Myth: People with mental health problems are violent and unpredictable.
Fact: The vast majority of people with mental health problems are no more likely to be violent than anyone else. Most people with mental illness are not violent and only 3%–5% of violent acts can be attributed to individuals living with a serious mental illness. In fact, people with severe mental illnesses are over 10 times more likely to be victims of violent crime than the general population. You probably know someone with a mental health problem and don't even realize it, because many people with mental health problems are highly active and productive members of our communities. https://www.mentalhealth.gov/basi…/mental-health-myths-facts
This one might get long.....
Part of the reason why people are so convinced that people with mental illnesses are violent and dangerous is that every time there's a mass shooting, there's an outcry about it.
I'm not saying we don't need improvements in mental health care. We do. Heck, we need improvements in all medical care. But what we also need is a shift in the mentality surrounding mental health care. We need to end the stigma and start educating facts.
There's the line we hear about how so and so criminal justified their crime with some sort of illogical babble. Well, here's the thing... a lot people with mental illness hide a lot of the justifications of their actions. It's easier to have it called crazy than to dig up the dirty painful truth. It's easier to say they just had a psychotic snap than to say that they were survivors of years of sexual abuse. Besides, we're so used to having every possible behavior attributed to our illnesses, what's another on top?
No one wants to face the truth of the lives of those with mental illness. No one wants to admit that they are TEN TIMES more likely to be victims of violent crime, that their, for many of them, lives are filled with tales of violence and victimization. It's so much easier to just say they're crazy and put all the blame on them instead of actually examining the society that surrounds them.
There are proven, quantifiable differences in form, function, and hormonal imbalance of those with mental illnesses. My most recent favorite study is a meta study of fmri studies of both mental illness and more traditional neurological illnesses. What did the researchers find? That both mental illnesses and neurological illnesses are NEUROLOGICAL illnesses, that the fine line between going to a neurologist and going to a psychologist is what area of the brain is affected. That's it.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4629069/
Would we ever stigmatize a patient with MS or Parkinsons seeking appropriate medical treatment for their conditions? Would we make it difficult for them to take time off of work to go see their doc? Would we cap the number of appointments they could have in their insurance? Would we tell them it's all in their head? Would we condemn them for needing to take a day or two off of work when things got bad with their health?
It's so much more than just the mental health care system.
It's that the deck is stacked against us.
It's insurance companies topping out the number of appointments with psychiatrists at eight visits. It's employeers who fight against employees having time off to go see psychiatrists and psychologists. It's being told that "it's all in your head" and shamed for seeking treatment. It's being looked at like a violent threat so often that it begins to affect what you see in your mirror. It's every single person who's been told "I don't believe in psychiatrity." or "You just need some time out in nature." It's all of it.
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