Calling It What It Is

There are some that attribute the White Supremacist hate crime mass shootings on mental health. If that is so, then take a look at the following as contributing factors: 1. Excessive hateful tweets by the Commander-In-Chief 2. Excessive incarceration rates for people of color 3. Excessive income inequality 4. Excessive suicide rates for children and adolescents 5. Excessive lack of personal savings 6. Excessive student college debt 7. Excessive murders 8. Excessive political divide 9. Excessive increase in hate crimes 10. Excessive minimum wage 11. Low-level ranking of happiness 12. Excessive divorce, marital, and child abuse and 13. Excessive social media, TV, and radio discord. These 13  factors suggest that many individuals in power such as our economic, corporate and political leaders have mental health issues as well as they’ve contributed in managing, promoting , controlling  and making us ill in our  very sick culture. With that being said, let’s begin by examining the difficulty of parental upbringing as a main contributing variable in the development of those that commit hate crime murders and provide an intervention strategy.

One concern are the family issues within the psychological development of our young that participate in hate crime murders. The first place to start is to take a look at the so-called nuclear family that rears these despicable individuals. We believe that the foundations of personality is essentially established by five or six years of age. We know that marital relationships are difficult and that the length of a marriage does not necessarily correlate with harmony and bliss within that union. We also know that unhappy parents stay together for many reasons and they often use the kids as being one excuse. Add, limited education; limited manufacturing and other employment issues; limited financial resources; and limited personal future outlook and its effect on the development of the child. We know that the birth of a child does not contribute to strengthening a marital relationship in troubled economic and political times. Within this framework, let’s take a look at the birth of a child.

The infant begins life with the birth trauma. This internal anxiety state affects the heart and respiration rates of the newborn and sets the stage for future anxiety tension systems during rearing. How can these parents focus on the physiological and psychological needs of the newborn within the conflicting psychological stress within their life space? They likely have difficulty meeting their own psychological needs let alone the needs of the young. Within this dynamic, we believe that it can be very difficult for the newborn to develop a sense of trust with their parents and the other Homo sapiens that follow. With the formation of a sense of mistrust, one becomes fearful, anxious, suspicious and paranoid regarding others that do not fit within their cognitive schema. Therefore, the assimilation and accommodation development within their cognitive schema results with individuals that are uneasy and suspicious who dislike and hate other Homo sapiens. It’s not a surprise why these individuals are prejudiced.

The infant initially, within his development ,learns about the dangers in the external world; what is considered “good “behavior; what is considered” bad” behavior; behavior that’s likely to be physically punished; behavior that’s likely to result in dissatisfaction with the parent by their  taking away  love, praise and other positive reinforcements; behavior that is considered moral and ethical; behavior based on lies, falsehoods, prejudices and idiosyncratic beliefs; and what the youngster can get away with in the absence of the disciplining parent. Often, it’s difficult for the young child to learn consistency regarding appropriate and inappropriate behavior.  How does the child learn about appropriate and inappropriate punishments and discipline techniques? The answer of course rests on the idiosyncratic beliefs and behavior by the parents. It’s not too unusual for attitudes regarding behavior to differ between parents as males are generally more punitive, stern and rule conscious. Thus, we have a wide array of different beliefs, different consistencies and different disciplinary mechanisms imposed by parents. We also know that love oriented discipline is more effective in fostering positive conscience development than physical punishments.

Around three or four years of age, the formation of conscience and guilt begins with the child identifying with the powerful and omnipotent parental figures. The parent’s conscience, moral and ethical code becomes adopted by the child. It’s as if the child now has a code for human behavior that’s borrowed from the parent’s behavior. The phrase “do what I say not what I do” fits here.  That base, parental actions, becomes firmly established but can evolve when other important identifying figures become part of the individual’s life. Identification can be about persons, beliefs, ideas, prejudices and attitudes. By five or six years of age or so, the child has a rudimentary sense of right and wrong. Remember, right can be wrong and wrong can be right. It’s about perception, belief and reinforcement. Freud’s “the child is father of the man” fits. A child’s prejudice, contradictory beliefs and opinions can generally be traced back to parental attitudes and behavior.

 Attitudes regarding ethnic and racial prejudices as well as the beginnings of moral and ethical conduct and understandings are learned from parents. The power of their influence can be in either a positive or negative direction. Furthermore, conscience development proceeds and goes beyond notions of right or wrong and enters into a concept of justice based upon considerations of equity among and between individuals for those with cognitive maturity. With this understanding, the importance of developing a sense of trust and a “normal” sense of guilt and conscience is highly dependent on parental rearing practices. If these areas are damaged, there are serious negative consequences with the probability of sadomasochistic character development.

The child becomes an adolescent and in this stage he begins forming an identity. If all goes well that identity is based on many components including school achievement and competency; beginning independence from family; getting along appropriately with adults, authority figures; and developing satisfying interpersonal relationships with peer group. If successful, being popular, being part of various school social groups, fitting in, being part of athletic, music and art groups and doing well academically are norms and indications that things are developing well for the adolescent.

However, if unsuccessful, the adolescent is likely to be deficient in academics, not participating in the performing arts, sports, and student government coupled with impaired social relationships along with drugs and alcohol issues. With identity diffusion, the adolescent is now vulnerable and susceptible to various and opposing ideologies and/or cults. The adolescent becomes more noncompliant, oppositional and rebellious against authority figures within the norms of society. The adolescent is ripe for unconventional, hate filled rhetoric and has limited rational, analytical and in-depth reasoning faculties. This loner can be easily misled and becomes a non- rational follower. This alienated loner becomes a threat to society and requires some form of intervention as a result of the personality variables of mistrust, impaired conscience, and diffuse identity.

Within our insane society, perhaps the federal government can contribute to a solution rather than perpetuating by taking a do-nothing stance. What you call it- mental health or call it anything else doesn’t matter. What matters is identifying and treating the problem. This is a homeland security issue. That means federal funding is available within this large agency. We also know that teachers, counselors, principals, parents and even students can help identify the emotionally vulnerable that are having difficulty adjusting. Therefore, we need to develop a pipeline of communication among all the players.

 Create a mental health unit to consult with secondary schools to identify troubled youth and their families.  With identification, send an intervention team of educated and mental health individuals into the home environment of the troubled in order to develop a communication network between all the participants. That could be a start in identifying potential hateful, murderous and prejudiced individuals. The goal is to assist families and reduce potential violence from these troubled youth. Let’s start with identification and opening up dialogue.