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Thinking the unthinkable

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Re: Thinking the unthinkable

#231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Physical abuse does not solve mental health issues. Ever. Submission is a terrible goal in raising children.

But in some cases, these are just behavior issues, not mental health issues. Indeed, prescribing pharma and telling a kid he's mentally ill might be compounding the behavioral issue.

I never suggested medication, or telling a child that they are mentally ill.

"I wonder if a nice beating would have done you any good." This was a response to a description of severe acting out by a child. A child threatening to kill herself or her parents is not an indication of sound mental health. Hitting them will make it worse.

Sufficiently dysfunctional behavior defines what it means to have a psychological problem.

Re: Thinking the unthinkable

#232
post #79

I feel for the parent who has written the article, and whereas I agree we must do more to address the needs of kids with mental illness, I disagree with the stated premise of the article, that it's easy to talk about guns. It's actually not easy to talk about guns in this country, which has led to a lack of any serious gun control regulation. It borders on insanity when we look at the type of weaponry we allow our ci…

"It borders on insanity when we look at the type of weaponry we allow our citizens to purchase..." "The nra is a terrorist organization." Wow. Just plain wow. It's probably pointless to respond to your post, considering the emotions you are displaying regarding this topic, you probably won't even listen to a single thing, no matter, at least others who see this reply might understand just how perturbed you really are…

>> I really would like to hear this, because Connecticut has some of the strictest gun control regulation in the country

How about this from op: >> >> To the point where even those few who are allowed access >> >> cannot keep weapons at home

Re: Thinking the unthinkable

#233
post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If a sudden moment of clarity would be a repeatable cure for mental illness, we would not need mental healthcare. Please read up on confirmation bias.

[deleted]

There are behaviors which simply aren't acceptable, and it's important that the people who behave those ways are let to know that they're not. Threatening to kill people almost certainly falls on this list.

Not only that, but some people, such as people with schizophrenic disorders, need medicine (Specifically, pharmaceuticals.) to stay sane, literally. Part of the problem with disorders where you need to take pills are that some people don't want to take them, or the pills help them, and then they decide they're fine and stop medicating themselves. At which point they relapse into an episode.

I think we absolutely need better mental health care, and better mental health care research. We still don't know much about basic things like sleep. And yet we're being tasked with treating a growing number of people with psychiatric issues. Naturally, the result is something of a disaster.

Re: Thinking the unthinkable

#234
post #230

> “Then I’m going to kill myself,” he said. I remember doing that. > He’s been on a slew of antipsychotic and mood altering pharmaceuticals, a Russian novel of behavioral plans. Nothing seems to work. I remember that. > A few weeks ago, Michael..threatened to kill me I did that too. She forgot to mention the time(s) he threatened to run away. (I'd be surprised if he didn't.) After a marathon of transfers, expulsions,…

This reads like something I'd expect to see on kuro5hin.org. I have no idea weather you're trolling or honest - and I have to admit I like that a lot; your comment should be (is) subject to interesting discussion. The mental challenge of deciphering whether or not you're actually serious (thereby weighting if the reality you describe could be real; significantly your change of heart; also how anti/a-social you actual…

I am 100% serious. Though I probably should have left out that aside about Linkin Park. It probably didn't give the right image. (I was already thinking about things, and it reminded me of the song, as I remember it.)

Re: Thinking the unthinkable

#235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Physical abuse does not solve mental health issues. Ever. Submission is a terrible goal in raising children.

Why do you assume that submission is the goal of the beating? Or that you know the best way to raise children?

"Outcome: The problem was fixed. He became more subdued and never threatened to run away."

What other goal would there be? The idea of corporal punishment is that child fears getting hit enough that they will stop acting on the motives they have which conflict with those of the parents. In other words, they will submit to the motives of the parents.

Common sense aside, the fact that beating doesn't produce good outcomes for children is common knowledge in highly educated societies.

The American Academy of Pediatrics says:

"First, establish a positive, supporting and loving relationship with your child. Without this foundation, your child has no reason, other than fear, to demonstrate good behavior. [...] If you feel discipline is necessary, the AAP recommends that you do not spank or use other physical punishments. That only teaches aggressive behavior, and becomes ineffective if used often."

Re: Thinking the unthinkable

#236
post #12

Post like this terrify me. What if there isn't anything that can be done? It seems like there are some people that are just born broken or at some point they break. Men who experience schizophrenia it often stars in their late teens or early 20s, and late 20s/early 30s for women [1]. I had a friend in high school who was completely normal in every way. During his first year in college he literally just went crazy. It…

This may be politically incorrect to say right now, but I think the genes associated with mental illnesses that have a tendency to lead to violence will be phased out by a future generation sometime within this century and the next. We'll soon enough try gun control. That won't stop mass killings. Then we'll try increased mental healthcare access. That won't do much because we'll struggle with the Constitutionality o…

A few randomish thoughts:

The U.S. (and Australia, which was a penal colony) likely has a higher than average (at least for Europe) incidence of what I will call "maverick" traits -- gene based traits that make people less able to go along to get along, for some reason. They aren't necessarily bad traits, they just aren't very conducive to "domestication". The tend to be some of the same traits necessary for activities like exploration and other risky behaviors -- including founding a start up. One of the things YC asks about on its application is rule breaking behaviors. Folks who are too compliant are not well suited for doing groundbreaking work. So I don't personally think that breeding these traits out is necesarily a good thing.

The reason America has higher rates is because a lot of our ancestors left Europe (or other countries) when they just could not fit in. Many left to seek the right to worship as they saw fit -- in other words to think and believe as they wished. So it looks to me like Europe already tried to get rid of these genes and, instead of extinguishing them, mostly exported them, thereby concentrating them in a couple of countries. People with these genes tend to not "go quietly into the night". They tend to go kicking and screaming. So I do not think criminalizing people for having such traits is a good policy. It is better to find ways to help them live constructively with certain traits and to carefully distinguish between traits, which are value neutral, and outcomes or behaviors, which are not value neutral.

I usually do not say this publically, but if Joan of Arc were alive today, she would likely be in a psych ward having her meds adjusted, trying to make the voices stop, instead of playing midwife to the bloody birth of modern Fance. I have also read that Alexander the Great was likely bipolar. Again: I am not so sure that our desire to rid ourselves of people who aren't "normal"/adequately compliant or "cure" them of their differences is such a good thing. I think there are better ways to deal with peope like that than simply trying to break them. I think the goal of breaking them is likely a loss for both the individual being broken and for society. Take that too far and we lose important human traits, like adaptability.

I have a genetic disorder. It is more common in populations which historically were subjected to high death rates from a particular infectious disease (though I don't recall which disease). In other words, carrying at least one gene was likely protective against dying from this infection. Thus this deadly genetic disorder became more common in cases where it helped you survive in the face of worse things. The same is true of Sickle Cell disease, which is protective against malaria. Viewing genetic variations of that sort solely as defects and not as adaptations misses the big picture. If they weren't adaptive in some situations, they wouldn't be selected for by evolutionary pressure.

Re: Thinking the unthinkable

#237
post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hand writing is a big thing here in India. And generally many super intelligent kids lose out to mug pots because of hand writing. Coming to my case, I consider any one who boasts about great hand writing a loser. The moment I stopped writing exams I started giving a damn about hand writing. Hand writing improvement initiatives were the biggest things I hated in school. It was a exercise in futility. Looking back I f…

Interesting. Here in the States (at least, where I grew up), handwriting is a real mixed bag. When you are learning how to write as a small child, it's a big deal to write clearly (for obvious reason). Then you are forced to learn cursive, and its a big deal to write cursive clearly. Then it doesn't matter anymore. Literally everyone stops caring as long as it is legible. It's a weird system. While you are learning t…

I think some schools don't even teach cursive any more.

I wonder how those kids write their signatures.

Re: Thinking the unthinkable

#238
post #12

Post like this terrify me. What if there isn't anything that can be done? It seems like there are some people that are just born broken or at some point they break. Men who experience schizophrenia it often stars in their late teens or early 20s, and late 20s/early 30s for women [1]. I had a friend in high school who was completely normal in every way. During his first year in college he literally just went crazy. It…

This may be politically incorrect to say right now, but I think the genes associated with mental illnesses that have a tendency to lead to violence will be phased out by a future generation sometime within this century and the next. We'll soon enough try gun control. That won't stop mass killings. Then we'll try increased mental healthcare access. That won't do much because we'll struggle with the Constitutionality o…

You realize the US will likely be waging wars for the foreseeable future, and that being a soldier will likely pay more than minimum wage, certainly up to past the age of procreation (I like to think of this as the event horizon for evolution; evolution only "sees" up your youngest child; if you then die, you gave still made the right evolutinary choices).

The military will have need of sociopaths and killers.

Re: Thinking the unthinkable

#239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you assume that submission is the goal of the beating? Or that you know the best way to raise children?

"Outcome: The problem was fixed. He became more subdued and never threatened to run away." What other goal would there be? The idea of corporal punishment is that child fears getting hit enough that they will stop acting on the motives they have which conflict with those of the parents. In other words, they will submit to the motives of the parents. Common sense aside, the fact that beating doesn't produce good outco…

>>What other goal would there be?

The goal for the drastic measures my mom took was to not loose her child. That he stopped being such a big brat was a bonus. He was still strong tempered, but at least he would no longer test my mother. And the threat of a beating kept the rest of us in line. We knew not to test her. All of my brothers and sisters grew up to be decent human beings.

In case you are wondering, my brother never beats his kids, is enough for them to see him mad when they misbehave for them to fall in line.

I concede, had he had a mental disorder it would probably not have worked. In this case though, I'm not sure the OP really had a mental disorder which is why I suggested the beating. Some kids will go to great lengths to manipulate you as much as they can.

Anyway, this is just an anecdote so take it as such.

Re: Thinking the unthinkable

#240
post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think bambax's main point is summed up by - "The NRA says "guns don't kill people, people do" but the truth is that guns help people who want to kill people, kill more people." Do you have any real points to counter that, rather than just pointing out irrelevant technicalities or calling him names? And no, it doesn't change bambax's real point at all whether its a automatic or a semi-automatic.

When a person makes a statement, "All guns are bad, and the more automatic they are, the worse." They've lost all credibility, and in my opinion aren't really deserving of a well thought out rebuttal due to their obvious lack of experience in this field. Let's take this statement, "The NRA says "guns don't kill people, people do" but the truth is that guns help people who want to kill people, kill more people." Right…

OK. "Operator" runs amok with a nerf gun.

Slightly different outcome.

How again is the highly efficient killing tool not part of the problem?

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