Like many people, I find it hard to listen to the actionless debate that takes place after every mass shooting. But as the nation continues to move on from one of the most violent weekends in history, I am particularly disturbed by what I hear being said and the simplistic and inaccurate conclusions being used as a smokescreen to cover over the need for gun control. For me, as a psychologist, I see the studies and the conclusions drawn on the causes of violence. As a daughter, I know the impact of gun violence all too personally.
My father owned a transmission shop in Jersey City, NJ. One night while he was closing up, a man walked in with a sawed off shotgun. He demanded that my father give him the money from the cash register, which of course my father did. Then he wanted his wallet. As my father reached in his pocket to retrieve it, the man held the gun to my father’s face. As he pressed the trigger, my father pushed the gun down and it shot hundreds of pellets into his abdominal area. The man ran off, leaving my father to die. I still cannot believe the courage my father had, holding his wounds to reduce the bleeding and reaching for the phone to call 911. He tells the story of talking to himself out loud, for fear if he let himself drift off, he would never wake up. We were lucky, they told us in the hospital, that he was taken to Jersey City Medical Center, as the doctors there train for the military because there are so many gunshot victims. By skill of a surgeon placing mesh where his own flesh should be and from my father’s dogged determination during months of recuperation in the hospital, my father survived. He lost his business because of the tragedy, but he kept his life. And for the rest of his days as a constant reminder, my father had to carry an x-ray to show in airports, as so many pellets remained in his body that it set off the screening machines.
When the shooting took place I was in my second year of graduate school. At the time I was overcome by the relief that my father was still alive. But I also felt such relief that we didn’t live in Jersey City. My father could come home and we could live far enough away from Jersey City that I did not feel the threat of gun violence so common that military doctors would train in my local hospital. I, like so many people had the privilege to live in a safe suburban neighborhood,. I could move on with my life, not feeling that guns or gun violence was an issue that related to me.
But now that I am older and wiser, I hope, my understanding of the problem of gun violence is far broader. I have worked in neighborhoods where gun violence is common and most everyone is afraid. I have worked in juvenile hall where lonely boys are made to feel a sense of belonging when they learn to use a gun. And I have treated family members who lost a loved one from self inflicted gunshot wounds. I can’t help but now recognize how selfish I had been, ignoring the problem of gun violence far too long as other people’s problems. I now believe it is our nation’s collective problem a public health crisis that demeans us all as a society.
I feel protective of people with mental illness who are being blamed for gun violence. I can only hope to counteract this notion by sharing the facts. I quote the words of the CEO of the American Psychological Association, Arthur Evans, PhD, in response to many of the politicians statements implicating mental illness: “The United States is a global outlier when it comes to horrific headlines like the ones that consumed us all weekend. Although the United States makes up less than 5% of the world’s population, we are home to 31% of all mass shooters globally, according to a CNN analysis. This difference is not explained by the rate of mental illness in the U.S. The one stark difference? Access to guns.” And in regard to those politicians who were quick to blame video games, the evidence is also clear: “Researchers have extensively studied whether there is a causal link between video games and violent behavior, and while there isn’t quite a consensus, there is broad agreement that no such link exists.” Every country in the world has people with mental illness and people who use video games at similar rates to our own. In fact, Japan and Korea have much higher rates of video game usage but much lower rates of gun violence. In contrast Americans own nearly half of the 60 million civilian owned guns in the world.
I share with you the conclusion and recommendation of my professional association. I ask you to think about supporting these measures in our next election cycles and letting your local politicians know how you feel:
“Based on the psychological science, we know some of the steps we need to take. We need to limit civilians’ access to assault weapons and high-capacity magazines. We need to institute universal background checks. And we should institute red flag laws that remove guns from people who are at high risk of committing violent acts.
“And although the president called on the nation to do a ‘better job of identifying and acting on early warning signs,’ that requires research to ensure we are making decisions based on data, not prejudices and fear.
“We agree with the president’s call to strengthen background checks. But this falls woefully short of what is needed. We must take a comprehensive public health approach and provide dedicated federal funding to agencies, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institutes of Health, to better understand the causes, contributing factors and solutions to gun violence.
“The president clearly said that it is time to stop the hateful rhetoric that is infecting the public discourse. We ask that he use his powerful position to model that behavior. And we ask that the federal government support the research needed to better understand the causes of bigotry and hate, and their association to violence, so that we may devise evidence-based solutions.”
