Mind Games
Jill Miller Zimon makes note that elements of our government want access to everyone's mental health records - free of an audit trail for "national security".
But the government shouldn't trust trained and experienced mental health professionals to judge whether or not someone's plot is real or just surreal. Nope, let's get a whole bunch of government functionaries looking at everyone's mental health records because then we can really find the danger within.Absent is any evidence that fanatical terrorists about to blow us up are stopping by their head shrinkers to talk about how a distant father made them want to strap on C4 and blow up some infidels. The idea they will catch anyone with this type of data is absurd. It's sure great the government can put on the loincloth of national security to go snooping whatever they happen to be curious about. I'm not saying they'll stock up on mental health visits of potential political rivals and then leak them. I'm sure the high levels folks in the administration would never do something so unethical as leak mental health records, or out CIA operatives. That's crazy talk. And since we now know who's fishing around to look at all the crazy talk, we'd better keep this between you and me.
Edit 6/29/06 5:54 PM: Updated link to point to the right article.
posted by Jerry @ 8:40 AM
7 Comments
Links to this post
7 Comments:
Jerry, ever see the movie Gaslight?
Yes, but not for a loooong time. I think I may rent it this weekend....thanks for the mind-bump!
:)
Jerry, I respect you a great deal, even when we disagree. Yes, it seems rather unnecessary and dramatic that the gov't would look at mental health records. But I would not be the LEAST bit surprised to find that they in fact are. NO, I have not read or heard anything to make me think that in fact they are, for the purposes of rooting out terror or anything else. But they have the authority to do so without my knowledge and possibly without a subpoena. That alone scares me. It is wrong, just plain wrong.
This post has been removed by a blog administrator.
I agree...if this is not a limit, then what is? It comes as close as you can to looking at what people think, as bad as anything Orwell imagined. Lucky for me I have never talked to mental helath professionals, I've put all my problems into this blog to keep them secret ;)
And, okay - not to beat a dead horse, but also, think about it this way: by the time the terrorist actors are making calls and exchanging money, they've already done the thinking, or at least are doing it simultaneously. You know how on the Sopranos you had the guy in therapy, dealing with conflict over what he did and the rest of himself? Really - who is to say that prospective terrorists don't do the same? What do we always look for in the cases of high school kids shooting up or planning to shoot up a school? We ask, did anyone know? Who did they see? Had they ever had counseling?
All indicating that if there'd been involvement or KNOWLEDGE about what the person was struggling with or thinking about, maybe they could have been stopped.
I'm sure you see where I'm going with this. So, in fact, I don't know that it's as crazy or far-fetched as it might initially seem.
nice information and nice site
Post a Comment
Links to this post:
Create a Link
<< Home