm not talking about locking them up. I'm talking about the provision of medical care when a person says "I think I may be a danger, can you help me please".

It's quite possible that quality therapy and/or a combination of drugs, on a regular basis, could have helped Moat function normally.

If someone says they cant control themselves and maybe a danger to others clearly they should be sectioned into a secure unit until they can be assesed.

I have nothing in principal about people coming out at a later date but currently theres no way to legally force the potentially dangerous ones to take their medication so the current system fails time after time.

 

[Scouse]

If someone says they cant control themselves and maybe a danger to others clearly they should be sectioned into a secure unit until they can be assesed.

In principle I agree with this. However, if you know you're going to be incarcerated you're massively less likely to admit it. We end up with nutters hiding it, which is the worst possible outcome.

I think the correct route would be to encourage people to come forward and give them therapy and medication straight away. Starting that afternoon.

I think that approach would save more lives.

 

[rynnor]

He was probably expecting to be taken in and was suprised when he wasnt though. You cant really just hand the guy a load of lithium though - he might hurt himself let alone others - the secure unit is a safer option for him too.

We have a friend who is schizophrenic and I have visited her in secure units over the years and seen the whole process for myself a number of times over.

1. She becomes a danger to herself/others and is sectioned into a secure unit.

2. She spends months under the heavy sedative effects of the various drugs and balloons in weight - when you see her she drifts in/out of sleep.

3. They reduce the dose - she's more awake but still a bit doped out. She can go out but has a curfew.

4. They put her in sheltered housing.

5. They gradually reduce her support.

6. Convinced she's cured she stops taking her medication.

7. goto 1 above.

 

[Scouse]

At least she's in the system. Mandatory incarceration means that they'll be out there and won't come forward...

 

[rynnor]

At least she's in the system. Mandatory incarceration means that they'll be out there and won't come forward...

But her quality of life is awful - as she's gotten older the damage to her brain has meant these cycles get smaller and smaller. If she was either made to take her medication or kept on the curfew stage she would at least have some quality of life but the system just trys to get her out and withdraws support.

 

[Scouse]

Don't disagree with that. Lifetime support is probably needed in the most severe cases.

Slowly, as medical science advances, the number of people that require this would probably become less and less.

What price not having nutters going round shooting people eh?