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Obama health care reform protesters. AP Photo/Al Grillo
In response to President Obama’s proposed health care plan, people are disrupting meetings by screaming and yelling, and now they are carrying guns and assault rifles to those meetings. Open carry states allow people to carry unconcealed guns without a permit. The gun toters say they are bringing the guns because “they can.” How mentally healthy is the public discourse? The work of Murray Bowen, the great Family Systems therapist can answer that question. His work applies to both families and society.
The lifelong challenge for every individual in a family is to take a position of difference while still remaining emotionally close. This is a basic psychological task that helps people stay healthy and maintain healthy relationships. But it is a difficult one. Differing opinions make people uncomfortable.
The need to deal with differences while remaining engaged with others also applies in the workplace and in the town square. It is a cornerstone of democracy, as opposed to a dictatorship, where people with dissenting opinions hide them in fear of violent retribution.
The public debate over health care is about people having different opinions, just like in a family. How is our society handling these different opinions? With emotional outbursts and the implied threat of violence. Is this healthy? To answer that question, look at families.
In families, people give their children a “time out” when they are hysterical or out of control because they are teaching their children to be respectful of others and get control of their emotions. Likewise, in marriage, “emotional flooding” during a disagreement is one of the predictors of divorce because problems can’t be solved when emotions are running too high, according to Dr. John Gottman.
When violent families come into treatment, nothing can be done until the violence and the possibility of violence ceases because no differing opinions can be talked about freely if one or more of the individuals in the family, by speaking up, risks being the victim of the violent rage of another. Even an implied threat is a threat that intimidates and shuts down free exchange. A family member who stands with fists clenched is likely to intimidate another, especially if there is a history of violence.
People in our society have been shot for political reasons. Carrying a gun to a political rally is an implied threat that intimidates others, even if the particular individual carrying the gun has never been violent before.
Protesters in America are perfectly free to attend meeting and speak up about their opinions, they don't need to make a scene in order to secure this right. The protesters in the photo above demonstrate this. But disrupting meetings, yelling and screaming, preventing the free exchange of ideas, and implying violence by carrying a gun subvert the freedoms of everyone else at the meeting who are there to listen, discuss, state their opinions and ask their questions without fear of violence.
The mental health rating for today’s public discourse on health care, characterized by emotional outbursts and open carry: on a scale of one to five? It’s a zero.
Comments
The onley subversion taking place is that of the government riding ruff shod over the populous, speaking from the bully pulpit, and through their media mouthpieces.
Greater discussion needs to take place, on health care and many other crucial issues facing our nation. To discount the gun carriers and the shouters, suggesting they are intimidating and subversive, is ludacris, the are no more intimidating than the sentators, congressman, and president, who attned with armed guard, the ability to wage war abroad and at home, wielding an ability to take what they like for whatever purpose they like with the stroke of a pen.
The only intimidators, using strong arm tacticis are the politicians taxing us by force for poorly planned entitlements, designed to bring more under their control. Redistribution to buy votes and control the poplulation.
I am intimidated and subverted, and it is by the Obama administartion, his like, and the media who tows the line for socialism.
Good article. The gun-toting, swaggering 'protesters' who showed up to the health-care rallies showed a shocked nation the true level of their debating skills. They have none. They understand only the language of the gun - and decide to talk in that language even when their opponents want peaceful discourse. Shamefully - these '2nd-amendmend-abusers' are not just not chided - but supported outright by their party leaders.
Hopefully, these remaining Republicans get voted out of office - so we can start having legitimate discourse on national issues.
Carrying a gun is a fundamental right in American and we need to stop getting upset when it is exercised. I think that it is interesting that those who hate open carry of guns at protests seem to think it is ok to burn a flag. Also, the cops at these protests carry guns. Does this mean people should feel intimidated for speaking out against the government.
Open carry is a statement that the individual believes in self-reliance. They are willing to protect themselves as no one else, not even the police, is responsible for protecting you.
Thank you for your comments so far. A few ideas: if the police were using their guns against innocent civilians at protests then yes, people would certainly be intimidated and afraid of them for sure, and afraid to protest.
Some people do feel bullied by government policies. The way we address this, the power we have is to vote and speak openly to advocate for what we believe in.
Ms. Mental Health Examiner, is not hoplophobia a mental health problem as well?
Those that have chosen to protest openly armed are in no way impeding the free flow of ideas or others right to speak. They are showing that they are truly free men and women.
They are also visibly deterring the violence of the SEIU at a St. Louis town hall meeting with Russ Carnahan, a Florida town hall hosted by Kathy Castor, and the Obama town hall in New Hampshire.
Hoplophobia (fear of weapons) is not a common phobia or a major mental health concern, but for those who have it it can be debilitating. It usually occurs in people with PTSD who have witnessed or been a victim of gun violence. A phobia is a pervasive irrational fear that spills over into all areas of life. Something like believing in gun control, for example, cannot be considered a phobia.
People can have different opinions without one side or the other being mentally ill.
In our country we are already free and don't need to carry a gun to enforce it, but laws allow people to carry them so that is that.
Do you really have any way of knowing that guns at political rallies do not impede the free flow of ideas? You sound so certain. Perhaps the gun toters feel free to express. Others may not.
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