I wrote at the beginning of the Andrea Yates retrial about the public opinion shift on mental health that defense attorneys were banking on to get her prison sentence overturned. Wednesday she was found guilty by reason of insanity, and the discussion has …
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There is a strong stigma directed towards people with mental illness. I believe that with better education and understanding people with mental illness will no longer be feared or shunned by the general public. I do believe that public awareness and sensitivity is on the rise but there is still room for improvement.
I believe more and more people in the generaL public are becoming more comfortable with and understanding of mental illness. This will invariably happen as more people will have someone they know diagnosed or treated. I don’t think, however, that whether someone tries to show understanding for someone you is guilty of a horrible charge and gets off on insanity is somehow an indicator for their understanding of mental illness. I don’t think anyone charged with a serious offense should be able to get off by reason of insanity ever…I don’t care how mentally ill they are, if they kill someone they need to be locked up forever or given the death sentence. But I am very understanding of mental illness, considering my experiences in receiving treatment.
Last year I discovered a book on the wikipedia written about the drowning of five children, published in 1986. I was going to publish it on my blog but I convinced myself it was a foolish notion. Just before finding that information, I had discovered that George Chapman who was claimed to be Jack the Ripper, was possibly acting out Edgar Allan Poe’s Telltale Heart, in which a man murdered his wife and buried her under the floor boards in the house. I do not know if this was referencing Poe’s father’s thoughts about his mother or his adoptive father. I happen to be related to some Chapmans. Chapman’s real name was Klosowski, a Russian Jew and were accused of these crimes. Klosowski was charged with three murders unrelated to the Ripper murders and hanged. He was basically psychotic as a result of someone reading those stories and probably projecting them out onto whoever. Having had a public business, a barber at one time, he was certainly subjected to many public associations. My guess is his situation was no different than Yates’. Beware what you read and watch in TV. Lindsey Wagner, a well known actress and star of Bionic Woman appeared before a US Government committee in DC in 1993, telling the committee that allowing children to view violent television should be prohibited and that children could become violent as a result. Words can kill, it may not happen today or tomorrow but what you allow into your subconscious mind will manifest itself sooner or later. There are numerous books written on the subject, The Power of Your Subconscious Mind, The Genie Within, TNT. It doesn’t matter what believe about what is said. It is the same with music, the ideas get planted. Listen to the music, turn your radio on, get in touch with God, turn your radio on…
As Paul Harvey says, “good day”.
What I also believe is that people are more educated about issues concerning mental illness. Sazs was a bit short sighted in my opinion. Penfield, a Neurosurgeon discovered that something in the brain or the mind still works even while a person is anesthetized. Where does it come from? If the brain is not processing what it is seeing and hearing it certainly must be getting input from somewhere. If I become my mother’s child (literally I become possessed of my mother’s child) and she watches television, don’t you think I would be affected by what she’s seen and heard?
Stacy said: “I believe more and more people in the generaL public are becoming more comfortable with and understanding of mental illness.”
What you are saying is that most people are permitting others to become subjected to this onslaught of psychic baggage from movies and books and they are aware of it and in fact are allowing it to happen.
People have the right to their mental freedom, not just their physical freedom and should be protected from the indulgences of others.
As to my mother, if I had been an actress it would have been no problem, I am not.
This video is an eye-opener -
http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/marketing-of-madness-are-we-all-insane/
While it is almost insane not to be on medication, the drugs can be seriously dangerous to one’s health. Had Yates been taught how to manage the baggage in her mind instead of relying on a Doctor who is doing nothing but drugging her up her children might still be alive. Who knows where those thoughts came from and like I said I found a book written about it and discovered history from the 17th century about 5 children being baptized.
It is a tragedy for which I hardly believe she can be held soley accountable.