To think the majority of those convicted of serious violent offences are mentally ill?

[AgentZigzag]

I've always been of the opinion that the majority of people who commit the most serious violent crimes are suffering from mental illness in some form or other.

This shouldn't be taken as a connection between mental illness and violence as I also think that most people with a mental illness don't commit crime and aren't violent, but rather that most people who have committed a serious crime are mentally ill.

Just taking Peter Sutcliffe as an example, how can it possibly be argued that somebody who has done what he did be anything other than mentally ill? In my mind 'sane' people don't go hitting women round the head with a ball pein hammer.

This is only my opinion, and I'm not posting to cause offence to anyone who has had any experience of violent crime, but I'd be interested to hear what you think?

I have Borderline Personality Disorder, and the idea of some of these sick bastards getting off on the "but I'm ill" mistake annoys me beyond belief. There will never be true respect and acceptance of individuals suffering from mental illness if it is presumed that they are all ill.

Some people are just evil and twisted, and deserve to be treated as such.

No not all, some people who committe violent serious crimes are of perfectly sound mind but are just born evil.

BFF, psychopathy is a form of personality disorder, and as such would be diagnosed as a mental disorder (anti-social pd in the diagnostic system used in the UK) rather than an illness.

Mental health legislation varies across the UK, but I think this would be the legal definition as well.

mental illness,is experiential spectrum.whilst there some commonality of symptoms.the nature and degree of mental illness are experienced differently

Hmm, so in lay terms, the same then - as opposed to having no mental..erm...ishoos? (sorry casting around for a word to encompase what I mean!)

I agree that there is a stigmatisation of people with mental illness as being more prone to being violent and/or committing criminal acts, I don't believe this connection to be true.

I do agree with the OP, but generally only with extreme cases/murder.

It's not the case that 'anybody who is labelled mentally ill is a killer', more that 'people who injure/kill are more likely to have a mental illness'

obvious really...

not obvious at all.not factual either

..and I have a mental illness. What I mean to say is that having a mental illness (obviously) doesn't make you a killer/rapist/etc

I think that in an otherwise unprovoked attack there may well be an underlying medical illness (whether it be anxiety related depression/schizophreniz/BPD/anything)

Before anybody jumps on me, I'm not explaining myself very well (it's late) so try and get the jist of what I'm saying beforeyou rip me to shreads.

i see what you are getting at, but i think it is possible to be rational (and therefore have a realistic world view, an understanding of normal cause and effect, and a realistic appraisal of the consequences of your actions) and still commit violent crime.

violence, after all, is not alien to humanity. A person can understand perfectly the consequences of killing someone, or grievously injuring them, and still want to do it - perhaps because they enjoy violence (and some people do, it can't be denied) or perhaps because they have some other aim (for money e.g.) in mind.

you might find that enjoyment of violence in itself sick, or the ability not to feel revulsion at violence as a sickness in itself..but there are people who stay within the law who use the same motivations that perhaps you'd be classifying as mentally ill along with them by that standard (sportsmen and women that channel their wish to be violent into beating their opposition, for instance)

I don't think that just because you have unlearned any enjoyment of feeling anger and expresing it physically (and you see quite a bit of his in children) that anyone who hasn't is not bad or wrong but mad. There are bad and wrong people in the world - as others have said. That doesn't mean those people have parted with their rationality at all.

There's no one universally accepted definition but essentially disorder is broader (encompassing for example learning disabilities, personality disorders), which in the strictest sense of the word are not illnesses.

Hope that makes some sort of sense.

crap, I'm dong very badly at wording my posts, apologies.

disorder is spectrum term,encompassing range of presentations and symptoms

scottishmummy - people who commit violent acts tent to have a higher incidence of mental
illness.

What I'm not saying is that people with mental illness are more likely to committ violent acts.

(god I hope I'm making sense)

(and when I say illness I also mean disorder)

no,you are confusing two discrete caegories

1. mental illness
2. violence

and making them correlated and causal when they may not be

I tried to be careful not to suggest anything as a fact, just my opinion, I think that's where the crux of the problem lies with the representation of mental illness, that people seem to think there is a black and white solution/experience that can be pinpointed somehow, which is not the case.

I'm not convinced though by any argument that writes someone off as 'evil', what does that mean? That the person has some kind of demon inside them that has to be obeyed? That sounds medieval to me.

To me you're wording it very well jareth, and that's what I'm saying in my OP.

zigzag you are being concrete,assuming "most serious violent crimes are suffering from mental illness" as plausible explanation. you leave little scope for human condition,base acts,and unpredictability.the hard bit of some acts is the never completley knowing why

So are you saying there is no connection whatsoever between any kind of violence and any kind of mental illness SM?

I'm not confusing anything sm.

Some people are simply just bastards committing violent acts. Some people are mentally ill and committing violent acts. Plenty of people are bastards and/or ill and don't ever hurt anybody.

There are studies (and I will try and find these when I;m at work) that in the case of serial killers there is a link between brain chemistry and violent impulses.

On a totally random, anecdotal and very personal note - when I'm happy and safe I don't have a violent urge in me. When I'm off my meds and in a hole I have to control my violent urges. When I'm in the midst of crippling depression I find little energy to do anything, but if I'm wrong I have extreme urges to harm.

But what do I know...

SM, You're being so black and white about this. I'm trying to say that in people committing violent crimes the percentage of them suffering from some kind of mental illness/disorder will be higher than that of the general population.

I don't really understand why you're arguing otherwise? Nobody is saying that if you have a mental illness/disorder then you're inherently violent...

i am saying it isnt straight causation as op suggests

the majority of people who commit the most serious violent crimes are suffering from mental illness in some form or other

not necessarily

I think the problem is that the majority of people find it hard to understand acts of such horrific violence, and find it much easier to accept that such things happen when a label like schizophrenia is placed on a criminal who, for example, sliced off people's arms in a church.

What people can't comprehend is an otherwise totally sane person going on a killing spree, killing children/mutilating bodies etc. I know I find it totally impossible.

If there is the label of mental illness there, then at least the 'normal' people can feel assured that it'll 'never happen to them'

Of course... any sane person, wronged in the right way (spouse fucking a 'best' friend) for example is perfectly capable of all kinds of badness, but that obviously doesn't constitute mental illness. Temporary (bastard induced) insanity, yes... not mental illness though.

erk, apols for the rambles.

erk, apols for grammar also.

just because one finds an act vile doesnt mean one is necessarily mental health issues

we live in a society where dreadful,violent horrific acts are perpetrated.i understand the struggle to find reasons and assume mental insatbility.but as hard as it is some acts are base and cannot be easily explained as illness.