Hate causes mass shootings, not mental illness

Hatred is not a mental illness. There is no prescription that can cure it, no medication that can suppress it.

Unlike mental health problems, which can be treated by doctors, the only cure for hatred is to teach tolerance.

Yet in the wake of two more mass shootings in the U.S. this past weekend, many legislators, right up to the president of the U.S. himself, have linked the violent attacks to mental illness.

Many are calling for “red flag” laws to be introduced in states that don’t already have laws allowing the authorities to remove guns from those deemed a risk to themselves, or others.

Certainly these laws aren’t only aimed at taking firearms from mentally ill individuals, but the overall suggestion is that it’s mentally ill people who are the threat.

Following the shootings, Donald Trump decried the crimes but

added: “This is also a mental illness problem. If you look at both of these cases, this is mental illness. These are really people that are very, very seriously mentally ill.”

There’s little doubt El Paso, Texas, suspected gunman Patrick Crusius would have had some mental health problems.

The same could be said for Dayton, Ohio, shooter Connor Betts.

People don’t go around randomly shooting strangers when they’re of perfectly sound mind.

But the real driving force behind the actions of these two vile individuals was hatred.

Crusius is accused of posting a white supremacist manifesto online shortly before dozens of people were gunned down in an El Paso Walmart, killing 22, in the U.S.-Mexico border city.

In it, the author expressed anti-immigrant and racist beliefs and warned of an “Hispanic invasion.”

Reports about Betts said in high school he had hit lists which resulted in fellow students being warned about him.

The lists named boys he wanted to kill and girls he wanted to rape, U.S. news outlets said.

Since Betts was quickly killed by Dayton police before he could cause more destruction as he quickly gunned down people in a popular nightclub area, killing nine, much about his motive and his state of mind may never come to light.

But he had all the markings of being a member of the so-called incel movement, a group of hatefilled misogynists who say they are involuntarily celibates because women reject them.

These individuals support violence toward people who have healthy and happy sexual relationships.

And Canada is not immune to such individuals, or their hate-filled beliefs.

Both the Toronto van attack last summer and the Danforth shootings were applauded by members of this cause.

These attackers, like the two latest mass murderers, likely suffered some form of mental illness, but that wasn’t what drove them to commit these heinous acts.

And linking these crimes to mental health only stigmatizes illnesses that need to be treated, risking driving those who need help further into the dark.

Following this past weekend’s shootings, psychologist Jillian Peterson, co-founder of The Violence Project, told CBS This Morning that people with mental-health problems are far more likely to be victims of crimes, not perpetrators.

She also told the program: “You’re not more likely to commit violence if you’re mentally ill. You’re actually less likely to commit violence if you have a mental illness.”

And so we come to the elephant in the room.

If mental illness is not the driving force behind all these mass shootings, mostly committed by white males in the U.S., then what is?

Could it be the proliferation of not only guns, but firearms designed for the sole purpose of killing a lot of people in the shortest amount of time possible?

Why are Americans able to purchase weapons that should only be in the hands of soldiers on the battlefield?

Maybe that’s what U.S. legislators should be focusing on.