Firearms Training

The difference between a snake oil salesman and a psychiatrist is that the snake oil that was brought to the United States by the Chinese who came to help build the Transcontinental railroad actually had medicinal benefits.

“Made from the oil of the Chinese water snake, which is rich in the omega-3 acids that help reduce inflammation, snake oil in its original form really was effective, especially when used to treat arthritis and bursitis.”

https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2013/08/26/215761377/a-history-of-snake-oil-salesmen

The Chinese shared the remedy with some of their American co-workers, but it was American “entrepreneur” Clark Stanley who swiped the snake oil brand and engaged in an aggressive advertising campaign selling the potion as a “cure all”. The trouble was that Stanley’s snake oil was composed of some innocuous fatty liquids and additives…but no snake oil. Stanley’s fraud was eventually exposed, and snake oil salesmen became synonymous with charlatans and those who sell fraudulent goods and services.

The difference of course is that the psychiatrist’s snake oil, the violence inducing, mind altering drugs, marketed under the cover of mental health treatment, is at the very core of many of the horrific incidents of mass murders that have shattered American society over the last few decades.

When the public – particularly legislators, law enforcement and educators – hear the term “mental health” they have often been led to believe this means some beneficent counseling, perhaps with a light sprinkling of medication, that can deter the recipient from potential acts of violence.

The reality is that today the term mental health usually means drugs. Mind altering, violence-inducing drugs. Between 80 and 90 percent of those treated for mental health conditions are prescribed psychiatric drugs that alter the mind and, as we will see below, in some cases, motivate the recipient to commit horrific acts of mayhem.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/252316/type-of-mental-health-service-used-by-us-adults-since-2002/

If Clark Stanley, an itinerant cowboy, was a charlatan, consider the modern psychiatrist. Living in large measure off of the American taxpayer (the U.S spends $238 billion a year on mental health treatment — yes 1/4 of a trillion a year), the psychiatrist operates entirely on opinion, not science.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/252393/total-us-expenditure-for-mental-health-services/

Virtually every branch of legitimate medicine determines and diagnoses physical illness based on science, on tests. Diagnoses of cancer, diabetes, heart disease, pneumonia, etc. are made based on scientific tests.

There is no science in psychiatry, there are no tests: no X-rays, blood tests, CAT scans, urinalysis, none. The psychiatrist makes a diagnosis (and bills) based on “mental disorders” listed in book called the Diagnostic Statistical Manual (DSM). And how do mental disorders come to be listed in the DSM so they can be charged for? They are voted in — a show of hands. It’s a political process. No tests, just opinion.

Solution after solution to the ongoing mass shootings has been offered. But the senseless slaughters go on. Innocent young souls in schools, those in churches seeking to affirm their relationship with God, and everyday Americans, gunned down in acts of madness.

The talking heads start: “He was bullied,” “He was fired,” “His girlfriend left him”, “He was despondent,” “Police have been unable to find a motive.”

But the evidence is right in front of them and, afterword, it screams at them from the grave.

A common denominator to many of these on-going acts of senseless violence, one thing they have in common, is that the shooter was on at least one psychiatric, mind-altering, drug and/or other mental health treatment.

It is a long, bloody trail, full coverage of which is far beyond the scope of this article as there are dozens. But a review of a few of the more high-profile cases proves instructive.

KIP KINKLE

In May of 1998, Kip Kinkle shot and killed his parents before driving to Thurston High School in Springfield, Oregon and opening fire on his classmates, killing two and wounding 25. Kinkle had been prescribed the anti-depressant Prozac and Ritalin. (Anti-depressant side effects include hostility, aggression, psychosis, violence and suicidality.)

ADAM LANZA — SANDY HOOK ELEMENTARY

Assassinating parents prior to a school massacre has a gruesome history. Adam Lanza, the 20-year-old killer that slaughtered 26 people at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newton, Connecticut on December 14, 2012, had shot his mother four times in the head before driving her car to the school and murdering twenty 6 and 7-year-old children and six adults. Lanza had been prescribed the antidepressant Celexa by a psychiatrist, though reports state that his mother took him off the drug due to perceived physical side effects. However, withdrawal effects from antidepressants and other psychiatric drugs can be chaotic (“According to researchers, withdrawal symptoms from psychiatric drugs ‘may include anxiety, depression, mania, and psychosis…”)
https://www.madinamerica.com/2019/04/withdrawal-symptoms-routinely-confound-findings-psychiatric-drug-studies/

Moreover, Lanza’s uncle said that Adam was also prescribed the controversial antipsychotic drug, Fanapt. Common psychiatric side effects of Fanapt include aggression, delusion, and restlessness. Less common or uncommon psychiatric side effects include catatonia, confusional state, hostility, impulse control disorder, mania and paranoia.

https://www.drugs.com/sfx/fanapt-side-effects.html

https://ssristories.org/the-antipsychotic-prescribed-to-adam-lanza-has-a-troubled-history-all-its-own-business-insider/

ERIC HARRIS AND DYLAN KLEBOLD – COLUMBINE

Eric Harris and his co-conspirator, Dylan Klebold, murdered 12 of their fellow students and a teacher and wounded 23 others in a massacre at Columbine High School in Columbine, Colorado on April 20, 1999. Then they killed themselves. Harris was on the antidepressant Luvox. (Another antidepressant. See side effects as above.)

A Colorado government hearing into the Columbine shooting heard evidence that led to panel chair, Colorado State Rep. Penn Pfiffner to state about psychotropic drugs and violence: “There is enough coincidence and enough professional opinion from legitimate scientists to cause us to raise the issue and to ask further questions.” Further, “If we’re only interested in debating gun laws and metal detectors, then we as legislators aren’t doing our job.” [Kelly P. O’Meara, “A Different Kind of Drug War,” Insight Magazine, 13 Dec. 1999.]

JAMES HOLMES, THE “BATMAN” KILLER

James Holmes, the infamous “Batman killer” who opened fire in a movie theater in Aurora, Colorado at a midnight showing of The Dark Knight Rises, killed 12 and wounded 70. Holmes was on the anti-depressant Sertraline (a generic form of Zoloft), the dosage of which had been recently tripled.

DEVON KELLY — THE FIRST BAPTIST CHURCH, TEXAS

On November 5, 2017, Devin Kelly, a 26-year-old former Air Force, E-1, went into the First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs, Texas and slaughtered 26 people, some infants as young as 18 months, and injured 22 others before killing himself. Kelly was reported to be on heavy doses of psychiatric medication.

https://thoughtcatalog.com/jeremy-london/2019/09/37-mass-shooters-who-were-on-antidepressants/

STEPHEN PADDOCK — THE LAS VEGAS MASSACRE

Stephen Paddock committed the largest mass killing in U.S. history on October 1, 2017 when firing more than a thousand rounds of ammunition from his hotel room in the Mandalay Bay into a crowd at a country music festival in Las Vegas killing 60 and wounding 411. Paddock had been prescribed the benzodiazepine called diazepam (commonly known as Valium), whose side effects include rage, aggressiveness, psychoses and delusions.

https://www.medicinenet.com/side_effects_of_diazepam/side-effects.htm#does_valium_diazepam_cause_side_effects

CHO SEUNG HUI — THE VIRGINIA TECH KILLINGS

Cho Seung Hui, a 23-year-old, naturalized American from South Korea went on a deadly shooting spree at Virginia Tech murdering 27 students and five teachers killing a total of 32 people in two different campus buildings. The New York Times said investigators found psych meds among his effects, while another newspaper said he had been observed taking antidepressants.

https://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/18/us/18gunman.html?pagewanted=2&hp

https://www.cyclingforums.com/threads/exactly-what-medication-cho-seung-hui-the-23-year-old-student-who-killed-32…

You don’t need to be a rocket scientist or even Sherlock Holmes to connect the dots. There have been 409 official international drug agency warnings issued on psychiatric drugs, 49 of which warn of self-harm, suicide, or suicidal ideation (psychotic fantasizing about committing suicide).

Adam Lanza committed suicide after his massacre, and so did Devon Kelly, Stephen Paddock, Cho Seung Hui, and Eric Harris.

And 27 of those psychiatric drug regulatory warnings warn of violence, mania, psychosis, hostility, aggression, and homicidal ideation.

https://www.cchrint.org/psychiatric drugs/drug_warnings_on_violence/

“Some 90 percent of school shootings over more than a decade [leading up to 2012] have been linked to a widely prescribed type of antidepressant called selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors or SSRIs,” according to British psychiatrist Dr. David Healy, a founder of RxISK.org, an independent website for researching and reporting on prescription drugs.
https://rxisk.org/wnd-education-psych-meds-linked-to-90-of-school-shootings/

As you can see, the snake oil is now a raging poison tearing at a million minds like a California wildfire seeking to ignite the next public slaughter. And the charlatan, cloaked by pharma’s billions, continues to hawk the snake oil despite a staggering 409 psychiatric drug warnings.

For instance, the number of children between the ages of 5-12 taking antidepressants has increased 41% since 2015. The snake oil salesman’s seeds of evil. Time bombs waiting to off.

What should be done?

Various legislative solutions have been offered. But there are more than 43 million Americans on antidepressants and until it is understood and recognized that psychiatric drugs, antidepressants in particular, cause some percentage of people who take them to commit these heinous acts of senseless violence, these mass murders will continue.
Politicians and law enforcement must recognize that these facts are being denied them by psychiatric advisers we are ever going to solve this ongoing carnage.

https://www.cchrint.org/psychiatric-drugs/antidepressantsideeffects/people-taking-antidepressants/

1-Legislation should be passed that mandates toxicology testing for psychiatric drugs in those committing acts of mass violence, including when a shooting has occurred. The results should be made public and available to health care, law enforcement and other appropriate bodies.

2-Alternative non-drug protocols, that do not have these violent side effects, should be advocated.

Of particular importance to note here is that psychiatric symptoms can often be traced to undetected physical conditions and when the physical condition is remedied the mental symptoms often disappear or are mitigated.

Those exhibiting such symptoms would be well served with a thorough, searching medical examination by a non-psychiatric healthcare provider.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6330910/

SOME CONCLUDING REMARKS

Under the pretense of caring for children and their fellow man, there are those who have vested interests in the utilization of psychiatric drugs and, thus, would try to refute this information. Because these statistics and cause/effect relationships are extremely difficult to deny, they seek to distract away from them and discredit the information by trying to nullify the messenger. Review the facts, decide for yourself.

There are those that will say that providing this information is an effort to provide justification for the heinous acts committed by these criminals. Nothing could be further from the truth. Individuals are responsible for their actions. Period. However, the information presented here will help provide an understanding of the mindset of these criminals and how they may have gotten that way.
There is a great deal of additional information about shooters on psychiatric drugs. Some of it can be found at these sites:

https://thoughtcatalog.com/jeremy-london/2019/09/37-mass-shooters-who-were-on-antidepressants/

https://www.cchrint.org/school-shooters/

https://www.lewrockwell.com/political-theatre/list-of-psychotropic-drug-related-school-shootings/

https://www.thelastamericanvagabond.com/mass-shootings-psychiatric-drugs-connection/

If we are going to bring an end to these ongoing acts of senseless violence and mass murders, we must address the true source of these horrific crimes, and confront the truth about the fact that mind altering, psychiatric drugs motivate violence, suicide and homicide. We don’t have to just get used to this new apparent paradigm of life, and we don’t have to listen to the ineffectual yammering of those offering “solutions” that will not stop the violence. We can actually stop this societal madness by implementing the solutions above.

John Truman Wolfe

Here is a link to the article
https://johntrumanwolfe.com/a-snake-oil-salesman-by-any-other-name/

While many have bought into the simplistic idea that availability of firearms is the cause of mass shootings, a number of experts have pointed out some uncomfortable truths. The ‘elephant in the room’ is being overlooked by our media, despite the fact it’s directly linked to the rise in mass shootings.

• While many have bought into the simplistic idea that availability of firearms is the cause of mass shootings, a number of experts have pointed out a more uncomfortable truth, which is that mass shootings are far more likely the result of how we’ve been mistreating mental illness, depression and behavioral problems
• Gun control legislation has shown that law-abiding Americans who own guns are not the problem, because the more gun control laws that have been passed, the more mass shootings have occurred
• 97.8 percent of mass shootings occur in “gun-free zones,” as the perpetrators know legally armed citizens won’t be there to stop them
• Depression per se rarely results in violence. Only after antidepressants became commonplace did mass shootings really take off, and many mass shooters have been shown to be on antidepressants
• Antidepressants, especially selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), are well-known for their ability to cause suicidal and homicidal ideation and violence

While many have bought into the simplistic idea that availability of firearms is the cause of mass shootings, a number of experts have pointed out a more uncomfortable truth, which is that mass shootings are far more likely the result of how we’ve been mistreating mental illness, depression and behavioral problems.

An article written by Molly Carter, initially published on ammo.com at an unknown date1 and subsequently republished by The Libertarian Institute in May 2019,2 and psychreg.org in late January 2021,3 noted:

“According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), a mass murder occurs when at least four people are murdered, not including the shooter … during a single incident …

Seemingly every time a mass shooting occurs … the anti-gun media and politicians have a knee-jerk response — they blame the tragedy solely on the tool used, namely firearms, and focus all of their proposed ‘solutions’ on more laws, ignoring that the murderer already broke numerous laws when they committed their atrocity.

Facts matter when addressing such an emotionally charged topic, and more gun control legislation has shown that law-abiding Americans who own guns are NOT the problem. Consider the following: The more gun control laws that are passed, the more mass murders have occurred.

Whether or not this is correlation or causation is debatable. What is not debatable is that this sick phenomenon of mass murderers targeting ‘gun-free zones,’ where they know civilian carry isn’t available to law-abiding Americans, is happening.

According to the Crime Prevention Research Center,4 97.8 percent of public shootings occur in ‘gun-free zones’ – and ‘gun-free zones’ are the epitome of the core philosophical tenet of gun control, that laws are all the defense one needs against violence …

This debate leads them away from the elephant in the room and one of the real issues behind mass shootings — mental health and prescription drugs.

Ignoring what’s going on in the heads of these psychopaths not only allows mass shootings to continue, it leads to misguided gun control laws that violate the Second Amendment and negate the rights of law-abiding U.S. citizens.

As Jeff Snyder put it in The Washington Times: ‘But to ban guns because criminals use them is to tell the innocent and law-abiding that their rights and liberties depend not on their own conduct, but on the conduct of the guilty and the lawless, and that the law will permit them to have only such rights and liberties as the lawless will allow.'”

The Elephant in the Room: Antidepressants

Thoughts, emotions and a variety of environmental factors play into the manifestation of violence, but mental illness by itself cannot account for the massive rise in mass murder — unless you include antidepressants in the equation. Yet even when mental health does enter the mass shooter discussion, the issue of antidepressants, specifically, is rarely mentioned.

The fact is, depression per se rarely results in violence. Only after antidepressants became commonplace did mass shootings take off, and many mass shooters have been shown to be on antidepressants.

Prozac, released in 1987, was the first selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) to be approved for depression and anxiety. Only two years earlier, direct-to-consumer advertising had been legalized. In the mid-1990s, the Food and Drug Administration loosened regulations, direct-to-consumer ads for SSRIs exploded and, with it, prescriptions for SSRIs.

In 1989, just two years after Prozac came to market, Joseph Wesbecker shot 20 of his coworkers, killing nine. He had been on Prozac for one month, and the survivors of the drug-induced attack sued Eli Lilly, the maker of Prozac. Since then, antidepressant use and mass shootings have both risen, more or less in tandem.

In the two decades between 1988 and 2008, antidepressant use in the U.S. rose by 400 percent,5 and by 2010, 11 percent of the U.S. population over the age of 12 were on an antidepressant prescription.6

In 1982, pre-Prozac, there was one mass shooting in the U.S.7 In 1984, there were two incidents and in 1986 — the year Prozac was released — there was one. One to three mass shootings per year remained the norm up until 1999, when it jumped to five.

How can we possibly ignore the connection between rampant use of drugs known to directly cause violent behavior and the rise in mass shootings?

Another jump took place in 2012, when there were seven mass shootings. And while the annual count has gone up and down from year to year, there’s been a clear trend of an increased number of mass shootings post-2012. Over time, mass shootings have also gotten larger, with more people getting injured or killed per incident.

How can we possibly ignore the connection between rampant use of drugs known to directly cause violent behavior and the rise in mass shootings? Suicidal ideation, violence and homicidal ideation are all known side effects of these drugs. Sometimes, the drugs disrupt brain function so dramatically the perpetrator can’t even remember what they did.

For example, in 2001, a 16-year-old high schooler was prescribed Effexor, starting off at 40 milligrams and moving up to 300 mg over the course of three weeks. On the first day of taking a 300-mg dose, the boy woke up with a headache, decided to skip school and went back to bed.

Some time later, he got up, took a rifle to his high school and held 23 classmates hostage at gunpoint. He later claimed he had no recollection of anything that happened after he went back to bed that morning.9

MIAMI, FL – MARCH 23: A bottle of anti-depressant pills named Fluoxetine are shown March 23, 2004 photographed in Miami, Florida. The Food and Drug Administration asked makers of popular anti-depressants to add or strengthen suicide-related warnings on their labels as well as the possibility of worsening depression especially at the beginning of treatment or when the doses are increased or decreased. (Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

In one review of 484 drugs in the FDA’s database, 31 were found to account for 78.8 percent of all cases of violence against others, and 11 of those drugs were antidepressants. (Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

The Risks Are Clear

The risks of psychiatric disturbances are so clear, ever since mid-October 2004, all antidepressants in the U.S. must include a black box warning that the drug can cause suicidal thoughts and behaviors, especially in those younger than 25, and that:10

“Anxiety, agitation, panic attacks, insomnia, irritability, hostility (aggressiveness), impulsivity, akathisia (psychomotor restlessness), hypomania, and mania have been reported in adult and pediatric patients being treated with antidepressants for major depressive disorder as well as for other indications, both psychiatric and nonpsychiatric.”

SSRIs can also cause emotional blunting and detachment, such that patients report “not feeling” or “not caring” about anything or anyone, as well as psychosis and hallucinations. All of these side effects can contribute to someone acting out an unthinkable violent crime.

In one review11,12 of 484 drugs in the FDA’s database, 31 were found to account for 78.8 percent of all cases of violence against others, and 11 of those drugs were antidepressants.

The researchers concluded that violence against others was a “genuine and serious adverse drug event” and that of the drugs analyzed, SSRI antidepressants and the smoking cessation medication, varenicline (Chantix), had the strongest associations. The top-five most dangerous SSRIs were:13

• Fluoxetine (Prozac), which increased aggressive behavior 10.9 times
• Paroxetine (Paxil), which increased violent behavior 10.3 times
• Fluvoxamine (Luvox), which increased violent behavior 8.4 times
• Venlafaxine (Effexor), which increased violent behavior 8.3 times
• Desvenlafaxine (Pristiq), which increased violent behavior 7.9 times

Depression Is Vastly Overdiagnosed

In her article, Carter also reviewed the clinical determinants for a diagnosis of clinical depression warranting medication. To qualify, you must experience five or more of the following symptoms, most of the day, every day, for two weeks or more, and the symptoms must be severe enough to interfere with normal everyday functioning:14

• Sadness
• Feeling hopeless
• Feeling helpless
• Feeling guilty
• Fatigue
• Loss of interest in hobbies
• Restlessness
• Abnormal sleep patterns, whether sleeping too much or not enough
• Thoughts of death or suicide
• Anxiety
•  Feeling worthless
• Feeling ’empty’
• Irritable
• Lack of energy
•  Slow talking and moving
• Trouble concentrating
• Abnormal weight changes, either eating too much or having no appetite

The reality is that a majority of patients who receive a depression diagnosis and subsequent prescription for an antidepressant do not, in fact, qualify. In one study,15 only 38.4 percent actually met the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) criteria, and among older adults, that ratio was even lower. Only 14.3 percent of those aged 65 and older met the diagnostic criteria. According to the authors:16

“Participants who did not meet the 12-month MDE criteria reported less distress and impairment in role functioning and used fewer services. A majority of both groups, however, were prescribed and used psychiatric medications.

Conclusion: Depression overdiagnosis and overtreatment is common in community settings in the USA. There is a need for improved targeting of diagnosis and treatments of depression and other mental disorders in these settings.”

What Role Might War Games Play?

Aside from antidepressants, another factor that gets ignored is the influence of shooting simulations, i.e., violent video games. How does the military train soldiers for war? Through simulations. With the proliferation of video games involving indiscriminate violence, should we really be surprised when this “training” is then put into practice?

As reported by World Bank Blogs, young men who experience violence “often struggle to reintegrate peacefully into their communities” when hostilities end.17 While American youth typically have little experience with real-world war, simulated war games do occupy much of their time and may over time color their everyday perceptions of life. As noted by Centrical, some of the top benefits of simulations training include:18

1. Allowing you to practice genuine real-life scenarios and responses
2. Repetition of content, which boosts knowledge retention
3. Personalization and diversification, so you can learn from your mistakes and evaluate your performance, thereby achieving a deeper level of learning

In short, violent mass shooter games are the perfect training platform for future mass shooters. Whereas a teenager without such exposure might not be very successful at carrying out a mass shooting due to inexperience with weapons and tactics, one who has spent many hours, years even, training in simulations could have knowledge akin to that of military personnel.

Add antidepressant side effects such as emotional blunting and loss of impulse control, and you have a perfect prescription for a mass casualty event.

On top of that, we, as a nation, also demonstrate the “righteousness” of war by engaging in them without end.19 When was the last time the U.S. was not at war someplace? It’s been ongoing for decades.

Even now, the United States insists on inserting itself into the dispute between Russia and Ukraine, and diplomacy isn’t the chosen conflict resolution tool. Sending weapons to Ukraine and calling for more violence against Russians are. Sen. Lindsey Graham has even called for the assassination of Russian President Vladimir Putin. Showing just how serious such a suggestion is, the White House had to publicly disavow it, stating Graham’s comment “is not the position of the U.S. government.”20

Graham, meanwhile, does not appear to understand how his nonchalant call for murder might actually incite murder. In the wake of the Uvalde school shooting, he now wants to mobilize retired service members to enhance security at schools, and while that might be a good idea, how about also vowing never to call for the murder of political opponents? Don’t politicians understand that this could translate into some kid thinking it’s acceptable to murder THEIR perceived opponents?

As far as I can tell, mass shootings have far more to do with societal norms, dangerous medications, a lack of high-quality mental health services, and the normalization of violence through entertainment and in politics, than it does with gun laws per se.

There are likely many other factors as well, but these are clearly observable phenomena known to nurture violent behavior. I’m afraid Americans are in need of a far deeper and more introspective analysis of the problem than many are capable of at the moment. But those who can should try, and make an effort to affect much-needed change locally and in their own home.

Originally published June 16, 2022 on Mercola.com

Sources and References

• 1, 9, 14 Ammo.com, Prescription for Violence
• 2 Libertarian Institute May 20, 2019
• 3 Psychreg.org January 26, 2021, updated February 21, 2022
• 4 Crime Prevention Research Center, Mass Public Shootings Stats
• 5 Harvard Health October 20, 2011
• 6 Washington Post October 19, 2011
• 7, 8 Time April 16, 2021
• 10 Psychiatric News November 5, 2004
• 11 PLOS ONE December 15, 2010, DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0015337
• 12 Psychology Today January 5, 2011
• 13 Live Science January 12, 2011
• 15, 16 Psychotherapy Psychosom 2013;82(3):161-9
• 17 World Bank Blogs August 14, 2018
• 18 Centrical Benefits of Simulations Training
• 19 War and Violent Crime Research
• 20 VOA Nws March 4, 2022

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.