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Mina George

Professor Martin

ENGLI 1102

12 April 2018

An Annotated Bibliography

Hirschtritt, and Binder. “A Reassessment of Blaming Mass Shootings on Mental Illness.”EScholarship,

University of California, 13 Mar. 2018.

In this article, Hirschtritt and Binder talk about how the mass shootings that occurred in the past

few months have brought up the problem of mental-health disorders, that many people suffer from in

America. Some studies have shown that other factors than mental illness could cause violence. People

with serious mental health disorders are more likely to be victims. Being a victim of violence in the

past, owning a gun illegally, or being involved in selling drugs; all these could also conduct to gun

violence and mass shootings. According to MacArthur Violence Risk Assessment Study, a very little

number of people that have been released from psychiatric asylums have done any violence with guns,

which clearly shows that it is not only mentally unstable people that would be involved in gun violence.

Many people in the US suffer from mental disorders but it does not mean that they are violent or could

harm anyone, and it is for that reason that mentally ill people should stop being condemned and viewed

as violent persons.
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Jaffee, Laura Jordan. “Rethinking School Safety in the Age of Empire: Militarization, Mental Health,

and State Violence.” Disability Studies Quarterly.

This article explains how school safety is nowadays a major concern, especially after the several

mass shootings that occurred in different colleges. In fact, gun control is as important as reopening

mental-health institutions. A background check for the people buying guns would prevent mentally

unstable, or people with violent behavior in the past from buying guns and therefore do violent acts.

There is a link between gun violence and mental illness and controlling mentally ill people and

preventing them from owning guns will definitely avoid any violent acts. In addition, bringing more

police to secure colleges would not be as effective as bringing more psychiatrists to help mentally

unstable students. Americans need more psychiatrists, who can improve their mental health. Reporting

mentally ill people to the police would definitely prevent violence.

Carey, Benedict. “Trump Wants More Asylums - and Some Psychiatrists Agree.” The New York Times,

The New York Times, 5 Mar. 2018.

After the school shooting in Parkland Florida, president trump has declared the reestablishment

of psychiatric asylums in the US for the safety of the country. Many people in the US suffer from

mental disorders, which makes Trump's decision of reopening mental health institutions a good idea.

Psychiatric hospitals eventually discharged their patients in the 1950s in a process called

deinstitutionalization. Thousands of patients were free. Nevertheless, many mental health experts are

denouncing a process that they believe has gone too far. These experts defend the usefulness of

psychiatric asylums but are denouncing the bad treatments that patients had in the past. Furthermore,

Psychiatrists, bioethicists, and policy experts still strongly agree with Trump's proposal

Khazan, Olga. “Trump's Call for Mental Institutions Could Be Good.” The Atlantic, Atlantic Media
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Company, 23 Feb. 2018.

Mental institutions have been closed in the US for the past decades, and Americans need more

psychiatrists, who can improve their mental health, from the president to the last citizen. In fact, the

shootings that occurred in different places in the US brought back the fact that many Americans suffer

from mental health disorders. President Trump would like to reopen those mental health institutions

and in fact that is not a bad idea because it will clearly help avoiding accidents caused by people who

are mentally ill (shootings for example). However, for some experts, reopening those asylums would

only help mentally ill people but not specifically help avoid shootings. We could clearly see that there

is an important debate concerning Trump's call of reopening those institutions.

Vannette, Jennifer. “Perspective | What Really Drives Mass Shooters to Commit Atrocities.”The

Washington Post, WP Company, 10 Apr. 2018.

This article explains that other factors could lead to gun violence and not mental illness only.

Some studies showed that a very small percentage of people that commit gun violence had any mental

illness such as schizophrenia, depression or bipolar disorder. In fact, Jennifer brings up an important

point which is violence because of racial discrimination in the country. Many people commit gun

violence because they are against some people's religion, race or ethnicity. In fact, Jennifer explains

that instead of pointing out that mental illness is what leads to gun shootings, we should go back in the

history and see that this ideology of gun violence was already existing.
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James, Alexa. “Police Are Our Safety Net for the Mentally Ill in Crisis.”Chicagotribune.com, 10 Apr.

2018.

This article talks about the student that has been shot by a police officer at the University Of

Chicago campus just because he looked suspicious or threatening. Again, Alexa explains in this article

that bringing more police officers on campuses will not help dealing with mental illness as much as we

need to build a mental health system in this country. In fact, many students suffer from mental-health

disorders and this is a serious medical condition. Dealing with mentally ill people with violence like

this officer did with the student will not solve the problem.

Simon, Robert I., and Liza H. Gold. Gun Violence and Mental Illness. American Psychiatric

Publishing, Inc, 2015.

This book brings up the link between mental illness and gun violence. Again, Simon and Liza

show us that other factors than mental illness lead to gun violence. In addition, many gun violence that

occurred recently in the U.S were suicides and not mass shootings. This book explains the

misinterpretation that most of the people have concerning mental illness and gun violence. The authors

talk about mental-health disorders that many Americans suffer from but also other problems in the

society that lead to gun violence.